Partition my disk for instaling Windows as a guest OS?

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I never use virtual machine before.

I plan to partition my hard drive (250GB) on a Thinkpad T400 laptop (8GB main memory, and install Ubuntu 14.04 as my main and host OS.

In the future, when I have to use some Windows software (such as Adobe Acrobat, MS Office, SAS), I will install a virtualization software program such as Virtualbox, KVM or VMWare Player, and then install and run Windows 7, 8.1 or 10 as a guest OS.

Since I now plan to partition my disk, I want to leave enough space for virtual machine and guest OS (even though I might not need them now), and have some questions:

  • In what partitions will the virtualization software program, and the guest OS be installed respectively?

  • If not considering what software applications which I will install and run under the guest Windows, how much space should I give for the guest OS and the virtualization software

  • if considering the software applications which I will install and run under the guest Windows, are the sizes taken by them similar to the sizes when they are installed under a Windows installed directly on a computer? E.g. will MS Office take up the same size when it is installed on a guest Windows as it is directly on a host Windows?

Thanks.

Answer

  1. A guest OS of a virtual machine is a set of files and those file can be stored anywhere on your computer, including in your Ubuntu partition. By default VirtualBox stores the files of the guest OS in your user subfolder of your /home folder.

  2. The recommended size of the virtual hard drive for a either a Windows 7 guest OS or a Windows 8.1 guest OS in VirtualBox is 25.00 GB. The recommended size of the virtual hard drive for a Windows 10 Technical Preview guest OS in VirtualBox is 20.00 GB, although the recommended size of the Windows 10 virtual hard drive may change when Windows 10 is officially released.

    When you create the virtual hard drive, you can choose whether the new virtual hard drive should grow as it is used (dynamically allocated) or if it should be created at its maximum size (fixed size). A dynamically allocated hard drive file will only use space on your physical hard drive as it fills up (up to a maximum fixed size), although it will not shrink again automatically when space on it is freed.

  3. The space taken by an application in a guest OS running in a virtual machine is the same as the space that would be taken by that application if it was installed in the same operating system running in a physical machine.

Attribution
Source : Link , Question Author : Tim , Answer Author : karel

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