Oracle VM VirtualBox Reviews

Oracle VM VirtualBox allows me to extend my existing computer to run multiple operating systems.

Oracle VM VirtualBox is easy to use.

The solution could be more user-friendly.

I have been using Oracle VM VirtualBox for approximately eight years.

Oracle VM VirtualBox is stable.

I have not used technical support because this is no support in Iran. I have used online help such as YouTube videos.

The installation is straightforward.

I plan to continue using this solution and I recommend it to others.

I rate Oracle VM VirtualBox a ten out of ten.

We use Oracle VM VirtualBox for testing.

Oracle VM VirtualBox is like a virtual machine.

it helps to run multiple operating systems.

They have to improve the user interface and the installation.

Oracle VM VirtualBox is not flexible. It's not like VMware.

They could also improve the market position. Customers are more familiar with the VMware brand and prefer to use it.

Because they don't push the market a lot, the customers are not aware of Oracle VM VirtualBox, and its capabilities. 

I have been using Oracle VM VirtualBox for one month.

Technical support is good. We don't have any issues with the technical support.

It is easy to install Oracle VM VirtualBox and did not take a lot of time.

For one engineer who has two to three years of experience, it is simple to implement.

There are no licensing fees.

At this time, I cannot recommend this solution to others.

I would rate Oracle VM VirtualBox a five out of ten.

We use Oracle VM VirtualBox in combination with Oracle Database. We also run Tomcat inside VirtualBox.

Within our organization, there are five people using this solution. 

The snapshot feature is very powerful; it protects us from disaster. 

The AI and the UI could be improved. The user interface is a little outdated and the AI is not very attractive.

Currently, when pilot testing VMs, sometimes we have to test them on the cloud — this is complicated. In the next release, it would be nice if there was a convenient way to migrate the VM images from the local server to the cloud server.  

Oracle VM VirtualBox is stable. 

Although we haven't needed to scale out, I'd imagine it's quite scalable. 

The initial setup was quite straightforward. 

We also evaluated VMware.

I would recommend this solution to others. It's easy to use. Everything you need to know can be found with a simple Google search — the whole process. 

Overall, on a scale from one to ten, I would give this solution a rating of eight. 

I use it for experimenting with different operating systems in user environments. I also use it to have a backup to the Windows so that I can access Windows, and it is up and running. I don't have to worry about building a system from scratch.

The pause feature is valuable. I can pause, which is something that not all hypervisors allow. The snapshot feature is also valuable.

It would be good if we could use Hyper-V Windows subsystems with Linux and VirtualBox on the same instance. Currently, to be able to use VirtualBox, we have to restart the machine into an instance of Windows where Hyper-V is disabled, which is understandably very inconvenient.

I have been using this solution for more than five years.

It is stable. It is more stable than it used to be.

I don't have any experience with their technical support.

Its initial setup is straightforward. The duration depends on whether you're using it on Windows or Linux. It takes slightly longer on Windows than Linux.

I deployed it myself. Currently, I am the only user of this solution.

I plan to keep using this solution. I would rate Oracle VM VirtualBox a seven out of ten.

This product is very user-friendly and easy to use.

It has a good user manual and it's easy to find information about it.

When I select the Ubuntu operating system from within the virtual machine, it sometimes hangs. There are times when I need to reboot the system to resolve the problem. I have 64 gig RAM in my machine, and an i7 processor, so there is no issue as far as memory is concerned.

I have been using Oracle VM VirtualBox for approximately six months.

There are not very many bugs in the application.

There are between 15 and 20 students using this product. This is going to be expanding in the future because we are doing several migrations in the environment.

I have not been in touch with technical support. Since it's open-source, I just downloaded it from the internet and we are using it fine.

This is an open-source product and it can be used free of charge.

This is a product that I suggest to people because it's free of cost, open-source, very user-friendly, and all of the information for the end-user is available in the manual.

In summary, this is a good product but there is always room for improvement.

I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.

