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<topic xml:lang="en-us" id="emul-hardware">
  <title>Emulated Hardware</title>
  
  <body>
    <p><ph conkeyref="vbox-conkeyref-phrases/product-name"/> virtualizes nearly all of the host's
      hardware. Depending on a VM's configuration, the guest will see the following virtual
      hardware: </p>
    <ul>
      <li>
        <p><b outputclass="bold">Input devices.</b> <ph conkeyref="vbox-conkeyref-phrases/product-name"/>
          can emulate a standard PS/2 keyboard and mouse. These devices
          are supported by most guest OSes.
        </p>
        <p>
          In addition, <ph conkeyref="vbox-conkeyref-phrases/product-name"/> can provide virtual USB input
          devices to avoid having to capture mouse and keyboard, as
          described in <xref href="keyb_mouse_normal.dita#keyb_mouse_normal"/>.
        </p>
      </li>
      <li>
        <p><b outputclass="bold">Graphics.</b> The default
          <ph conkeyref="vbox-conkeyref-phrases/product-name"/> graphics device for Windows guests is an SVGA
          device. For Linux guests, the default graphics device emulates
          a VMware SVGA graphics device. See
          <xref href="settings-screen.dita#settings-screen"/>.
        </p>
        <p>
          For legacy guest OSes, a VGA-compatible graphics device is
          available.
        </p>
      </li>
      <li>
        <p><b outputclass="bold">Storage.</b> <ph conkeyref="vbox-conkeyref-phrases/product-name"/>
          emulates the most common types of hard disk controllers. See
          <xref href="harddiskcontrollers.dita#harddiskcontrollers"/>. Whereas supporting
          only one of these controllers would be enough for
          <ph conkeyref="vbox-conkeyref-phrases/product-name"/> by itself, this multitude of storage adapters
          is required for compatibility with other hypervisors. Windows
          is very selective about its boot devices, and migrating VMs
          between hypervisors is very difficult or impossible if the
          storage controllers are different.
        </p>
      </li>
      <li>
        <p><b outputclass="bold">Networking.</b> See
          <xref href="nichardware.dita#nichardware"/>.
        </p>
      </li>
      <li>
        <p><b outputclass="bold">USB.</b>
          <ph conkeyref="vbox-conkeyref-phrases/product-name"/> emulates the most common USB host
          controllers. See <xref href="usb-support.dita"/>.</p>
        <p>The emulated USB controllers do not communicate directly with devices on the host.
          Instead they communicate with a virtual USB layer that abstracts the USB protocol and
          enables the use of remote USB devices. </p>
      </li>
      <li>
        <p><b outputclass="bold">Audio.</b> See <xref href="settings-audio.dita"/>.</p>
      </li>
    </ul>
  </body>
  
</topic>
