Going all Ubuntu

Well since HackDay I've been feeling all fuzzy over the sheer number of Ubuntu users and feeling I needed to use it again. I have used it before however since installing Vista I couldn't be assed to dual boot etc again. Tonight I decided to VM the latest Ubuntu release, I VM XP with IE6 and Windows Server any way for testing purposes, why not Linux. As to date I have only been using MS software as VM's i have been using Microsoft Virtual PC 2007, so i thought tonight we could add a bit of non M$ goodness. So i created my new machine, set up the RAM and HDD mounted my ISO, booted up, and chose the run / install option. This is where thigns got flaky. Once the VM had loaded from the "live" Cd the screen turned to gibberish, utter jibberish. I thought initially it was something had went astray during the boot so I rebooted the VM. Alas the error still appeared. So here I was with either Gibberish or a black screen, and both options quite hapily ate 50% of my CPU usage. After traulling the net it appears there are quite a few issues with Ubuntu on Virtual PC. the root of all this seems to be because the S3 video adapter that is emulated by MS is only 16Bit. Most Linux Distro's expect and use 24bit, hence the errors. I tried to use lots of alt methods by using lower bit rates etc but it still crashed for me, at which point i decided to give up and try VM instead. So here I am, happily installing VMServer and getting some Ubuntu loving. It's a sad state when Virtual Machines don't run properly due to poor emulation. Hopefully at some point ill get Ubuntu back on Virtual PC as it makes my life easier having them all in one place!