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I have an Asus Eee PC X101ch with an Intel Atom N2600. I need to run Windows 95 on it, but it doesn't work natively. Only through a VM.

Is it somehow posible to boot to a virutal machine? Like:

BIOS → VM software → VM → OS → program

It should be like VirtualBox in fullscreen, but bootable and as fast as possible.

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  • Possibly you could boot from a USB stick or a bootable CD or an external HD and then salvage your data from the hard disk. Jan 20, 2015 at 14:26
  • I think you dont get it... The os i want to run IN THE VM is not compatible with my physical computer (but is compatible with vm). I want to make it so i have the fastest vm i could ever get (possibly without os).
    – Jan4V
    Jan 20, 2015 at 14:28
  • I have an old but reliable laser printer, and I use it with W98, as I have never found later drivers that are compatible. The main reason I cannot boot into W98 directly is that there is too much memory, over the 2GB addressing limit, so I use a VM to restrict this. If you can install less memory, or tell your BIOS to use only part of what's installed, then you may be able to use native W95.
    – AFH
    Jan 20, 2015 at 14:47
  • The bios is brutally restricted, no way. Belive me, there is no way other than vm/emulator.
    – Jan4V
    Jan 20, 2015 at 14:48
  • Ok, thanks. Next time please just rewrite the question starting with the important things, no "EDIT" markers. That makes it much easier to read. Thanks.
    – slhck
    Jan 20, 2015 at 14:50

2 Answers 2

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I would use a small linux distro to boot and have that run the VM software at startup. You could do this by changing the default runlevel to single user mode and having init run startx with the appropriate commands in your .xinitrc to run your VM software in fullscreen mode.

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  • Good idea, try the Xen hypervisor, not sure if it'll boot Windows 95 though.
    – user256743
    Jan 21, 2015 at 0:48
  • Yeah, what distro would you recommend?
    – Jan4V
    Jan 21, 2015 at 6:22
  • @Jan4V - If you are new to Linux I would start with something like Debian or Ubuntu - Unless HDD space is a constraint - because of the ease of installing packages such as VirtualBox. Once you get it up and running you can customize the boot up to meet your needs. Another thread suggests Slitaz unix.stackexchange.com/questions/33331/…, which I haven't used before but does look promising in its simplicity Jan 21, 2015 at 12:02
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Im not sure I follow your example, but with Windows 7 and newer you can boot from a VHD. The VHD is the virtual hard disk of a virtual machine. VHD boot allows you to boot the OS on the VHD. However, at that point its not a VM anymore, its a live machine. Changes to the OS/disk will be saved to the VHD. This means if you boot to your "normal" OS, and then boot the VM associated with the VHD, those changes would be reflected there.

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  • Nope, vhd booting supports only windows 7+ guests i think. But good idea.
    – Jan4V
    Jan 20, 2015 at 14:46

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