I’ve recently installed the RC of Windows 7 on my home machine. One thing that’s different is Virtual PC 2007 doesn’t work anymore on Windows 7. Instead you have the new ‘Virtual PC’ application that can be downloaded as an add-on from Microsoft.

This provides the much-talked about XP mode that permits users to run Windows XP applications from within Windows 7. But what about existing VM’s?

Well I was able to load up an existing VM I had and everything seemed to work ok. The interface is kinda different in that you can’t use ALT+DELETE to send the CTRL+ALT+DELETE combination. Instead there’s a menu item that sends it instead.

Additionally, you can install the integration components. This permits the VM to access things such as drives, clipboards etc from the host OS. The only issue is that when you try to run the VM again in Virtual PC 2007 the whole thing crashes and burns. It’s probably the integration components that’s causing it as it seems to be the only thing that’s changed between versions. Be warned!

[UPDATE]

Yep it’s definitely the integration components. I was able to boot the VM and access debug mode. From there I uninstalled the integration components and voila, the VM worked again under Virtual PC 2007 SP1.