Terminology

Let's start off with some terminologies:

Terminology	Description
Virtual Machine, or VM	This is essentially a standalone computer installed within another platform/OS. A virtual machine is also sometimes called a guest machine. This typically provides a complete system platform with its own set of operating system, hardware configurations, and installed software packages, but still runs on top of a host machine that has the main OS (operating system), and the physical hardware. There are different applications that can create and run virtual machines. A partial list includes: VMWare Player (free): http://www.vmware.com/products/player/ VMWare Workstation, or other products: http://www.vmware.com/products/workstation/overview.html Windows Server Hyper-V Server 2008 R2: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/server-cloud/hyper-v-server/default.aspx MS Virtual PC: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtual-pc/ Virtual Box: https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads
ISO File	This is a disk image—an archive file of an optical disc in a format defined by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). This contains archived CD/DVD content. In a VM, an ISO file can be treated as a real CD/DVD. All you need to do is to point the CD/DVD settings to the ISO file path. If you need to, you can also burn the ISO to CD/DVD or create ISO files using any CD/DVD image file processing tool, such as: PowerISO: http://www.poweriso.com/ MagicISO: http://www.magiciso.com/ FreeISO Creator: http://www.minidvdsoft.com/isocreator/ Nero Burning Software: http://www.nero.com/enu/
Service Account	This is the account used to run services running on a Windows operating system.