We use VirtualBox for client purposes. It's a legacy software.

The fact that it is free is the solution's most valuable aspect.

The management and interface are pretty good. 

It's a pretty good product in terms of monitoring.

Integrations are pretty easy to implement.

I would like there to be a web version of the solution, wherein I can access it over my network. It would be ideal if it was more web-based.

The memory and hardware usage could be a little bit lighter. Right now, it's quite heavy on the usage. The CPU usage should be lower.

I've been using the solution for more than five years at this point.

The solution is very stable. It doesn't have bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable.

The scalability is okay, however, it is limited. It's only about 50% as scalable as I expected it to be.

I've only ever had minor issues in the past, and, when I did reach out to technical support to get assistance, they were able to help. They seem to be quite knowledgeable and responsive. So far, I am satisfied with the level of service provided to my organization.

The initial setup is not complex. It's very straightforward.

Deployment only takes a few hours. It's quite a fast process.

We had it on just one server. It wasn't a big deployment.

We use the solution for free. We don't have to pay for licensing.

I'm not sure which version of the solution we are using.

I'd rate the solution seven out of ten.

If you're going to use VirtualBox on a small scale, I would recommend it, especially if you are using it for a legacy application.

My main purpose in using this solution is to run Windows machines on top of my Linux servers. I am running a Windows server on top of a Linux machine and then another four machines just to create an environment for our clients so that people can log in. Because they don't find Linux easy to use, I give them windows on top which they find more familiar.

The thing is I like is the simplicity in Linux when I'm using the Oracle VirtualBox. In terms of networking, it doesn't need any special configuration, especially when working with Linux. The other thing I like about it is being able to share folders. It makes life very easy to transfer things from one person to another. I don't have to worry about mounting a USB device. You just create a folder and give privileges then I can share information very fast.

The product needs better support for multiple network cards. That is the major area that sometimes it can be a bit of a mess to configure multiple network cards to communicate well with each other. That's the major thing for me.

Another thing I've run into is that it would be nice on Oracle if you can use something like a Hyper-V environment. You can just install the environment and then start installing all your virtual machines on top of that. Rather than having to install Windows or Linux when you need them, you just install the VirtualBox. If it can just roll out on its own and had its own hyper vista software — that would be something I've been praying to see from Oracle VirtualBox.

I think also that a challenge I've seen some people have after I convince them to use the product is when they are switching to various views. In some situations, the view switches to a seamless full screen and the menu bar disappears. When this happens they may not know how to switch it back. I don't know if Oracle can put a button on-screen so that when you are in a seamless view or scale view or something like that so those familiar things still fit where you can find them. In fullscreen, you still have the menu, but in some of these screen views that don't have the menu, they could put a visible button that can bring the menu back up. With that, you can easily get back familiar controls and eject your USB or whatever you need to do. If you don't know the shortcuts, it can be difficult to navigate or do even common tasks. They need something else instead of just using keyboard shortcuts.

Oracle with VirtualBox rarely crashes since about version four onwards. It rarely crashes and rarely hangs. Although — I think it is on version six — sometimes I may take a snapshot and try to revert or even when I try to save a snapshot using Windows XP, sometimes the whole virtual machine crashes. But I am not sure if it is a fault with the software or something else because it only happens with one particular machine.

When you take three or four snapshots and you accumulate snapshots, it is as if at some point the snapshots get a bit mixed up in the machine, especially if you do not shut down. I have been helping some of my friends because they're not ready to move from XP. So I've gotten them to use Oracle VirtualBox for some solutions. One guy's machine crashed because they had been taking snapshot after snapshot. When we tried to restore it, we could not restore the machine back. So it happens, but rarely. But all in all, from Windows 7 downwards, I have not seen any problems with the VirtualBox. I actually love it. It's really stable for me.

I noticed also that if you do not shut it down regularly and you are constantly hibernating or pausing, that can be a really big headache. Sometimes the computer may freeze and you have to go back to the machine's original state.

