I've been struggling with VirtualBox lately. It seems poorly optimized on my system – both Linux Mint and Manjaro KDE lag quite a bit, and I'm unable to install CachyOS. Are there any good alternatives to VirtualBox for running virtual machines?
5 Answers
Ultimately, it’s not terrible, but I’ve moved on from it. It can be a hassle since not all Linux distros have easy installation packages. Many come with built-in virtualization options that can be as good or even better, like VMM or GNOME Boxes. I think if you want to give VirtualBox another shot, make sure you install the correct extension pack!
If you're running Linux, you should check out GNOME Boxes for a user-friendly experience, or Virt-Manager if you need something more powerful. On Windows, Hyper-V is an option if you have a Pro license, or VMware Workstation. In my experience, VirtualBox is decent for tinkering, but not what I’d rely on for production.
Yeah, VirtualBox can be rough sometimes. I switched back to Windows after having a bad experience with it on Linux. Just make sure you have enough RAM since VMs really chew through resources.
I wouldn't say VirtualBox is bad, but it certainly isn't the most optimized hypervisor out there. It's designed for learning and quick setups rather than heavy use. If you’re experiencing significant lag, you might need to check your computer’s resources and ensure that virtualization is enabled in BIOS. Consider how much graphics memory you're allocating as well! For something more feature-rich, you might look at Proxmox.
It really depends on how much RAM and CPU your host machine has, along with what you're allocating to your virtual machines. Are you using 3D acceleration? If you give the VM enough resources, especially while installing the guest additions, it can actually run pretty well. If you're looking for alternatives, you might want to check out QEMU/KVM with GUIs like GNOME Boxes or Virt-Manager. I’ve had good experiences with those, especially on NixOS where VirtualBox tends to have issues.

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