@ronnie-wong

Thanks for the clarification, this is very helpful. The issue here isn't confusing instructions, it's that I often get stuck in gratuitous detail and have a hard time moving forward even if the answers aren't necessary.

Brian,
You could try Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2012 R2. It's completely free and supports the following:

64 virtual processors per virtual machine 1 TB per virtual machine 64 TB per virtual hard disk 320 logical processors on the computer that runs Hyper-V 4 TB on the computer that runs Hyper-V 1024 virtual machines per host server
You can get more info at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh833682.aspx
And you can download it from http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/evaluate-hyper-v-server-2012-r2
Note: It does not include the full Windows GUI as such but you can manage it remotely via Server Manager.
Thanks
Tim