[LAU] Uniting Windows and Linux audio worlds.

Hi, I think that I've mentioned this is the past, but I'm happy with what I'm doing, and I wanted to share. Some of you may have felt at some time, a difficulty with sticking with only Windows, or only Linux for use as an audio workstation. I've tried two machines with a kvm switch, and the dual-boot thing. Finally I came to a quite happy solution using "virtualization", running Linux in a Vmware virtual machine on a Windows 7 host. One thing that's nice is that I can try out all sorts of distributions, audio centric or otherwise, by just making ad hoc installations under VMware. I can even light more than one up at a time, to move files around between the 'machines'. Love Gentoo, but hate the down time? Install in a window somewhere in the background. Even if it won't boot, your main machine is still running. Where it comes to audio, I really want to run Reaper and Finale native on the native Windows machine. What's nice is that it is painless to get your sound hardware working under Linux, no matter what sort it is. Just make it work in Windows whether it be PCI, USB or Firewire, and it will appear to your Linux box as an Ensoniq AudioPCI card, which has an old friendship with Linux. I'm pretty sure that you only get one stereo card from Linux, so if that won't work for you then this idea is out (although you could run Windows 7 in a VM from a Linux host!). I have a keyboard with a USB midi interface, and I can pass that through to Linux just fine. For X applications, I just install and run Xming, a great light X server for windows. My Linux apps run in their own windows next to my windows apps, and I can cut and paste between them. I have a ~/vmshare file under Linux that is shared with a folder on my Windows desktop, so I can shuttle files between Windows and Linux easily. I have a robust machine, so I can give two cores to the VM, two to the native OS, and 4Gig ram to each. One must keep in mind that the VM does not run for free. 2Gig ram total in your box is probably a fair minimum. Also, make sure your bios supports the VT extensions and that they are turned on (they usually default to off). This made my computer music world a great deal nicer. I recommend it. Tobiah