So far my needs have been really static. I've not really tried to invest in scalability because my needs are fixed currently, so I do not have too much to say about scalability. But it should not be an issue.

The installation of VirtualBox itself is easy.

All of the implementations I have I did myself.

Right now I am mainly using the free versions of the solutions. I'm not ready to spend a lot because I don't have too many machines. I do not qualify to be charged yet. So I've never worried too much about the pricing because most of my pricing is academic for the machines at school. But even being a school, I have a special agreement with Microsoft.

On a scale of one to ten where ten is the best, I would rate this product as a nine.

I recommend it, especially for people who are beginners because most things they will want to use will virtually be plug-and-play. It's click-and-use. I would recommend it to those people who are beginners. Because most other products, you really need to know a lot of networking and how to use them to maintain them. But with Oracle, it is simple. For most needs where you have to only have a really small network, this will be fine.

We use VirtualBox for running our ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and a host of websites. The underlying operating system is Solaris, which we run on VirtualBox virtualized, and it is running exceptionally well. Then I run VirtualBox as a hypervisor and use Windows (when necessary) and Linux. I run a whole host of websites on Linux virtualized using VirtualBox and we also run our ERP — Xpert ERP — on VirtualBox.

It has contributed to the flexibility that we have running our network.

The most valuable feature for me is the ease-of-use. With the GUI, it is easy to set up things and configure new things intuitively. It is a very good interface. VirtualBox is not as feature-rich as VMware, but the GUI from VirtualBox more than makes up for the features that it is lacking.

We are currently on version 5.1.38 but we are definitely going to upgrade to version 6. Some of what I would like to see in the future may already be in that release.

For me, it would be great to have a function where I can teleport from one machine to another machine just using the GUI. At the moment, this capability is only available via the command line. Other products like VMware and Windows Hypervisor already have that functionality. I think it would be an excellent addition and improve the product if Oracle implemented this functionality directly in the GUI. 

The feature I would like in addition to teleporting is that I would like to see more reporting capabilities. For example, it would be good to be able to easily report on the status of the servers and virtual machines. It would be enough just to get a list that says how much CPU power each machine is using, the amount of memory it occupies, etcetera. Something like a snapshot of everything in graphical format. A dashboard that actually combines all the reporting about what is happening on your virtualization would be valuable. Getting all the information at a glance is what I would like to see.

I find the solution to be exceptionally stable. I've no reason to look for other solutions, honestly, because it is so stable. It just fits into your network and it just runs. No matter what you are doing, even if you do it wrong, nothing fails. The worst that can happen is that you allocate more resources than you actually have on the hardware platform. If you misallocate your resources and require more memory for your virtual sessions than is physically available on the platform, then you run into a little trouble. It doesn't fail, it just becomes a bit slow. Or it could get very slow, I guess, if you are careless. But it has never failed for me.

We live in an exceptionally small country. We have probably the lowest number of people per square kilometer in the world. There is only a group of about 20 or 25 IT professionals that I know about in our country. All of them are using VirtualBox. They are using other solutions as well, like Windows Hypervisor and VMware. The only reason why they do not convert 100% to VirtualBox from Windows Hypervisor and VMware is that they have already invested the money it cost them to get those solutions in the first place.

So, while VirtualBox is absolutely free and they definitely use it in their companies, it cost money for their companies to invest in Windows Hypervisor and VMware. It will not go over well if they just move away from those solutions to VirtualBox because they have already purchased them.

I think it is a very scalable product and it stays stable while you scale it. For example, while it is active on a production server, you can expand the capabilities. You can stop and start or add virtual machines. The only thing that you have to know is not to allocate more resources on that hardware platform than is available in the hardware. The scalability of the hardware is separate from the product itself. You can't scale the product bigger than the resources on the box.

I have used Oracle technical support in the past for other products and I have been satisfied. But I never had to use technical support or any other resource to address problems I had using VirtualBox. There is not one situation where it was necessary.

