Download and install VirtualBox from . Once that's done, launch VirtualBox and click New to make a new virtual machine. Provide a name for the environment and select Microsoft Windows as the operating system and "Windows 8 (64 bit)" (or just "Windows 8" if you downloaded the 32-bit version) as the version. Then select the base amount of RAM to allocate, I'd say at least 1GB if you're running the 32-bit version and 2GB if you're running the 64-bit version.

Next, you need to create a virtual hard disk. Using the defaults of "Start-up Disk" and "create new hard disk," click Continue and select the format of the disk. I chose a VirtualBox disk, but there are several other formats including Parallels. Click Continue and select whether you want the space to be dynamically allocated or static. Click Continue again and give the disk a name and a maximum size. Click Continue to review your disk settings and click Create. Finally, click Create one more time to tie it all together.

You're almost kinda sorta there! Now you have the environment, you just need to install Windows 8. Click Start and VirtualBox will initiate the First Run Wizard which, and I hate to disappoint you, isn't that magical. Click the folder icon next to the popup menu and select the ISO disk image of Windows 8 you want to use. Click Continue to review again and then Start.

VirtualBox will start the environment using the Windows install disk image. From there, you'll need to run through the standard Windows setup providing the activation key.