Originally developed by a German Company and then used by Sun Microsystems for its xVM platform, VirtualBox 2.2.0 is a software package that is installed in the host operating system. The application provides a virtual environment for each of numerous operating systems called Guest OS that can be loaded and run separately. Designed to work on different platforms, VirtualBox introduces some evolutionary changes.
Presently, VirtualBox runs on Windows, Linux and Macintosh hosts and supports a large number of guest operating systems including but not limited to Windows (NT 4.0, 2000, XP, Server 2003, Vista), DOS/Windows 3.x, Linux (2.4 and 2.6), and OpenBSD.

Some of the features of VirtualBox include:

. Support for Open visualization format (OVF), which provides import and export functionalities and format along with the provision to introduce virtual applications to the users.
. Added hardware accelerated 3D support for Linux and Solaris systems. (Was available only for Windows).
. Support for new host only concept of networking, which incorporates the features of both bridged and internal networks. In this case, the hosts and VMs can communicate with each other the usual way without needing a physical connection interface.
. Provision to support hypervisor optimizations, additional VMDK file variants and hardware virtualization.
. Provision for increased memory limits on 64 bit  hosts to 16 GB.
. Ability to enable audio adapter in GUI along with addition of C API.
Some of the hitches in this tool include:
. Inability to detect physical interface during installation.
. Possibility of infiltration through the network interface created on the host.