Run Multiple Windows Sessions from 1 Computer

Operating Systems & Open Source Windows
1

Hey guys. Hypothetical question. Now before anyone gets into the nitty gritty, I am aware that the hardware that would be needed to do this would be insane but I'm just wondering. Would it be possible to run to entirely seperate sessions of Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8, or 8.1 from one computer? Would it be possible to run one to one monitor and the other to another monitor and have a mouse and keyboard for each one individually? Essentially be able to have 1 computer, act as 2 computers?

 

And on the side, if this is possible, what kind of hardware would it take? I'm just curious don't actually plan on doing it so you don't need to tell me how impractical it is. I'm only interested in whether it is possible and what hardware would be required to do that.

2

simple virtual machine work, no special hardware required

personally i haven't been able to get the mouse/keyboard to stay stuck inside a vm, but other people say it works fine, haven't had a need so i haven't tried to get it working exactly myself

there's no "special" hardware required, but some things that would be more suited are having extra ram, and extra cpu cores

3

K, so, obviously performance would suffer greatly, but would it be possible to have 2 people running an intensive program like Photoshop, Premiere, Aftereffects, or games at the same time?

4

Try http://synergy-foss.org/ if you want to control several computers with a single mouse and keyboard.  I use it at work to go between my Mac and PC.

5

No I want to control one computer with several mice and keyboards in their own session of windows. So the opposite of what you do.

6

you could, but to do intensive things you would have to set it up differently than you would (i should say differently than i would) for just having something to run light programs and have an extra environment separate from my main system, for that you would want to use a linux host and set up some stuff that i'm not too knowledgeable on (look in the linux section at anything about gaming, emulating windows, virtual machines)

as long as you have the horsepower to do it, you can, but you're looking at server grade processors and probably (you might need to, i'm not sure) multiple graphics processors

7

Well, you can actually emulate windows on Linux and run it faster than windows ever would run normally.

8

I'm not looking to emulate it to get it run better. I want to run it twice individually from each session on separate monitors with separate mice and keyboards from one computer.

9

yes, and the best way to do that is to emulate it on a linux host, windows can't run intensive virtual machines

10

What about Multiseat enviroments?

Softxpand does it. (I never tested it)

http://www.miniframe.com/products/softxpand-2011-duo.html

In general this is what you looking for -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiseat_configuration

 

11

where is the edit Button????

This sounds good too http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35821