# win4lin and windows XP

## enzobelmont

there's a new version of win4lin www.win4lin.com

it will support windows XP (release date for normal customers: feb 23).

i can't wait.

someone can get it before general public release (VIP customers)???

please post comments.

sorry my english...  :Wink: 

----------

## mmschnei

I am also quite intersted, but I must say I have become quite a fan of VMWare and would recommend it to anyone who is looking to run WindowsXP in linux.

----------

## emes

The next version of crossover office is supposed to support Office XP. That seems a much better solution than to have to buy a copy of windows.

----------

## enzobelmont

 *emes wrote:*   

> The next version of crossover office is supposed to support Office XP. That seems a much better solution than to have to buy a copy of windows.

 

the current version of crossover office supports office XP

i want to run windows XP as fast as my win98 win4lin setup...  :Wink: 

sorry my english...  :Wink: 

----------

## emes

oops, i meant office 2003, sorry

----------

## Pink

 *enzobelmont wrote:*   

> there's a new version of win4lin www.win4lin.com
> 
> it will support windows XP (release date for normal customers: feb 23).
> 
> i can't wait.
> ...

 

It's a good product, I have been on the beta testing team for a while.

It is a bit slower than win98 is in win4lin (if you see what I mean), but it performs well, sound, printing, etc as you would expect rather than enabling certain aspects - it just works.

Remember it is an initial release and will not perform as well as win98 does in win4lin.

Worth a go though, not sure how much they are going to charge for it though.

I think it is a good alternative to vmware, and best of all (compared to win4lin) is that win4linpro will not need any kernel patches! Yeah!

The main thrust of the testing and design is for win2k but (obviously) winXP should work ok with it.

HTH

----------

## uncleben

Pink.. how are games doing in win4lin pro?

if win4lin pro will support any kind of direct3d hardware acceleration Netraverse will be my personal jesus

----------

## Pink

 *uncleben wrote:*   

> Pink.. how are games doing in win4lin pro?
> 
> if win4lin pro will support any kind of direct3d hardware acceleration Netraverse will be my personal jesus

 

Afraid you'll have to find another jesus  :Sad: 

direct3d in 'pro, like win4lin, and AFAIK in vmware, is pretty much stuck at 2d level (and some minimal 3d stuff) due to the incompatiblity with the X-window system.

In other words, forget gaming with these products. WineX/Cedega is the best bet for windows gaming in Linux.

----------

## uncleben

have you tried some games using software rendering or DirectDraw?

Like Diablo maybe, since it does not run in Wine or Cedega

----------

## Pink

No sorry, as they are not made for gaming I have never tried beyond the basic tests (I use a console for any gaming so don't really know about it on the computer side any more)

They are really for applications running at native (or in the case of win4lin/win98 - faster) speeds.

It's possible Diablo would work but I have no way of testing this and honestly doubt it would to any decent frame rate. I'm note even sure what Diablo is.

You could try the trial version of win4lin in portage and see if it works - it will give you an idea as to whether it would in win4linpro.

Possibly someone else has some other experience of attempted gaming in these environments?

----------

## jdgill0

Looking at this PR announcement at linuxpr

 *Quote:*   

> Win4Lin Pro(TM) is being offered at an introductory price of $99.95 per copy until March 31, 2005.

 

Also, as mentioned in an earlier post, it seems win4lin Pro will be more Win2k ready than WinXP ready:

 *Quote:*   

> The shipping release of Win4Lin Pro fully supports execution of Windows 2000 applications on Linux. The company plans to aggressively issue enhancement releases to add additional features for Win4Lin Pro, including enhanced support for Windows XP.

 

----------

## enzobelmont

today win4lin should be available... i'll wait a week to see first impressions (from users)...

i doubt it will raise full speed in windows XP as  in win98.

sorry my english...  :Wink: 

----------

## jdgill0

I sent the sales an email.  Couple things I found out include:

 *Quote:*   

> The price for Win4Lin Pro is $139.99 for the electronic license, $111.99 with the educational discount applied. However, you may purchase Win4Lin Pro for $99.99 from now until March 31st as part of our product launch special.
> 
> The first release of Win4Lin Pro has support for Windows 2000. We anticipate XP support will be in a near future release, by mid to late March. Customers who purchase Win4Lin Pro now will not have to pay to upgrade for XP support. It will be included. Technical support via email is currently provided with all the Win4Lin products for as long as you own the product.

 

Indeed, Win4Lin Pro is primarily supporting Win2k to start with.  The sales person was also not sure about how the login procedure would work, i.e. would the ctrl-alt-del method still work.

