Virtual Machines

[Stepway1]

Any help appreciated for someone who is completely green to Virtual Machines.

I have an iMac M1 Venturer.

I simply wanted to download a manual, the instructions were based on windows 7 32bit and Virtual Box, I eventually found the latest Version of that and almost got there but Virtual Box 7 crashed as it seemed to be attempting to load windows so gave up with that. (message said it was closing in case my computer were damaged)
(there was no mention of ISO images in the manual download instructions and that item was left blank as per its default)

I have now installed UTM buying form the App Store in the hope it would be easy, but I get into trouble on two counts.
1) I do not know how to handle ISO files other than it seems a legal Windows one can be obtained and somehow converted for UTM
2) I have read so many conflicting web reports, some say UTM is OK for M1 iMac with others saying it is not?

Should I give up for both these reasons?

Thanks for looking

 

[Shirasaki]

UTM is a pretty good software for vm on apple Silicon Mac, and you can run windows 7 on it with lower performance. You should search for UTM tutorial on how to install operating system on it.

Home

Documentation for UTM virtual machines

docs.getutm.app

Btw, UTM is free and open-source. Mac App Store version provides direct support to UTM development. No feature difference between both.

 

[Stepway1]

Thanks, giving up I have read a lot of articles but can't find an idiots guide to the ISO opening method.
I have UTM installed no problem that far also downloaded a file but things keep expanding.
It would be simpler to but an old Win laptop even though I don't want to go back.
Thank you for your help.

 

[bobcomer]

It would be simpler to but an old Win laptop even though I don't want to go back.

Simpler and more effective. And it's not going back if it's just an additional machine used for specific tasks.

As for UTM, it really, really doesn't work well at all. I know all that is needed to install an OS on UTM and the state it's in currently, I can't install a new virtual machine in it, it just doesn't work well enough -- I always end up with it crashing during install.

If you really want to go the VM route, do yourself a favor and buy "parallels", it does work and it'll do it all for you. I don't like the licensing or support situation for Windows on Arm, but that doesn't really effect individual users. I've owned and used it for years.

 

[Stepway1]

Thanks for that, makes sense & as you said I want to use for one specific task.
I never mind paying to get where I want to be but parallels seems very pricey for my means, does it instal well?

 

[bobcomer]

I haven't had many problems with parallels over the years. There was a bug between parallels and Ventura, but they published a workaround pretty quickly, and it only effected old installs. (it is actually a settings bug I think)

I can certainly understand not wanting the cost, and maybe buying a used Windows PC to do the job might be a better fit. That's what I actually use more, and I Remote Desktop into the Windows PC from my Mac.

 

[Stepway1]

Thank again, I am looking for a cheap PC.

 

[pshufd]

I used this guide to install Windows 11 ARM on my 2021 MacBook Pro 16:

I did the 14-day free trial thing with Parallels and was going to buy it for $100 until I found out that $100 was the subscription price. So I tried UTM. I could not figure out how to install it with an ISO so I put it down for a couple of days and looked for guides on the web and YouTube and found this one. It's long and involved but it did work. I initially downloaded the Beta Channel kit and tried that for a few days but it crashed quite a bit and so then I tried the Dev Channel kit. That has run stable with no crashes for a couple of days for me.

The trick was to download a VHDX installer from Microsoft instead of an ISO.

This will run Windows ARM but it will run x86 software through Microsoft's version of Rosetta 2.

UTM Windows 11 on ARM is good enough for me. I have Intel Macs and have had no problems installing Windows or Linux on VirtualBox. I've been using VirtualBox for quite a number of years though. I do not have that level of comfort with UTM but I just got my first start. It would probably be good experience getting other operating systems to run under it but that's a project for another time. I have the basics of what I need and I have to say that it plugs a hole that I had and I no longer need to use an Intel Mac or Windows box. But I have them around until I can sell them.

 

[Boyd01]

Just noticed this in the latest Parallels update, they will no longer support Windows 7. They say it can still be used, but a future Parallels update might break your installation.

KB Parallels: Legacy Windows Support

kb.parallels.com