virtual

MagicISO's MagicDisc Virtual CD/DVD-ROM is a free tool that lets you create and use virtual CD and DVD discs that play just like the real thing, only you don't need to open and close the disc tray. You can create up to 15 virtual discs, which you can configure like any real disc: audio CD, DVD, game disc, or rewritable disc. You can create audio programs, save them as ISO images, and play them like an audio CD without having to burn them to disc. The tool offers versatile compression, encryption, and mounting options, too. It supports … Read more

Once upon a time, CD-ROMs and other optical discs provided the much-needed storage space that hard drives lacked, but with terabyte drives, shuffling disks in and out of your tray is just a nuisance. SlySoft's Virtual CloneDrive is a free tool that creates up to 15 virtual CD and DVD drives in Windows. You can copy your CDs and DVDs to your hard drive as ISO disc images and run them normally with Virtual CloneDrive. Instead of swapping disks in and out, you can simply mount and unmount disk images with a few clicks. Virtual CloneDrive works with any … Read more

Some of the minds behind virtualization technology used by Amazon Web Services are launching new security software today called Bromium, which is designed to protect against attacks by keeping apps and their individual tasks separate from the operating system.

While traditional antivirus software prevents known malware from infecting machines, and firewalls block unauthorized packets from getting into the network, there isn't really a good solution for the biggest problem in security today -- the naive end user. An unwise click on a malicious attachment or URL is often the easiest way into an organization's network.

"We're … Read more

MidiPiano is free software for playing and producing MIDI music files, with the addition of a virtual piano that can be played with your keyboard or cursor.

The interface for MidiPiano is okay, but not fantastic. The buttons are simple and easy to understand, but almost too simple and could be improved upon for functionality. You can play previously saved MIDI files or make your own. Creating MIDI music with this software consists of recording while you play the virtual piano and then editing to cut or insert notes. You can also adjust the octave, speed, and volume.

The virtual … Read more

Both Parallels Desktop 8 and VMWare Fusion 5 have just been released, with each offering similar approaches to running Windows and other operating systems within OS X.

Since their release, I have used both of these virtualization packages, and in my personal experiences they work quite well to run Windows and integrate its services and programs into OS X. Both support some of the latest features of Mountain Lion such as full-screen modes, seamless presentation of Windows applications within OS X, and easy access to your OS X files from within Windows. In my experiences with running Windows XP and … Read more

Parallels Desktop 8 has been made available for public purchase, offering faster graphics and improved startup and resume times over previous versions. If you need to run Windows or any other operating system on your Mac, then while dual booting is arguably the fastest and most stable option for executing code, another approach that perhaps has more utility is virtualization, where you can open a window to the hardware on your system and allow a second operating system to run simultaneously.

In the past week, the developers for the top two commercial virtualization programs for OS X (VMWare Fusion and … Read more

BERLIN -- Parallels released version 8 of its virtualization product today, updating the Windows-on-Mac software to stay up to date with both Microsoft's and Apple's latest operating systems.

The software uses a technology called virtualization that lets a guest operating system, including Windows, Android, or other instances of OS X, run atop an OS X host. That's handy for transitions -- there are lots of new Mac users these days switching from Windows even if Windows still dominates.

There are two big reasons customers pay $80 for the software to do that, said Parallels Product Manager Kurt … Read more

Both Parallels and VMware have announced the availability of the next versions of their popular virtualization software for running Windows and other operating systems within OS X. VMware Fusion 5 is available for download today, and the next version of Parallels Desktop will be released very soon on September 4.

Parallels Desktop and VMware Fusion are two of several available options for running guest operating systems within OS X so you can use applications and services supported for those operating systems along with your OS X applications without having to leave OS X and boot directly to them. This approach … Read more

Wednesday's tech news roundup is at full throttle:

T-Mobile will launch a truly unlimited data plan beginning Sept. 5. No caps or throttling. Sprint also offers this, but T-Mobile is competing with pricing. Sprint's starting price for unlimited data is $80 a month, and users are limited to 450 voice minutes. T-Mobile also starts it at $80 a month, but throws in 500 minutes. The larger difference is when you want both unlimited data and unlimited talk; Sprint charges $110, T-Mobile charges $90 a month. Of course, there's also smartphone choice and service to consider. T-Mobile will … Read more