
Trying to run a virtual machine on a computer that has such a processor results in the virtualization app being used spitting out an error message that usually informs the user that the program needs hardware acceleration to function, but it looks as though they currently have the technology disabled. In many cases, VT-X is, by default, disabled on Intel processors. The hardware acceleration technology built into Intel CPUs is known as Intel VT-X hardware acceleration and that in AMD CPUs is known as AMD-V, whereas other CPU manufacturers (such as AMD) bless their processors with different hardware acceleration technologies. For virtualization programs such as VMware and Hyper-V to work on a computer, though, they need access to the hardware acceleration technology that comes built into almost all CPUs in this day and age. Virtual machines are commonly used to try out different Operating Systems, test programs in a sandbox environment and to experiment with the features of a system without worrying about any repercussions. You can use a virtualization program to create a virtual machine, and on a virtual machine, you can run an entire virtual computer – complete with its very own Operating System – in a window on your current system. Virtual machines (or VMs, as they are commonly referred to as) are astounding things.
