Re: Macbook Pro and Windows Questions

In article <290720081401483528%nonone@xxxxxxxxxxx>,
Noone <nonone@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

In article <jollyroger-8BCA04.13181427072008@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Jolly Roger <jollyroger@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

You'll enjoy the upgrade immensly, I think. : )

I did buy a Macbook Pro and I'm sure once I get it set up I will be
extremely pleased. Especially with more processor speed and increased
RAM. I've upgraded to 4gig RAM.

If you wish to use Boot Camp, you should know that it will require that
you restart your Mac to boot into Windows, and restart again to boot
back into Mac OS X. With Boot Camp, Windows applications cannot run
along side Mac OS X applications.

There are alternative solutions to Boot Camp <snip>

I did read up that I need to use Boot Camp in order to set up.

Not if you want to use vmWare Fusion or Parallels Desktop , you don't.
: )

I also
read about Paraells and VMFusion. I purchased a copy of VMWare Fusion.

How much HD space should be used to partition for Windows?

Whatever suits you best. If you use vmWare Fusion, you don't have to
bother with partitioning your hard drive, since Fusion will just create
a file of the right size to use as a virtual hard drive image. I
typically use 20-40 GB for my virtual hard disks.

Virtualization solutions have one major caveat: While they run most
Windows applications at full speed just as if you were booted into
Windows (and sometimes even faster!), neither offers much support in the
way of hardware-accelerated 3D video. This means that Windows
applications that use hardware acceleration will not perform as well as
they would if you booted directly into Windows with Boot Camp. The good
news is the two classes of Windows applications that require 3D video
acceleration are Windows games and CAD/3D modeling applications. If you
don't plan on running such applications, I highly recommend you consider
using a virtualization solution to run Windows for the obvious benefits
- mainly not having to reboot or partition hard drives.

I have no plans on playing gams or using CAD/3D software. I've never
been much of a gamer, even on the Mac. So it sounds like VMWare Fusion
will work well.

In that case, yep - it'll run most everything you throw at it at
apparent full speed. You'll be impressed / pleased!

Thanks though for the additional information. If I should decide to run
any game programs in the future, I'll remember to boot directly into
Windows from Boot Camp.

That will entails creating a Windows boot partition on a hard drive as
well, which may be a bit of an inconvenience for you. Just kep that in
mind.

Feature-wise, the two are very similar. In general, I've found that
vmWare Fusion is more no-frills and is compatible with more USB devices,
while Parallels offers more eye candy, such as the spinning cube
animation similar to what you see when you use fast user switching in
Mac OS X.

I read up on both and came to conclusion that VMWare Fusion sounded
like the way to go. Thanks for your input on the two.

You'll find most will tell you Windows XP - hands down - because it
performs better and does not utilize as much of the hardware to do the
same work. But you should also consider the system requirements of
whatever Windows applications you plan to run. If one or more require
Vista, you may be stuck with running Vista.

Yes, so far all PC people I know say XP.

I'm one of those "PC people". I just happen to be a Mac user as well.
: )

I think a lot of people assume if you are a Mac user, you must not have
much experience with Windows, Linux, Solaris, and other operating
systems. For some of us, nothing could be further from the truth. ; )

But now I wonder if Pro or
Home. Have no idea what the difference is besides price.

The big glaring difference that *I* happen to care about it that Pro has
a lot of the networking support that I need to connect and interface
with the network of my corporate employer. See if this helps you get a
better idea:

<http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_home_pro.asp>

Amazing how many versions of Windows OS compared to how Mac OS releases
are handled. Pretty crazy!

It may be that some of these supposed Windows-only CDs are not actually
Windows-only. If you give us a list, we can tell you more.

They are indeed only Windows only. I tried opening on Mac and the only
files on them are EXE files. They are Pharmacy Technician Study CDs,
and also some study and informational CDs from specific hospitals and
retail pharmacies.

Ah - that's a shame.

Thanks again for your input, it's much appreciated!

Any time! : )

--
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JR
.

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