syntax I'll never remember.

C:\Program Files\Sun\VirtualBox>VBoxManage clonehd "base.vdi" "myNewBox.vdi"

In me never ending quest for the ultimate browser start page, I'm giving Pageflakes a try. The interface is very similar to iGoogle or "My Yahoo" personalized start pages. I thought I'd try something that's off the corporate bandwagon.

From their "about us" page: Pageflakes, the social personalized homepage, is revolutionizing how we how we start with and use the Internet. At www.Pageflakes.com, you can easily customize the Internet and make it yours using '"Flakes" – small, movable versions of all of your web favorites that you can arrange on your personal homepage. You can also participate in the Pageflakes community, sharing your page as a "Pagecast" with a private group or with the world, and connecting with other users across the globe. Over 235,000 Flakes and 140,000 Pagecasts are available for thousands of uses and interests, including Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, news, sports, e-mail, local events, search, photos, music, videos – even interactive tools like a calendar and a to-do list – and just about anything else you do on the web at school, work and at home. The Pageflakes user community creates and helps each other discover more new Flakes and Pagecasts every day.

1. Click Start, and then click Run.
2. Type gpedit.msc, and then click OK.
3. Expand Computer Configuration, expand Administrative Templates, and then expand System.
4. Double-click Display Shutdown Event Tracker.
5. Click Disabled, and then click OK.

I find myself squinting more and more when I read blogs on the internet, but I hate the lower Windows display resolutions (I'm using 1400x900). Firefox has built in keyboard shortcuts for zooming (CTRL+/CTRL-), but I find them clumsy to use...also, you have to repeat this for every page you view.

I found a Firefox extension named Default FullZoom Level that meets my needs perfectly. I can set the default zoom to 125% so I don't need to change it on every page I view, and I can easily change the zoom by clicking CTRL, or CTRL. for zooming in and out respectively. Those shortcuts are more user friendly for me than Firefox's default ones, and the default zoom level is a life saver.

Courtesy of http://www.pcmech.com/article/dont-rebuild-virtual-pcs-copy-them/

"One very handy trick I found is that you can copy virtual hard drives (.vhd) files and instantly get another environment. For example, you could build a new virtual PC hard drive and load XP with all the updates and then simply copy the VHD file to a new file name and, whola!, you now have two ready to go environments. All you have to do is just run through the virtual PC creation wizard and set it to use an existing hard drive (your copied VHD file) and you are ready to go."

I had some trouble getting network connectivity on my virtual Windows Server 2003 Instance. Thanks to this post, I learned that I had to set the Networking Settings for the VM to use Shared Network (NAT) as the network adapter, and then:

"To fix the Shared Network (NAT) Internet no connection or not working issue, the resolution is to manually assign the IP address for the DNS Server for the guest operating system to 192.168.131.254, the virtual gateway IP address used by Virtual PC. To make the change (in guest operating system), open Network Connections folder (in Windows Vista, access via Network and Sharing Center), and right click Local Area Connection network icon to select its Properties. Then double click on Internet Protocl (TCP/IP) under General tab or Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4) under Networking (for Windows Vista) tab. Click to select the radio button of Use the following DNS server addresses, and then type in 192.168.131.254 into the IP address box for Preferred DNS Server. Click OK twice to exit, and voila, the Shared Network (NAT) now works as it should with Internet access."

So It tried VMWare and the web browser GUI thing wouldn't load right...I hacked around an got the Web play something or other to load but when I tried to log in I got another error...something about ports this time or Tomcat not working right..I said "Tomcat? Come on!".....so I uninstalled it and tried Microsoft Virtual PC...installed without a hitch and ran perfectly..I got Windows 2003 Server and the new Windows 7 beta running in no time.

I couple of learning points that I needed to Google around for: ~Install Virtual Machine Additions on your VM instance to get file drag/drop and copy/paste from the parent OS working (very nice to have)...I'll let you Google how to do that. ~If sound doesn't transfer out to your host OS's speakers, following this post's advice to "update the audio driver with the "C:\Program Files\Virtual Machine Additions" folder.

Ah, playing with a fresh OS is a geek's dream!!!!