Microsoft has announced that the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Virtual Server 2005 R2 are available as a free download. Although there is no fee for the Virtual Server 2005 R2 software but if you want to order it on a CD you’ll have to pay shipping and handling charges. You can use Virtual Server to create a robust virtualization environment for your production server consolidation, to support disaster recovery and high availability scenarios, and to consolidate mixed workloads including Linux guest operating systems.
The download ranges in size from 28.4 MB to 29.2 MB, depending on the language selected. The approximate download time over a 128K connection is 31 minutes. Click here to download the software.
Here are the requirements for 32-bit version.
Supported Operating Systems
1. Windows Server 2003
2. Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1
3. Windows XP Professional Edition
4. Windows XP Service Pack 2
Requirements for Use
1. Computer with a 550 MHz or faster processor; 1.0 GHz or faster recommended
2. Requires an Intel Celeron, Pentium III, Pentium 4, or Xeon processor; or AMD Opteron, Athlon, Athlon 64, Athlon X2, Sempron, or Duron processor
3. All physical processors supported by the host operating system
4. Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition, Enterprise Edition, or Datacenter Edition or later
5. Windows Small Business Server 2003 Standard Edition or Premium Edition
6. Windows XP Professional (for non-production use only)
7. 256 MB of RAM minimum (additional memory needed for each guest operating system)
8. 2 GB of available hard-disk space (additional disk space needed for each guest operating system)
9. Super VGA (800 × 600) or higher-resolution monitor recommended
A set of virtual machine add-ins are also available as a free download, and will be supported for an initial set of nine Linux distributions listed below:
Enterprise distributions:
1. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 2.1 (update 6)
2. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 (update 6)
3. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4
4. Novell’s SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 9
Standard distributions:
1. Red Hat Linux 7.3
2. Red Hat Linux 9.0
3. Novell’s SuSE Linux 9.2
4. Novell’s SuSE Linux 9.3
5. Novell’s SuSE Linux 10.0
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