I tried installing this on the latest VirtualBox release. It installed cleanly, but the VM would not fully boot.
It just hangs on the startup splash screen, with the progress bar about three-quarters of the way across.
I found a wiki page advising VirtualBox users to disable "I/O APIC", and to change the virtual network adapter to "PCnet-FAST III". But this made no difference.
Just to be thorough, I re-installed completely from scratch with these settings. Still no difference.
Just to be crazy thorough, I created a new VM profile that was set for a 32-bit guest. Reinstalled from scratch. Still no difference.
Gave up.
Nothing but respect for the ReactOS folks, and all they've done over the years. But I imagine that the overwhelming majority of people who try this out are doing so in a VirtualBox VM. So if you don't have an up-to-date and accurate list of instructions for installing ReactOS on VirtualBox, prominently displayed near the download page, then you might consider prioritizing that.
I just tried it in VMware Workstation, both on Linux and Windows. Looks to be 32-bit only. Did not install. Rebooted to black screen. Also did not detect multiple CPUs. Tried settings for windows NT, 2000, 2003, Windows XP and Windows XP-64-bit. I've booted Windows NT 3.51 in here as well as OS/2 Warp, Solaris, and other less used OSes in here. This is one of the very few that didnt boot. I dont get how Windows NT 5.2 (2003-level) is going to be very useful anymore as the two OSes at that level, Windows XP-64 and Windows 2003 are out of support so while this project is impressive Im not what the point of it is outside of being an interesting science project. It also didnt support NTFS, only FAT during install.
NOTE: Just got it working. Seems to be UP only, 32-bit only, works under "Windows XP Pro" profile with IDE only.
Impressive clone of windows 2003 32-bit, 13-14 years after...
VirtualBox is a real piece of crap when it comes to support for small-time operating systems, and even Linux (no KMS, no DRM, etc). I strongly recommend qemu instead.
> So if you don't have an up-to-date and accurate list of instructions for installing ReactOS on VirtualBox, prominently displayed near the download page, then you might consider prioritizing that.
If you scroll down while on the downloads page, you'll find preloaded images for QEMU, VMWare, and VirtualBox under the "Advanced Downloads" section header.
I installed it literally 2h ago with no problems. Set the OS to Windows Server 2003 32-bit and don't touch anything else. It installed in no time and it works perfectly.
I had that issue with the boot process hanging 3/4 through on 0.4.3, but it (so far) seems to be fixed for me on 0.4.5. I'm using Parallels Desktop, with a 32-bit VM set to act as Windows 2000.
First off, I'd like to thank all the developers who have put their time and effort into building this amazing piece of software.
I have been curious: if ReactOS aims to be binary compatible with windows, does this mean it succeptible to windows malware infections? I understand that despite having a similar API, the ReactOS implementation different from microsoft's implementation, so a vulnerability on Windows won't necessarily be present in ReactOS, but let's say a user infects themselves through a malicious word doc macro that downloads a windows malware exe or dll, can that still cause harm to a reactOS system? Or is some sort of sandbox in place to prevent such attacks?
It's a vague question. Bugs in implementation creating security exploits are usually not going to be replicated on both systems. Applications, including malware, using only the documented API functions should behave identically.
In short: WannaCry should work "properly" on ReactOS in that it will use the crypto APIs to encrypt all of the user's files. It shouldn't propagate itself through the same remote network vulnerability that affected Windows.
>yes, it'll probably work. Viruses are Windows applications like any other.
The difference here is documented/support APIs vs other code paths.
This is true so long as the 'application' is using the normal APIs, as soon as an application depends on out-of-contract 'implementation details', which the bugs that are utilized by worms definitely are..., all bets are off.
In short ReactOS is more and more likely to implement the API needed by an app, but that doesn't mean it implements the out-of-API defects that malware depends on. Like anyway software, it probably as its own defects.
But that bug doesn't have to be in Windows. If you can get privilege escalation in a Windows app that the user trusts (hello, Office), then you're in. ReactOS is based on Windows circa XP and doesn't implement UAC, so that vulnerability is wide open.
A definite improvement over 0.4.3. I just tried it with a Windows graphics program I make, and while it isn't perfect, it works and is usable. Looks like you can actually run Photoshop plug-ins on ReactOS now.
I know this is such a little nitpick for a huge project like this one, but every time I see ReactOS screenshots I notice that the taskbar looks off. Comparing this [1] screenshot from the article to this [2] random Win98 screenshot, the start button and app buttons seem to have different margins, padding and dimensions.
Again, it's such a small thing, but I (and I guess other people do as well) tend to focus on this kind of graphical details. I wonder if it's easy to fix...
XP has consistent paddings though. In reactos padding on top of the Start button is smaller then on the bottom. Taskbar buttons (for apps) are smaller than start, and do not have padding in between them.
5.2 is windows 2003 / xp-64-bit. XP is 5.1. 64-bit XP was based off of Windows 2003 code base. All are out of support at this point. Doesnt seem like MP or 64-bit is supported per https://reactos.org/wiki/AMD64.
Qemu provides device emulation for KVM, but there is other code that could affect Windows/ReactOS compatibility, including guest drivers for net/disk IO.
Virtio drivers should already work. The emulated SATA and E1000 ones also work as they are the same as for QEMU, which works. Audio HDA also works. (a bit better than in Windows if you pick pulseaudio backend)
I haven't really looked into ReactOS, but I just read some more about it [1], and I'm starting to get interested. There's still not a lot of software for Linux, but there's a ton of software for Windows. I also don't really care about the price of the Windows license, but I really like that the source code is available, and that I would be able to fix any bugs and submit a pull request. Having said that, I don't recall ever noticing a single bug in Windows, and I used it for more than 10 years. Definitely a lot of security holes though (i.e. viruses.)
Unfortunately, I don't think I will ever have a practical reason to use this or contribute to it. I use Windows 10 to develop apps, and sometimes to play a couple of games on Steam, so I think I'll always need to be running the latest version of Windows.
I wonder how practical ReactOS could be as a small business server?
With Microsoft's changes in Licensing, it seems there's a demand for an OS as straightforward as Windows, obviously with some degree of compatibility, but without all of the telemetry garbage. Could ReactOS (or a distribution derived from it) plug this gap?
I think the two main things such a thing could bring to the table is graphical "familiar" (for the windows admin) administration. Something that abstracts the files.
I am really impressed with what ReactOS is doing, but what is the practical reason for it? I believe (correct me if I'm wrong) they're cloning Windows XP, which happens to be my favorite Windows operating system.
Wine and .NET only cover the userland. There are a huge number of Windows installations out there that are stuck on XP because some specialized device (e.g. a lab probe or a CNC mill or a dialysis machine) only has drivers for XP. If we could get these on ReactOS, it could decrease the impact of the next WannaCry.
I found a wiki page advising VirtualBox users to disable "I/O APIC", and to change the virtual network adapter to "PCnet-FAST III". But this made no difference.
Just to be thorough, I re-installed completely from scratch with these settings. Still no difference.
Just to be crazy thorough, I created a new VM profile that was set for a 32-bit guest. Reinstalled from scratch. Still no difference.
Gave up.
Nothing but respect for the ReactOS folks, and all they've done over the years. But I imagine that the overwhelming majority of people who try this out are doing so in a VirtualBox VM. So if you don't have an up-to-date and accurate list of instructions for installing ReactOS on VirtualBox, prominently displayed near the download page, then you might consider prioritizing that.