For some functionality, you additionally need the software Docker Desktop on your PC to be able to use it. This includes the download and use of dedicated AI models, for example for instance segmentation. You can install Docker Desktop together with your application via the ZEISS Microscopy Installer. For details about Docker Desktop, refer to their documentation at https://docs.docker.com/desktop/, and for system requirements see https://docs.docker.com/desktop/install/windows-install/. Also note the following special condition:

  • If you work with Docker on a system with multiple Windows users, always sign out of your Windows account to initiate a shutdown of Docker Desktop and your application when you have finished your work. Otherwise, the other users may have problems using Docker Desktop. Alternatively, use a setting in the options of your application to start and stop Docker Desktop automatically with the application.

Docker requires that BIOS-level hardware virtualization support is enabled and can either run with Hyper-V or with WSL2. We recommend using WSL2 if possible. WSL (short for Windows Subsystem for Linux) is a feature of Microsoft Windows that allows you to use of a Linux environment within Windows. For WSL2, the WSL2 feature has to be installed and activated. For more information, see the system requirements linked above and https://docs.docker.com/desktop/features/wsl/. WSL2 provides improvements to file system sharing and boot time, and Docker Desktop uses the dynamic memory allocation feature in WSL2 to improve the resource consumption.

If you do not or cannot use WSL2, the resources allocated to Docker Desktop are not automatically managed by Windows and might not be big enough in certain instances. In such a case, you can also adapt the resource allocation manually, see Adapting the Resource Allocation for Docker Desktop Manually. Additionally, Docker Desktop has experimental features that are activated by default, which can lead to an increased resource consumption, for example disk space. Such features can also be deactivated manually, see Deactivating Experimental Docker Features.

Hyper-V is Microsoft's hardware virtualization product which lets you create and run a software version of a computer, called a virtual machine. For Hyper-V, you have to activate Hyper-V and Containers Windows features.

Hyper-V System Performance Disclaimer

If Hyper-V is enabled in Windows, be aware that this might affect the overall PC system performance and, therefore, could lead to longer processing times or to reduced acquisition performance in the software. Enabling the BIOS level hardware virtualization does not influence the system performance and can be left switched on.

Hardware Recommendations:

  • ZEISS MidRange Workstation
  • 64 GB RAM or more (32 RAM dedicated to Docker Desktop)
  • For the use of AI models, the recommended hardware configuration is 8GB GPU and 64GB RAM. Only NVIDIA GPUs with CUDA Compute Capability ≥ 7.5 and the CPU are supported.