Virtual Box

Great reference video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4R2mDlIEKo
He has 4 in the series.

Be sure to grab VB USB Boot HERE. Great for booting a flash drive for testing without rebooting the PC.

Reminders:
Install both main and extension pack
Install "guest additions"
Start with 2048 virtual ram (can be adjusted later when virtual machine is stopped)
2 processors
Max video memory
30GB HD approx dynamically allocated
bridged network adapter works better but NAT works also

If linux host must do this for thumb drive access
  sudo usermod -a -G vboxusers (your user name)
  In client just grab through devices menu
Shared clipboard
  machine not running general - advanced set to enable
  machine on devices shared - clipboard - set

View menu - full screen (popup for menu is on bottom of screen, can change position in general settings

Set up video capture of vb in display menu. Enable after vb machine is running or it captures everything.

Drag and drop only works in Linux virtual machines. Only host to guest and only on Linux virtual machines.

Save machine state: click x for close vb and select "save machine state".

Seamless windows: under view tab. To return "right cntl - (I missed it)

Snapshots: Save the virtual machine at any point. With machine off click on snapshot icon. Must create an original parent snapshot. Then can do new snapshots and go back to any of them.
When machine running go through machine menu. This saves snapshot and machine state. This takes more disk space. This is all very cool. Avoid taking snap shots when machine running unless really need to. Don't delete snapshots from middle of tree. Just change descriptions. Normally uncheck save machine state when restoring a snapshot.

Share folder:
Guest Additions must be installed on each machine.
(In the Linux (or any guest) machine window go to VB menu - Devices and choose "Insert Guest Additions". A link will be dropped onto the Linux desktop. Start the link.)
Before machine started:
Create folder on host machine. No need to share.
In vb go to shared folders auto mount
In Linux the folder shows in "media"
Must add yourself to the group
groups (user name)
sudo usermod -a -G vboxsf (user name)

Display scaling with window enlargement need Guest Additions also.

Errors:
SMBus base address uninitialized - upgrade BIOS or use force_addr=0xaddr
Solution: Turn off the option "Enable Nested Paging" in the VirtualBox configuration under Settings->System->Acceleration.