Even when the root OS isn’t doing anything with the hardware, even when the root OS doesn’t have the drivers installed so it CAN’T do anything with the hardware, it doesn’t get passed through to the virtual. The virtual never finds out they exist.
Nope always true. One of the first rules of testing: anything that sometimes invalidates the test ALWAYS invalidates the test. Is there hardware that works identically under virtual? Of course. But for the testing to be valid you have to prove that the hardware you’re working with does, which means you have to do at least one identical pass under virtual and real and get 100% identical results. Of course if you’re going to be doing real machine testing anyway there’s not much reason to do virtual.
There you go again assuming the hardware is identical to the function. Ethernet is a known quantity, Dell’s specific implementation of ethernet is NOT.
Fair enough. I will point out again that the virtual test was IN ADDITION TO the real OS on real hardware problems that were seen in the article and on numerous web forums.
It is an additional data point, showing that Windows XP refuses to recognize a well documented, well understood Ethernet implementation.
To sum up:
Real Dell hardware, Intel EtherPro chip:
Current version of Linux Mint - OK
Most current version of Windows XP (SP3) - FAIL
Other, various hardware, Intel EtherPro chip:
Current versions of Linux - OK
2002 version of Linux - OK
Most current version of Windows XP (SP3) - FAIL
Virtual hardware, emulated Intel EtherPro chip:
Current versions of Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD - OK
2002 version of Linux - OK
Most current version of Windows XP (SP3) - FAIL
See the pattern?