Does anyone know if you can still have ctrl-alt-del logins?  Whether or not you can have the login for Windows come up full screen?  I also did not get a clear answer on network logins.  Our computer lab network is setup where the students login to the "network" versus the local machine.  The sales rep was not too sure about how this all would work!

----------

## gour

 *Pink wrote:*   

> It's a good product, I have been on the beta testing team for a while.
> 
> It is a bit slower than win98 is in win4lin (if you see what I mean), but it performs well, sound, printing, etc as you would expect rather than enabling certain aspects - it just works.
> 
> Remember it is an initial release and will not perform as well as win98 does in win4lin.
> ...

 

Hi Pink!

I was happy win4lin users for years until I switched to amd 64-bit computing  :Cool: 

The announcement about win4lin pro has been just posted on the mailing list and the joy of running it will cost $99 (later it will go up to $140) - no upgrade path  :Crying or Very sad: 

However, it is mentioned that the product is based on QEMU which is free, so my question is it worth to cough $100 for running few legacy applications or better to support QEMU?

I'd continue with win4lin 5.0 but cannot because I'm on 64-bit kernel  :Laughing: 

Sincerely,

Gour

----------

## jdgill0

 *gour wrote:*   

>  *Pink wrote:*   It's a good product, I have been on the beta testing team for a while.
> 
> It is a bit slower than win98 is in win4lin (if you see what I mean), but it performs well, sound, printing, etc as you would expect rather than enabling certain aspects - it just works.
> 
> Remember it is an initial release and will not perform as well as win98 does in win4lin.
> ...

 

If you don't mind my asking, where did you see that Win4Lin Pro was based on QEMU?  I was unaware of QEMU, so I too am interested in whether or not QEMU is a solid product that could be used in place of Win4Lin Pro.

----------

## gour

 *jdgill0 wrote:*   

> If you don't mind my asking, where did you see that Win4Lin Pro was based on QEMU?  I was unaware of QEMU, so I too am interested in whether or not QEMU is a solid product that could be used in place of Win4Lin Pro.

 

Official announcement just posted on win4lin-users list:

 *Quote:*   

> The Win4Lin Pro architecture is a combination of our 20 years of product development experience with Win4Lin and Merge, combined with our embrace of the QEMU project. We have been contributing to QEMU for some time now and expect to continue contributing and increasing our sponsorship of this very important open source project. We believe that our experience and value-add represents a significant value to Linux users needing to run Windows in a Linux environment. Integration into Linux host services – file system, networking, cut and paste, etc…, installation, QA and testing, usability, support, etc… are all areas of significant value-add over the base QEMU project.

 

I'll definitely check it out before cashing $100 for an 'upgrade'  :Wink: 

Sincerely,

Gour

----------

## jdgill0

I was looking over the QEMU website.  It seems there are two products here, QEMU and  QEMU Accelerator Module.  The Accelerator module is closed source, not GPL'd.  The website says under QEMU that typical application slow down ratio is between 5 and 10, while for the Accel. Module it is between 1 and 2.  I suspect Win4Lin Pro is using the closed source QEMU Accel Module?

----------

## gour

 *jdgill0 wrote:*   

> I was looking over the QEMU website.  It seems there are two products here, QEMU and  QEMU Accelerator Module.  The Accelerator module is closed source, not GPL'd.  The website says under QEMU that typical application slow down ratio is between 5 and 10, while for the Accel. Module it is between 1 and 2.  I suspect Win4Lin Pro is using the closed source QEMU Accel Module?

 

True.

otoh, the qemu author is looking for financial support, so if users/some_company provide enough, the qemu accel. module can become gpl-ed  :Cool: 

Sincerely,

Gour

----------

## Pink

In all honesty, I would wait a few weeks before trying it (i.e. after some improvements), they have a lot of work to do and, IMO, they were forced to release it 'too soon' by their new sponsors.

It is very slow and I would not use it for production use (I'll stick to win4lin at the moment if I need to use a windows app).

Having said that, it only the first release, so expect improvements, but it is not worth getting overly excited about yet (unfortunately).

Just my opinion

----------

## jdgill0

 *Pink wrote:*   

> In all honesty, I would wait a few weeks before trying it (i.e. after some improvements), they have a lot of work to do and, IMO, they were forced to release it 'too soon' by their new sponsors. ...

 

Having learned Win4Lin Pro is based on QEMU then reading some other posts on QEMU, and QEMU's website, it certainly feels like Win4Lin Pro was pushed out a bit early.

