Microsoft Is 'Investigating' a Universal Version of Virtual PC

[webmaster]

With Apple having released Boot Camp and the availability Parallels software for non dual boot solutions, everyone who needs to run Windows on their Macs is happy, and all are waiting to see what the rumored virtualization capabilities of Leopard are.

All is well, that turns out well, and people have already forgotten that not that long ago, nobody was expecting a Dual boot solution from Apple, and everyone was anticipating Microsoft to upgrade the Virtual PC software to work with Intel Macs and Parallels was still largely unheard of. So, what happened to Microsoft and their Virtual PC? After all, they own both Virtual PC and Windows, and
if anyone could have gotten the new virtualization software out of the door, it was them.

The answer comes from a recent interview, for virtualization.info, in which Mike Neil, Virtual Machine Technologies Product Unit Manager at Microsoft answered a few questions:

virtualization.info: Few months ago Microsoft declared its intention to offer a virtualization solution for the new Apple Mac OS X on Intel architecture. Are you still on this path? If so there are raw dates for release?

Mike Neil: We haven't declared intentions to develop a virtualization solution for Intel-based Macs. Microsoft's Mac business unit remains in the best position to provide a fully integrated non-dual boot solution that works with Windows. This team is working with Apple to incorporate changes in the OS that could allow a Virtual PC solution to work on Intel-based Macs. We're still in the process of investigating a universal version of Virtual PC.

It looks like those waiting for Virtual PC should not hold their breath. Why Microsoft needs Apple to make changes to their OS in order to get Virtual PC to see the light of day is unclear, seeing as how other, third party developers have already done the same thing, with less resources and less access to the bowels of Windows… and it is already a Universal Binary. What exactly is Microsoft investigating? Why do they need Apple to hold their hand when others can do without? Even if they do manage to get Virtual PC out of the door in the foreseeable future, it may already be too late, as those who needed the software already have it, and it has been out for quite some time.