Ubuntu Unleashed: Howto Integrate Windows XP Desktop into Ubuntu Gutsy and Hardy Heron!

Howto Integrate Windows XP Desktop into Ubuntu Gutsy and Hardy Heron!

Labels: Integrate XP into Ubuntu Desktop, Virtualization Posted by defcon on Tuesday, October 30, 2007 at 1:45 AM

Ok this is really really simple and a great feature of VirtualBOX Now you can simply run Windows XP/Ubuntu at the same time concurrently while switching in between windows applications and Linux applications! I can effectively run XP and Ubuntu at the same time on my Intel HT 3.0 ghz 768 meg ram flawelessly and my box isnt even top of the line. Check out some screenshots:

Ok lets keep this quick & simple shall we?
Grab a copy of VirtualBox Here

or wget http://www.virtualbox.org/download/1.5.2/virtualbox_1.5.2-25433_Ubuntu_gutsy_i386.deb
Run your easy package manager or c/p in the terminal:
sudo dpkg -i virtualbox_1.5.2-25433_Ubuntu_gutsy_i386.deb
Grab your XP cd or steal a copy off of suprnova or thepiratebay... who needs to buy a bsod pos Os anyways, were just using xp for business needs or whatever, unfortunately some companies and people feel that we gotta stick with micr0soft or if we want a better solution than wine, here we go...

Add yourself to the vboxusers group.

sudo adduser defcon vboxusers

Now lets get started, open up VirtualBox from Applications->System Tools->VirtualBox and click "NEW" Select OS Type XP and name your VirtualBOX, select the base memory and make a drive, make sure you have 7-10 gigs to spare.

Now make sure you setup your CD/ROM to be bootable and any other settings you see fit...
I basically summarized this because its a GUI and newbie friendly...

Now install pop in your cd or mount your warez xp iso with v-box and fire up the new Virtual Machine. Install XP like normal, and select FAT32 as a filesystem, it seems faster to me. Now once the install finishes, login and click on "Devices"->Install Guest Additions...

This will allow you to integrate XP into the Ubuntu Desktop, and allow you to use share folders, copy/paste between OS's and no capture keys...

Once installed simply reboot and log back into XP. And now lets enable Seamless mode :)

To enable seamless mode, after starting the virtual machine, press the Host key (normally the right control key) together with "L". This will enlarge the size of the VM's display to the size of your host screen and mask out the guest operating system's background. To go back to the "normal" VM display (i.e. to disable seamless windows), press the Host key and "L" again.
I hope you like this easy howto, its pretty cool to show off to friends/family and co-workers and to run proprietary yet needed M$ applications.

Comments (17)

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· 909 weeks ago

This is awesome. Thank you for the tips. A couple of questions:

Is there a way to hide the taskbar or an easy way to integrate the VM windows into the ubuntu desktop?

Will this work with Compiz turned on?

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· 909 weeks ago

hey vw, it is possible to remove the panel at the bottom, just right click it and delete it or... right click the bottom panel and autohide it, or move the panel or xp taskbar to a left or right side, btw compiz doesnt work properly with it so I disable it

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· 909 weeks ago

anytime im glade you enjoyed it, thanks for replying with how you got it to work for you, I appreciate it :)

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fluidhed · 882 weeks ago

Great stuff. Really well done. Had absolutely no problems when I followed your instructions. Thanks

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Karim · 880 weeks ago

You are excellent..I followed your advise and it works but my video card is slow..

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zandokan 0p · 879 weeks ago

men thats really cool im new to linix ,following this advise i will stay with linux its men nice

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fabz0r · 877 weeks ago

you are such a big help!!!

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Chak Joy · 876 weeks ago

Hi,

I have installed Ubuntu on win XP. I would like to copy some data from my windows file to a file created in Ubuntu. The file has been opened using a vi editor. I am simply not able to copy the data from windows and paste in that linux file under Ubuntu. Can you please help me? Is there any way to do that?

Thanks

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emanuel · 868 weeks ago

Thank's a lot !! very usefull !!

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BuggyDE · 865 weeks ago

Just got this working, I find it does not work very well with compiz running. I get a lot of display errors. Great post and a lot easier to get working than the old way I use to do it.