I've actually been playing around a bit with Hyper-V in Windows 8, and you can run Linux guests, but nearly as nicely as VirtualBox does (it's harder to set up, and you don't get shared folders, shared clipboard, or proper full-screen resolution). Also, installing Hyper-V breaks VirtualBox, as it seems to monopolize the hardware features needed for good CPU virtualization.
Hi Bruce, thx for suggesting Hyper-V, but I think I will try VirtualBox first. Appreciate your responses.