Downloading and Installing VirtualBox

Hi it's Paul Hill from it.com And in this lesson we're going to learn about downloading and installing VirtualBox. Now since we're going to be learning about the Windows Server operating system, we're going to need a computer to install the operating system on. Now you could format, which means completely erase the computer you're on and then install Windows Server. But that means you would lose all the data that you have stored on your computer, which is a horrible idea. So I could teach you how to dual boot the other operating system, which basically means you split your hard drive in half and then you put another operating system on the new half that you create. But that's really just a terrible idea. So thankfully, there is a solution and it's called virtualization, which is a huge topic in the IT world right now. You have to understand it. Virtualization allows you to create a fake computer within your computer, just like when you install a new game on your computer, you can think of virtualization as being a computer game. But instead of playing the latest Call of Duty or battlefield, the game will be another computer. This allows us to create a virtual computer and launch it from our desktop computer. We can install any operating system we want, and we're going to take full advantage of this technology by installing the Windows Server 2016 operating system on a virtual machine. Best of all, you can get all this software completely free of charge. To get started, we're going to have to download VirtualBox, so I need you to open your web browser. And go to virtualbox.org. Now, once the homepage loads, click on the downloads link that's located on the left hand side of the screen. Now, under the VirtualBox binaries, we're looking for the correct version of VirtualBox, depending on what operating system we're using. So if you're using Windows 7 or Windows 10, you'll want the Windows Host If you're on Mac, then you'll want to choose OSX. And if you're on Linux, you can choose those and so forth. So I'm on a Windows machine, so I'm going to choose Windows host and note that my version may be different than yours. VirtualBox is always releasing updates, so if you see a different version number, that's no big deal. Just go ahead and download it. It's still going to do the same thing for you. Once the download is completed, double click and launch the executable to start the installation. Now this is one of those installations where you can just click yes and next through all the installation prompts, but make sure that you click the Always Trust software from Oracle Corporation checkbox and click install when you see the Windows security window. This is something that you really have to do. So you don't want to click the don't install button as it'll cause you a lot of issues later on down the road. Now, once the installation is complete, all you need to do is click finish and you're all done. In the next lesson, you're going to learn how to download Windows Server 2016. So continue on and I look forward to seeing you in the next lesson.