Some people are intimidated by the seemingly unlimited amount of damage they could cause to their Windows-installation when they install Linux. In my opinion, this danger is not big at all, but there are people who are not comfortable when trying out Linux on their working machine.

This is why we created the LBox.

The LBox runs under VMware and simulates a regular PC inside your computer. You can run it in Linux or Windows, and you will be able to try out everything without danger to your production machine. You can partition the virtual drives, reconfigure the bootloaders on the virtual MBR’s or do other ‘dangerous’ stuff. And if you completely wrecked the virtual machine, just start over with a new one :)

• Download and install the VMplayer for Linux or Windows (http://www.vmware.com/download/player/) or even better: Download and install the VMware-Server for Linux or Windows http://www.vmware.com/products/server/get.html). You need to register to use the server, but it is free of cost and you can build you own virtual computers with it. No need to follow the steps below, which have caused some confusion :)
• Details on installing VMware-Server on Ubuntu can be found on Ubuntu Tutorials
• Download and unpack one of the following, depending on how much RAM your virtual PC should have:
  • Virtual machine with 64MB of RAM - ZIP-file or tar.bz2-file
  • Virtual machine with 128MB of RAM - ZIP-file or tar.bz2-file - for real PCs with 256MB of RAM
  • Virtual machine with 256MB of RAM - ZIP-file or tar.bz2-file - for real PCs with 512MB of RAM or more
  • If you have other wishes for the size of RAM, you can edit the .vmx file with a regular text-editor.

• Put an Installation-CD into your drive (/dev/hdc). Any distro you want to try out.
  • If you are using a different location for your CDROM drive, you will need to edit the .vmx file in the folder for your virtual machine. For example, if you are using Windows, you will need to change it from '/dev/hdc' to something like 'D:' or whatever the drive letter is. This is also true for the floppy:

ide1:0.fileName = "/dev/hdc"
floppy0.fileName = "/dev/fd0"

become

ide1:0.fileName = "D:"
floppy0.fileName = "A:"

• Run the LBox in the VMplayer
• Have fun!

Since the LBox was mentioned on the LinuxReality.com podcast, I did a little audio (3:34 min, 2.3MB) in which I explain what it does and why it might be convenient. So, if you want to hear the German read you something, this is your chance :)