After installing Windows 8 on VirtualBox yesterday (mentioned in my previous post), I spent quite a while playing with the new OS. The only thing that bothered me was that I could not find a way to run the virtual machine fullscreen on my native resolution: 1920×1080. Windows 8 on VirtualBox did not gave me an option to use this resolution. Even Google (Bing) couldn’t help me. I also tried the command below but had no result..
VBoxManage controlvm “Windows 8 (name of the VM)” setvideomodehint “1920” “1080” “32”
The fullscreen issue (for me) forced me to try an alternative. As I also have VMware Workstation 7 installed on my machine, I tried to install it there, but quickly ran into this (apparently known) issue after the bootscreen:
vcpu-0:NOT_IMPLEMENTED vmcore/vmm/intr/apic.c:1903
So no luck on Workstation 7, up to Workstation 8 than! This are my steps to setup Windows 8 on VMWare Workstation 8.
Step 1. You can download the VMWare Workstation 8 from the official VMWare website (you have to register first, there you can also obtain a trial key)
Step 2. Install VMWare Workstation 8, which is pretty easy to do. Use the key you got from VMWare to activate the trial.
Step 3. When you launch Workstation 8, click the ‘Create new Virtual Machine’
Step 4. Keep the typical settings
Step 5. Be sure that you select ‘I will install the operating system later’. Otherwise you will get an error in the installation saying that there is no license (as windows 8 is not recognized yet).
Step 6. Select Windows 7 x64
Step 7. Give it a name, and select the location of the VM
Step 8. Select the default settings and finish the wizard. Then start the VM
Step 9. The VM will boot, but nothing will happen as there is no OS on it and we did not add any boot media. Do this by right-clicking on the VM tab and select the following
Step 10. Select the Windows 8 Developer Preview ISO you downloaded
Step 11. Reset the VM to reboot it
Step 12. Follow the installation steps to install Windows 8 (mentioned in my previous post)
Step 13. In Windows 8, if you go to your desktop, you can change your resolution to whatever you want.
Step 14: Set your VM in fullscreen modus
So, that’s it for today. Have fun with your fullscreen Windows 8! If you have any questions, shoot!
