::A Geek in Korea::

There is one key piece of software each my wife and I both need that we can’t use in Linux. While we can use Linux to great success 99% o the time, she needs to access her work documents saved in a proprietary format, and to use Internet Explorer for terribly designed Korean websites (aka, all of them requiring IE). I need to run the proprietary Nintendo Wifi connection program for my wifi USB adapter to work. They don’t work in Linux.

Before, I was running Virtualbox. It is completely awesome, and solved my need to access Windows XP applications while also keeping my computer free of viruses and the actual hassle of managing Windows. However, since I upgraded to Hardy Heron, the new version of VirtualBox 1.6 is broken. I can no longer set up my machine to use the virtualization software. Whenever I try to use Virtualbox now, it locks up the machine completely and I have to restart.

Until I can get the Virtualbox program to work, I can’t connect the Wii to the Internet. I really would LIKE to do this, because Nintendo is launching the “Nintendo Channel” in the USA, and I can now download game demos to my Nintendo DS. FREE GAME DEMOS! However, due to this problem, I’m sitting here with nothing. Not only that, but the Wii Ware channel with tons of interesting games will be released this month, and I really want to get a piece that action.

I could install the “Virtualbox Open Source Edition” so that my wife can do her work, but once the fix is released for the binary version, I’d have to reinstall the closed source version, since it is the only one to support USB. It is either that, or break down and by a proper wireless router and figure out how to connect all my machines to this. This is what I should have done from the start, but now I’m invested with the Nintendo USB adapter and hate to buy something twice for the same features, even if it would work better.