Setup is so easy to do that I think anyone can do it. It's even easier than installing Windows on a laptop. You spend literally just half-an-hour if you sit and oversee the installation. After that half-an-hour, you are as well-versed in the product as a guy that worked with it for ten years. I don't think the initial setup could be easier.

I can do the implementations all by myself. It is very easy and it was really impossible to make a mistake. 

The product is absolutely free to use.

The VirtualBox solution is an absolute gem of a product. I definitely recommend this product to other people because it's super stable and easy to install and use. The only thing you need to ensure on your server is that you have sufficient hardware resources to accomplish what you want to do and that you supply the server with clean power. The server needs to be running all the time or you will have problems. If you put the box on a UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply), you are all set.

I choose to run the product on-premises all the time for our deployment and also for deployments to my clients. I also prefer to run VirtualBox on Solaris and Linux. In testing and in production using VirtualBox on Solaris is the best way to go, in my opinion. I do not implement production servers on Windows-based machines because of the many vulnerabilities in Windows. I tend to stay away from Windows as far as possible except for testing purposes on a laptop or a PC that runs Windows. I will use VirtualBox for that.

On a scale from one to ten, where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate this product an absolute nine. It has a little bit of room for improvement even though it is an excellent product. It is super fast. It is very easy to use. It is rock-solid stable. With just a few more features and added functionality, it will easily reach a ten out of ten.

We primarily use the solution to test our virtual infrastructure.

The solution works quickly.

We can install Oracle VM Manager and from this manager, we can create our VMs on the machine.

The solution needs to improve its flexibility. It's not as flexible as VMware.

The initial setup was straightforward.

We use the private cloud deployment model.

We're currently in the testing phase, but we're hoping to go into production soon.

We moved to using Oracle VM because we have a small license. We did not enough have licenses for all server cores. Oracle VM has an advanced feature for hard partitioning.

We're using the solution for the Oracle database but only on the Oracle application server.

I'd rate the solution six out of ten.

I use this solution for experiments with virtualization in Linux, mostly.

We have an on-premises deployment.

The most valuable feature is the ability to copy bidirectionally between the desktop and the virtual machine.

The representation is very good. I have a problem with Hyper-V where you don't see the edges, especially the bottom and the top. With VirtualBox, I'm able to see that.

VirtualBox gives you granular control to very deep levels.

This solution is not resource-heavy on the system, and I'm able to run several virtuals at one time.

This solution is very user-friendly. 

I have to keep pressing the home key so that the mouse changes context, which is something that I don't like. It should have the functionality where if I move the mouse away from one screen, the context changes automatically.

This solution cannot run when Hyper-V is running, and it would be nice if these two solutions could co-exist.

I have never used this solution for production, but I wish there was a simpler way of deployment, and I wish there was an ecosystem around it. Some other solutions, such as Docker, have a whole surrounding ecosystem. You know where to get Docker files, you know what Docker works with, etc. It's a whole ecosystem instead of a single application. It comes with almost everything you need in one place, or in the community.

I am unsure as to how stable this solution would be in a production environment. I have always thought of it as an R&D solution, as opposed to a production solution. It isn't a problem related to VirtualBox, but rather, simply how I have chosen to use it.

If you wanted to scale this solution out, or up, an automation tool may make it easier and more user-friendly, or more straightforward.

I have never needed to speak with technical support.

I prefer this solution to Hyper-V.

The initial setup of this solution is very straightforward.

I upgraded to the most recent version a few weeks ago.

I performed the implementation myself. I started using this solution a really long time ago, and you don't need anyone to help with VirtualBox.

This is a great product and I use it a lot.

This is a good R&D solution, but I don't think it would be good in production. We look for different things in R&D, such as doing a proof of concept. In a production environment, having a whole ecosystem to support the solution, including for orchestration and automatic deployments, would be better. It would also need to have more talks, seminars, and conferences, calling people in that space and then posting them on YouTube. There is a lot more to it than the technical aspect.

Overall, I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.