Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE

#1

Post by Hawkee » Thu, Nov 15, 2012, 2:39 AM UTC

Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE
microsoft.com

Re: Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE

#2

Post by thristian » Thu, Nov 15, 2012, 3:01 AM UTC

The VMs are designed for Virtual PC, which is of course only available for Windows.

There's a script called ievms that will automatically downloade those VMs and convert them for use with VirtualBox on OS X or Linux:

http://xdissent.github.com/ievms/

Re: Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE

#3

Post by etfb » Thu, Nov 15, 2012, 3:06 AM UTC

thristian wrote: post #2

The VMs are designed for Virtual PC, which is of course only available for Windows. There's a script called ievms that will automatically downloade those VMs and convert them for use with VirtualBox on OS X or Linux: http://xdissent.github.com/ievms/

Interesting. Is there a similar option for VMWare, or is the format too different?

Re: Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE

#4

Post by suprfsat » Thu, Nov 15, 2012, 3:07 AM UTC

Ah, part04.rar. So I can pretend I'm downloading warez from Usenet and decoding and piecing it together by hand.

Re: Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE

#5

Post by jbyers » Thu, Nov 15, 2012, 3:07 AM UTC

These images have been available since at least summer 2008:

http://weblogs.asp.net/mschwarz/archive/2008/08/30/internet-...

Re: Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE

#6

Post by ra » Thu, Nov 15, 2012, 3:12 AM UTC

thristian wrote: post #2

The VMs are designed for Virtual PC, which is of course only available for Windows. There's a script called ievms that will automatically downloade those VMs and convert them for use with VirtualBox on OS X or Linux: http://xdissent.github.com/ievms/

Yes it's just such a pity that the virtual pc images are so massive.

Re: Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE

#7

Post by cheeaun » Thu, Nov 15, 2012, 3:13 AM UTC

Note that these images can still expire after 30 days (or 90 days with "rearm").

Re: Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE

#8

Post by adamnemecek » Thu, Nov 15, 2012, 3:18 AM UTC

etfb wrote: post #3

thristian wrote: post #2

The VMs are designed for Virtual PC, which is of course only available for Windows. There's a script called ievms that will automatically downloade those VMs and convert them for use with VirtualBox on OS X or Linux: http://xdissent.github.com/ievms/

Interesting. Is there a similar option for VMWare, or is the format too different?

There are utilities to convert a VirtualBox VM to VMware, if you are feeling adventurous :-). From my experience though, it's kinda painful (I forget what the issues were but I remember regretting the decision to convert the VM).

Re: Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE

#9

Post by evoxed » Thu, Nov 15, 2012, 3:19 AM UTC

thristian wrote: post #2

The VMs are designed for Virtual PC, which is of course only available for Windows. There's a script called ievms that will automatically downloade those VMs and convert them for use with VirtualBox on OS X or Linux: http://xdissent.github.com/ievms/

I've been using these for the past few months and they've worked fine. Plenty of things I wish worked better, but for the most part I'm happy that it's free and I don't have to reboot just to debug some CSS.

Re: Free VMs of Windows to test older versions of IE

#10

Post by Hawkee » Thu, Nov 15, 2012, 3:19 AM UTC

thristian wrote: post #2

The VMs are designed for Virtual PC, which is of course only available for Windows. There's a script called ievms that will automatically downloade those VMs and convert them for use with VirtualBox on OS X or Linux: http://xdissent.github.com/ievms/

ievms is not even necessary. This article explains how to do it with VirtualBox, http://samvermette.com/256