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Initially released on April 30 to MSDN and TechNet subscribers, the Beta development milestones for Windows XP Mode and Windows Virtual PC are now available for the public to download and test drive. Users will need, first of all, the Build 7100 Release Candidate of Windows 7. Make sure to install only the Professional, Enterprise or Ultimate editions; in fact, go with the high-end SKU, as it is the simplest choice, and the default installation option via the default RC configured packages.

“Windows XP Mode, an optional feature of Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise and Ultimate editions, helps small businesses upgrade to Windows 7 by providing a virtual Windows XP environment capable of running many Windows XP-compatible business and productivity applications. Customers can run many older Windows XP business and productivity applications within Windows XP Mode and launch them from the Windows 7 desktop with just a single click. A beta of Windows XP Mode will be made available on April 30,” revealed Scott Woodgate, director of Desktop Virtualization and Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP) at Microsoft, ahead of the Beta launch of the two features at the end of the past month.

While it might appear that Windows XP Mode and Windows Virtual PC are a standalone virtualized environment and a virtualization solution, the intimate level of integration with the Windows 7 client proves otherwise. Once installed, Windows Virtual PC and Windows XP Mode seem to have always been an integral part of the operating system. This is why Microsoft's description of the two offerings as Windows 7 optional features is right on the money. With the combination of the two, Microsoft is essentially offering a preconfigured, licensed and activated, free copy of Windows XP Service Pack 3 that will act as a virtualized environment for Windows 7.

System requirements

I already said Windows 7 Professional, Ultimate or Enterprise. In addition, Windows XP Mode and Windows Virtual PC will only work with a CPU of at least 1 GHz 32bit or 64bit; the processor must feature CPU w/ AMD-VTM or Intel VT features, and the CPU virtualization technologies must be enabled in the BIOS. It is recommended that XP Mode be run on machines with at least 2 GB of system memory, and on top of the RAM, each virtual machine needs at least 15GB of hard disk space. And that's it. You are ready to go.

Well... wait a minute. How do you know that you processor supports XP Mode? There are lists of supported CPUs on the Internet, you could try and hunt them down and then see whether you processor will play well with Windows XP Mode and Virtual PC. Is there an easier way? Of course! There are a couple of tools that will scan your hardware and tell you whether the processor supports hardware virtualization or not.

If your CPU is made by Intel, then you need the Intel Processor Identification Utility. Download it, install it and run it. In the CPU Technologies tab, if the value of the "Intel Virtualization Technology" field is Yes, then you can run Windows XP Mode and Windows Virtual PC. If it's NO, then you probably guess what's happening. For AMD processors, you will need to do the same with the AMD Virtualization Compatibility Check Utility. This tool will tell you straight forward whether you can or cannot run virtualization solutions from Microsoft. But fear not, chances are that you are running a modern processor, with hardware virtualization and with the BIOS setting already enabled. If it is disabled in the BIOS, you will have to comb the options available and enable it manually.