What is the best software to run Longhorn? Pcem is mostly for 9x operating systems and VMware and vbox seems to mostly have incompatible drivers

VMWare is my recommendation for Windows 8+, but if you have 7 on another computer, then VPC2007.

VMware 6.5.x range of course, or else you might not get graphical effects. And no, don't use VPC2007.

Vmware 7.1 is optimal. It can handle DCE of m3 with the 6.5.x compatibility setting and 6.5.x drivers, and the DCE of m4-m7 with hounsell's driver kit.
After application of disable hardware check regedit dword, DWM of post reset builds will also function with it.

I disagree, you can't get m3 DCE with 7.1, and there's no 6.5.x compat, it's just the same option as 7.1.x compat.

You clearly have not run it.

Looking here:
viewtopic.php?f=62&t=38747

Because you ran vmware 14 and its compatibilty mode grouped the two as one, you think the two are the same? No they are not. 7.1 is far more versatile for Longhorn than 6.5. It is also more compatible with a wide range of builds by its superior svga engine.

According to my experience, VMWare version 6.5.2 is suitable for Longhorn 3xxx's DCE, and VMWare version 7.1.4 is suitable for 4000+.
Longhorn 3683 is a special case, because it's DCE can only work on real machine.

You were referring to quite an old topic of mine, and I did test 3718 on 7.1 a month or 2 ago I believe, and it crashed. See this.
And about compatibility IIRC there's no option to set 6.5.x compatibility in 7.1, it's just combined with the default 7.1.x compatibility mode.
I agree that the SVGA engine of 7.1 is way better than 6.5, but some builds like 3706 and 3718 are very picky.

So where can one get workstation 7.

https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/detail ... ViZGVkZQ==
You need to register a VMware account IIRC.

Please, don't make statements like this without arguments. It's annoying

Honestly, VPC is a good option to start with if you only want to run plain Longhorn and want to test out some apps on it (I can assure you that it runs faster than any emulator). But when compared to other virtualization solutions, it's not optimal.

When it comes to speed, many virtualizers are faster than VPC (Such as VMware and VirtualBox). But recent versions of these are trickier to use (You have to set hardware a to hardware b, download x pack of drivers, set y option to z, etc.). The recommendation based on my actual knowledge would be VMware Workstation 12, with compatibility set to 6.5 and using the VMware Tools 6.5 (You can download them from https://thecollectionbook.info/information/downloads/ )

Or you can try VirtualBox, which is almost straightforward (I mean, the installation is as simple creat5ing a vm, booting from LH cd and following instructions on screen), and even get a decent speed.

Um, I didn't want to start a new topic since I kind of have a similar question. I have an official Longhorn beta 2 with me here, what kind of hardware would be good to run it?

Cosmo check this topic: viewtopic.php?f=61&t=39494

VMware 6.5X/7.1