The last time I owned a Windows-powered PC, I was on Windows Vista. Suffice to say, the OS has changed quite a bit since we last met.

Using a hardware virtual machine created on Triton Compute Service, I was able to access Windows as a guest OS in the cloud. Because Triton's HVMs are completely isolated and secure, I can easily spin up as many of these machines as I need to test applications. When testing is done, it's easy to delete the VM and eliminate that monthly cost, with no lost investment on physical hardware. Less time is spent setting up new environments, leaving more time for application development.

It was fast and easy to spin up an instance in the portal and connect to it with Microsoft Remote Desktop.

Why use a Windows VM?

It's still true that some software requires Internet Explorer or other Windows-only proprietary elements. Instead of the complexity of dual-booting or running two separate computers, a Windows VM is easy to spin up and tear down as needed.

Let Triton do the heavy lifting and keep your OS completely separate.

Watch the screencast

Watch to learn how to spin up a Windows HVM instance and connect to it via Microsoft Remote Desktop. Read the docs for step-by-step instructions on how to create an virtual machine.

Building other instances

Now that you have your Windows VM up and running, you can use the browser to spin up any other instance type in the Triton portal. Watch our videos to see just how easy it is to spin up another type of HVM, a Docker container, or an infrastructure container.