----------

## gour

 *Pink wrote:*   

> It is very slow and I would not use it for production use (I'll stick to win4lin at the moment if I need to use a windows app).

 

In case a decided to go with win4lin, I'd need a new M$ license  'cause Win98 is of no use any longer  :Crying or Very sad: 

The software I need to run (Folio Infobase) runs on Win2K & Win XP Pro, but not Win XP Home.

The license for both Win2K & Win XP Pro costs the same (in Croatia).

What do you recommend? 

I'm kind of retarded in M$ evolution being stucked with Win98 & Linux  :Cool:   :Wink:   :Laughing: 

Sincerely,

Gour

----------

## Pink

 *gour wrote:*   

>  *Pink wrote:*   It is very slow and I would not use it for production use (I'll stick to win4lin at the moment if I need to use a windows app). 
> 
> In case a decided to go with win4lin, I'd need a new M$ license  'cause Win98 is of no use any longer 
> 
> The software I need to run (Folio Infobase) runs on Win2K & Win XP Pro, but not Win XP Home.
> ...

 

Hiya,

Well I think this would come down to personal opinions, but I prefer win2k over winxp (both home or pro).

I have no real reason to back this up but, to me, win2k feels more 'solid' and I've had less problems with it than with winxp.

Also, if you are looking at going the win4linpro directions (instead of VMware for example) then I would also say that support is far better for win2k than winxp. However, this may only be for a while (a few weeks to a few months) as they are working on improved support for xp.

It may be worth opening another thread and seeing what anyone else thinks becasue this could be a fairly big decision for you - if you title it 'Win2k or WinXP better than Linux!' then you will get loads of people looking, LOL.

In summary, my recommendation would be win2k, but it is personal opinion, I would not class myself as a knowledgeable windows user.

HTH

----------

## gour

 *Pink wrote:*   

> Well I think this would come down to personal opinions, but I prefer win2k over winxp (both home or pro).
> 
> I have no real reason to back this up but, to me, win2k feels more 'solid' and I've had less problems with it than with winxp.

 

Thanks. Based on what I saw, xp looks very 'childish' or for dumb users, though win2k is also not very sophisticated  :Laughing: 

 *Quote:*   

> It may be worth opening another thread and seeing what anyone else thinks because this could be a fairly big decision for you - if you title it 'Win2k or WinXP better than Linux!' then you will get loads of people looking, LOL.

 

I do not feel excited to be crucified  :Very Happy: 

 *Quote:*   

> In summary, my recommendation would be win2k, but it is personal opinion, I would not class myself as a knowledgeable windows user.

 

Thank you. I'm also not a power-windows-user -- if such thing exists  :Wink:  and for running few applications, I'm sure I'll be fine with win2k before I 'move' this Folio Infobase to gpl-ed  greenstone and become M$-free  :Rolling Eyes:   :Cool: 

Sincerely,

Gour

----------

## kontol

I don't think win4linpro can install on gentoo linux.....I think only for redhat,mandrake,debian,xandos. I tried to install win4linpro using rpm on gentoo...but failed ...unless someone make ebuild of it for gentoo..like win4lin.

So anyone keen to make ebuild for win4linpro for gentoo??

----------

## Pink

 *kontol wrote:*   

> I don't think win4linpro can install on gentoo linux.....I think only for redhat,mandrake,debian,xandos. I tried to install win4linpro using rpm on gentoo...but failed ...unless someone make ebuild of it for gentoo..like win4lin.
> 
> So anyone keen to make ebuild for win4linpro for gentoo??

 

I'm sure someone will at some point.

As I said above, I was on the beta testing team and I had no problems  :Very Happy: 

To install it you need to emerge the rpm prog:

```
emerge rpm
```

Then issue the command:

```
rpm -ivh --force --nodeps Win4LinPro-6.0.0-09.i386.rpm
```

It is now installed.

I have done this multiple times in the testing phase and all is well.

Once this is done, follow the install instructions on the win4lin site

```
root: loadwinproCD

user: installwinpro
```

That's it. Then run it ('winpro')

If you have any specific errors could you post them?

HTH

----------

## dlehman

Yes I have an error I have installed win4linpro rpm loaded winxppro+sp2 cd with loadwinprocd as root 

now I run installwinpro as user and get the following error

installwinpro: failed to get screen information: make sure $DISPLAY is set

I have serched for this error and the only solution I can find is export Display=:0.0

I have done this and I still get the same error

any help?

Thank you

----------

