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VMware Alternative Now Available On FreeBSD

Posted by timothy on from the what-to-wear-today dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Serenity Systems International has announced a public beta (costing 50 USD) of 'Serenity Virtual Station' running for the first time on FreeBSD. While existing VMware owners are able to run the version 2 or 3 under Linux binary compatibility and the ports of the Linux kernel modules to FreeBSD 4.x and 5.x respectively, there is no working port of the currently available VMware 4 kernel module; this may provide an alternative to those wishing to purchase a VM today." Here is the full announcement, including a link to the online store.

41 comments

  1. Free as in Beer? by JabberWokky · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Ignoring the BSD aspect, is there a Free as in Beer system to run Win98 on a *nix style OS? Similar to VMWare?

    --
    Evan "Haven't found one, don't need it enough to shell out money"

    --
    "$30 for the One True Ring. $10 each additional ring!" -- JRR "Bob" Tolkien
    1. Re:Free as in Beer? by Goyuix · · Score: 3, Informative

      Bochs is known to run Win95, I would imagine it would run other Windows flavors as well, perhaps with varying degrees of success.

    2. Re:Free as in Beer? by dan_bethe · · Score: 4, Informative

      Look up qemu.

    3. Re:Free as in Beer? by gl4ss · · Score: 1

      bochs however is a full emulator rather than just a vm layer.

      --
      world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
    4. Re:Free as in Beer? by Goyuix · · Score: 4, Informative

      Well, as the author was asking for a free as in beer way of running a windows environment on *nix systems, bochs satisfies his request. Particularly if he is trying to run wincode on a SPARC or PPC chip.

      However, in an attempt to feed the Troll, there is a project called plex86 which attempts to virtualize the hardware, as well as a forked version that is much faster and lighter but only designed to run linux variants. Obligatory links:

    5. Re:Free as in Beer? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      yes i was recalling that there was such a project out there, just didn't remember plex's name.. thanks.

    6. Re:Free as in Beer? by dosius · · Score: 0, Redundant

      QEMU?

      Moll.

      --
      What you hear in the ear, preach from the rooftop Matthew 10.27b
    7. Re:Free as in Beer? by RevAaron · · Score: 4, Informative

      Bochs will run a bunch of Windows releases, as well as Linux/x86 and other OSes. But for the most part, it isn't really worth using it- it is slow. As hell. Or, as we say in Minnesota, slow as molasses in January. It's not bad to use Bochs for running old DOS apps- but then again, most people had a computer that was 4-33 MHz or so in the DOS days, so Bochs keeps up well there. But Windows or Linux... Painful.

      --

      Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
    8. Re:Free as in Beer? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Cool. This seems to be the same Fabrice Bellard as the author of LZEXE (remember, anyone?).

  2. Slashdotting from the BSD section?!? by pschmied · · Score: 4, Funny

    Wow, this must be a first. Their website appears to be down and this was linked from the BSD section.

    BSD trolls can put that in their respective pipes and smoke it.

    -Peter

    P.S. Did anyone download this? Does it work? Is it even remotely as good as VMWare?

    --
    . Penguins Surely Ca
    1. Re:Slashdotting from the BSD section?!? by Tezkah · · Score: 5, Funny

      I thought this was a troll on *BSD, seeing how the webside was /.'d from the *BSD section...

      ...but it turns out that they're running Linux!

    2. Re:Slashdotting from the BSD section?!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ...In a virtual machine running on BSD!

    3. Re:Slashdotting from the BSD section?!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      So I guess that Netcraft has confirmed that Li... oh, never mind.

  3. Qemu by ebcdic · · Score: 5, Interesting

    As far as I can tell, the only reasonably fast and complete free emulator is qemu. It's quite portable, and can emulate several processors, including x86 and PPC. You can then install the operating system of your choice.

    I had no problem emulating an x86 on my Mac, and installing FreeBSD.

  4. One word... by JamesTRexx · · Score: 1

    YEEHAAA!!!

    *smirk*

    --
    home
  5. Not there yet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    I tried the Linux version, it looks promising, but is not there yet. The worst part is that Win 2k et al are not very well supported. But maybe they have that working correctly in 2004Q4 too. Anyway, it is nice to see that it runs on FreeBSD. So, vote with your wallet if you want it to stay.

    Now we still need a NetBSD version ;).

  6. Vmware on FBSD? by nurb432 · · Score: 1

    Ive never got that to work.. Anyone want to toss some hints out....

    --
    ---- Booth was a patriot ----
    1. Re:Vmware on FBSD? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'd be glad to help. Toss out some error messages, mmkay?

    2. Re:Vmware on FBSD? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      My word, how clever! Heheh. You used a phrase that expresses what you think about BSD, and then highlighted letters in the phrase to spell out--hehe, this is the best part--"BSD"!!!! Too bad it wasn't an acronym, but nonetheless, good show! Hehehe. I got a good chuckle out of this one, boy I'll tell ya.

      How *do* you come up with this? Hehehe. Ah, my.

    3. Re:Vmware on FBSD? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You need Linux VMware 2 media/licence for FreeBSD 4 or Linux VMware 3 media/licence for FreeBSD 5.x. However I cant find a way to buy these from vmware anymore. Then uses the ports, both description have links to the webpages of the guys responsible for porting the kernel modules from Linux to FreeBSD:

      vmware2 http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/url.cgi?ports/emulators /vmware2/pkg-descr
      vmware3 http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/url.cgi?ports/emulators /vmware3/pkg-descr

    4. Re:Vmware on FBSD? by nurb432 · · Score: 1

      Something about needing kernel components, from the last attempt anyway..

      Have both Linux layer and BSD sys source installed..

      Latest ports via cvs...

      And even have a real license for vmware...

      --
      ---- Booth was a patriot ----
  7. Bochs isnt practical by nurb432 · · Score: 2

    Its not practical for application usage due to its speed. ( or rather lack of )

    Its strength is the complete emulation for testing of OS's, not for creating a 'useable' virtual environment..

    --
    ---- Booth was a patriot ----
  8. Overkill by JamesTRexx · · Score: 1

    Finally being able to read TFA, I wonder how much help it'll be in a citrix environment.
    If you only use thin clients, maybe, but I doubt if you have the right environment for having to use virtual machines then. Many older applications can run on windows with a little tweaking, and if it's about using both windows and *nix/*bsd applications, plenty of ways to be able to run a client/server solution on both platforms (citrix/x11).

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    home
  9. Voted with my $$. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I talked to the staff via phone and e-mail.

    1) The product was orginally developed on FreeBSD, then ported to Linux because 'that is where the money was'
    2) I told them and VMWare I'd buy a product supported on FreeBSD.

    Now I get to send a photocopy of the invoice to the VMWare office....perhaps the CEO's home address and explain how I was happy to BUY thier product - but it seems VMWare didn't wanna sell me a working product.

    1. Re:Voted with my $$. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And VMWare is so useless to not warrant me illegally using the crap. Even Microsoft code is worth using in ways the licence does not allow. (hint: not paying for it).

  10. Re:Reiser Rocks !! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Gentoo has no default file system. Ext3 is a lot more stable than Reiser 3.

  11. 5.x by nurb432 · · Score: 1

    Still on 4.x here, but with 5.3 about to appear, might give it a try instead..

    --
    ---- Booth was a patriot ----