Sandboxie is far better (or different - for its use case it is better). It doesnt use virtualization but rather hooks the APIs and redirects them to "in folder structure" where copy-on-write is used to keep local copy of registry, file system,... Far better and much less resource consuming aproach, its resource consumption is just a slight (I am talking about % or two) worse than native software, doing trampoline hook overhead is not worth mentioning, games will run at same speed. Imagine docker. You delete programs sandbox directory and all its traces are gone. I was its user for years (untill I have switched to linux due to some insane microsoft architectural decisions, like manifests and com junk within kernel32.dll) and was installing all the software into sandboxie, my base os was clean as "just installed". Give it a try, it is worth it. And now it is free :)

(Disclaimer: 20+ years development in low level windows world, from DRM to reversing malware and writting drivers. Dumped the windows completely and continuing on linux (didnt switch due to linux beeing any better, just windows got worse) and freebsd.)

This one is worth checking, sandboxie vs ransomware: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVwflbmBd_A

There are two pieces of software, that I consider a must on windows (and I miss very much on linux), one is totalcommander and second is sandboxie.

> It doesnt use virtualization but rather hooks the APIs and redirects them to "in folder structure"

Do they do it in a filesystem filter driver or similar? Hooking DLL calls in user mode is not really a secure way to do this.

Windows Sandbox doesn't replace Sandboxie. It's not a comparable product (yet).

Windows Sandbox launches an isolated, empty VM on every launch. This allows you to install and test software, but the contents are wiped after you close Windows Sandbox.

Sandboxie allows running arbitrary executable in it's own proprietary sandbox, with it's state being stored (and examineable) between runs.

The beauty is they are not wiped. They stay as isolated environment.

There is at least one advantage I believe for using Sandboxie instead of Windows Sandbox: performance.

Using Win Sandbox, Edge sandbox, Defender application guard or Docker for Windows enables Hyper-V system wide and makes your current host Windows runs inside a special VM which incur obviously a small performance impact.

New Windows installations are already run inside Hyper-V, due to new security features like Memory Integrity:

> Memory integrity is a powerful system mitigation that leverages hardware virtualization and the Windows Hyper-V hypervisor to protect Windows kernel-mode processes against the injection and execution of malicious or unverified code. Code integrity validation is performed in a secure environment that is resistant to attack from malicious software, and page permissions for kernel mode are set and maintained by the Hyper-V hypervisor.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security/threat-pro...

Unless your VM solution is a VMWare technonoly, in which case hyper-v gets turned right back off because VMWare has its own hypervisor that needs to run as low as possible.

Just announced that the next version of VMware workstation will be able to use hyper-v for compatibility with these security features (and more pressingly for their user base, WSLv2).

Oracle is also attempting to solve the same problem with VirtualBox, but it's not there yet.

My big gripe with that is that ms hyperv breaks vmware, which I need, so no sandbox for me.

Just announced that the next version of VMware workstation will be able to use hyper-v for compatibility with these security features (and more pressingly for their user base, WSLv2).

Sad that this is pro only. Home users are the ones who need this the most. Essential security shouldn't be an add-on feature.

Why? It's not the same as sandboxie in the slightest, it's a way to bootstrap a "clean slate" VM at boot, with everything you did in it getting destroyed when you reboot. That's the opposite of useful to home users (but perfect for entreprise).

The Windows Sandbox is just an auto-resetting, pre-activated Hyper-V VM. Nothing you couldn't do with your own off-the-shelf installation of Windows 10 in Hyper-V, and its probably a better idea so you get snapshots, advanced control over networking, and the ability to persist data for prolonged testing.

Windows Sandbox is much smaller in disk footprint than a full VM, faster to set up and start up, plus there's additional configuration available: https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/Windows-Kernel-Intern...

Sadly not having any means to add programs to Windows sandbox makes it unusable for me. Every time I reopen it to do something it’s in a bare install state with a bad version of Edge that slams me with just incredible amounts of advertising and pop ups.