I'm looking for a linux application that acts like a virtual machine, but not apps like VMware where you have to install a new copy of the OS.

I've installed Fedora11 on one hard drive and Windows XP on another. I want to boot up in Linux, open a virtual machine app and boot XP ALREADY installed on my second hdd (without the need to reinstall XP -- like in VMware).

Any suggestions??

Thanx

Well, since the VM has a different set of hardware than your "real" machine because, after all, if more than one driver was used to access, e.g., a disk drive, the poor drive would quickly become confused. What you're proposing would entail your Linux system drivers and your Windows system driver both, independently, accessing the same hardware. This is a "recipe for failure."

When a virtual system is set up, a "simulated" set of hardware is defined that "maps" hardware events in the virtual system to different requests to the "real" drivers of the actual hardware. So, to accomplish your goal, you'd need to define your virtual hardware to be identical to the actual hardware you had available when you installed your Windows (or Linux) system. That way the drivers on your already installed system would be able to work together.

It's usually easier to do a fresh install to the virtual machine so the correct drivers for the virtual hardware are installed rather than creating virtual hardware definitions for (the very large number of) real hardware out there "in the wild." If all of your hardware has open specifications and driver, you might be able to create such drivers.

But, for now, without virtual hardware definitions that identically mimic your real hardware, achieving your goal seems at best, problematic.

Ah ja, I understand what you say. Was a bit of a stupid question to ask from my said. Thank you.

Philosophically speaking, the only stupid question is "the one you didn't ask."