The Problem: You’re an engineer and you need to connect to a customer’s network, but maybe they require connectivity over VPN and their firewall restricts access to outside resources. Or, they may use the same IP subnet as your own internal network, restricting you from accessing your own local resources. My friends, there is an easy solution for this.
Some of you already know the best way around this would be to use another machine (virtual or physical). And if you are running Windows 7, I suggest you use Windows XP mode.
Windows XP mode was designed to assist program compatibility with legacy applications, but it can also be used as a regular virtual machine, for tasks such as the one described above. If you do not have Windows XP mode installed already, you can visit
Microsoft’s Virtual PC download page to install this component.
After selecting your system, simply download and install the Windows XP Mode and Virtual PC packages. Here’s a visual. It’s as easy as 1-2-3…4.
The result… a virtual machine running on your local PC, sharing network access (but not interfering) with the VPN. This can come in very handy, since you can still access local resources such as e-mail, network shares, SharePoint, etc.
-Joshua H., Network Operations Center Engineer, SOS