(sot) MacBooks - the Windows side of things?

[Simon Wicker]

if you use bootcamp to run win xp then there is no difference between an intel mac and a normal pc. you should be able to use this system for your development work.

the only thing you need to remember is that you will need to own both mac and pc licenses for most of the software you want to use on the two systems (i know that some apps allow you to run the same licence on either mac or pc but these are in the minority, adobe i believe would want you to have separate licenses).

so far i haven't heard any bad things about running windows on the intel mac although this isn't something i have done personally (i would need to purchase a windows licence and it is a bit steep).

cheers, simon w.

[ooo]

One thing to keep in mind is that Director is not UB, and won't deliver UB-projectors. Same story for Flash, although there is a UB flash player (beta?). Not sure if Rosetta will fully support Director/Flash. But on the PC-side both will run without a problem.

odo

[onostuff]

Thanks for the quick reply, guys.
I will probably be doing of the Flash and Dir stuff on my G5 anyway, so am not really worrying too much about running these apps on the Book anyway. But I will be wanting to test the projectors and Flash files on the PC, as well as maybe bringing some 3D files over from some PC apps.
One of things I might be having to do is do on the Windows side is some edit updates in Primire and interactive DVD stuff, and burning some test disks; So am assuming this can be done with the SuperDrive in Windows?

Patrick

[2a03]

I've been running XP through bootcamp on my Macbook Pro for about a month now... C4d runs very well on it as does After Effects, Photoshop, Premiere Pro, and Flash.... I've had no real issues with it...but I haven't tried burning any disks with it but I'm sure it works fine... There's an app called Macdrive 6.12... and that will allow you to read and write to the mac partition of your macbook as well as read/write to mac external harddrives, CD, DVD's etc... It really is like having 2 machines in one... a very nice solution. If there's any functionality you want me to test out for you on the XP side let me know...

[flingster]

well i got a macbook...and wouldn't run xp on it atm..few reasons 1) drive space 2) bootcamp is beta 3) xp pro license cost

i'm not that tempted either to be honest...but the dual machine route is very useful in the field if you're writing to the same space and sharing the same files at the end of the day. just wonder if you could use thunderbird on both machines point to the same mail files?? just got me thinking....my one gripe is lack of photoshop at the moment otherwise i'm not really wanting for much really atm...i don't think its a bad idea to have win installed as you say for testing but personally i think you're just gonna waste space with bloatware heh heh..

edit: maybe something like vmware could be a good route.

[knight42]

If you're thinking of running a Virtual Windows machine on the Mac, have a look at www.parallels.com - Parallels desktop for Mac lets you run XP in a virtual PC window, and it works very well. It won't be up for heavy graphics work as there isn't any native graphics support yet, but as a VM it's well worth a look. It will run MSDOS, any Windows version (not Vista yet), also various Linux flavours, and as an Intel app it's about as fast as BootCamp.

It's at Release Candidate stage at the moment so it's pretty cheap to buy.

[flingster]

just check whether vmserver was available for intel mac doesn't look like it...and neither is virtual pc as far as i can tell so your options are limited...bootcamp, parallels...other options people please?


edit: parallels looks good...whats this gfx card support you're talking about...how does that affect its usage..or at least manifest itself...running something like photoshop for example?

[ooo]

just check whether vmserver was available for intel mac doesn't look like it...and neither is virtual pc as far as i can tell so your options are limited...bootcamp, parallels...other options people please?

Rumours exist about Apple releasing a new virtualisation in 10.5 So Bootcamp is only a stopgap. Most optimistic rumours speak of an invisible virtualisation where you run windows apps in OSX (with Windows running in the background but invisible just like the OS9 classic mode). So that would mean OSX 10.5 Leopard would be an ultra universal OS. I can hardly believe it, but if true then .... :))))

odo

[flingster]

Rumours exist about Apple releasing a new virtualisation in 10.5 So Bootcamp is only a stopgap. Most optimistic rumours speak of an invisible virtualisation where you run windows apps in OSX (with Windows running in the background but invisible just like the OS9 classic mode). So that would mean OSX 10.5 Leopard would be an ultra universal OS. I can hardly believe it, but if true then .... :))))

odo

things are getting interesting on this front i had heard that bootcamp was only the beginning so its a bit of a waiting game by the looks of it.

[knight42]

parallels looks good...whats this gfx card support you're talking about...how does that affect its usage..or at least manifest itself...running something like photoshop for example?

Parallels emulates a VESA VGA card which provides all the right resolutions and 32-bit colour, but doesn't pass through any of the Mac's native accelerated graphics support, so on my iMac theres no ATI graphics card in the Windows VM. This means DirectX is out, and OpenGL was flaky when I tried DAZ Studio.

They reckon they can do DirectX support, but not with the forthcoming release.
I haven't tried Photoshop or C4D (I've transferred my license to Mac) but Paint Shop Pro runs pretty well. Err, so does QuakeII... :thumbsup:

[flingster]

Parallels emulates a VESA VGA card which provides all the right resolutions and 32-bit colour, but doesn't pass through any of the Mac's native accelerated graphics support, so on my iMac theres no ATI graphics card in the Windows VM. This means DirectX is out, and OpenGL was flaky when I tried DAZ Studio.

They reckon they can do DirectX support, but not with the forthcoming release.
I haven't tried Photoshop or C4D (I've transferred my license to Mac) but Paint Shop Pro runs pretty well. Err, so does QuakeII... :thumbsup:


ok understand what you mean now....like to see you've tried the essentials..quake2... ;-)

[ooo]

On the subject of parallels: Apple seems to have removed their promotion of Bootcamp !?Instead they now tell you to get Parallels if you want to run Windows! I have no idea why they pulled Bootcamp. Maybe they collaborate with Parallels for incorporation in 10.5?
You can read it here: http://www.apple.com/getamac/windows.html

odo

[onostuff]

That does seem strange. I was just reading an article in the Macworld that arrived this am about using Bootcamp and Parallels, and it indicated that bootcamp seemed to run things better and faster. Will see what surfaces in the next few days.

Patrick

[ooo]

Let me rectify that Apple didn't pull Bootcamp like I wrote. It's still available for download.

Only thing is that they now advertise parallels instead of Bootcamp as the way to run Windows. That's odd indeed. We'll have to wait and see what this means.

odo

[PresNevins]

The most recent issue of TidBITS has an article praising Parallels Desktop at http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=08567

It'll be well over a year before I have to upgrade my machine, but if we're this far along now, it looks like there should be some nice dual-OS stuff to play around with by then! :)

[flingster]

personally i think virtualization is the way to go..dual booting is a pain even if once up its faster...i was a bit suprised by boot camp to be honest...and we have no word on microsofts directions on this either, then add vmware to the mix and its all looking interesting really not only for mac users but also pc options...the dust on this story has only just begun to stir and we are about to see some interesting developments...its early days into intel hardware on mac so in a years time we'll wander what all the fuss is about...makes me wonder whether its worth buying into parellels yet as i'm sure we'll hear news from apple, microsoft, vmware in the coming months..vmwares offering is the business whether we'll see it macified is another thing...and then whether they support it long term..i guess same goes for microsoft to.

[arctan]

Is there a performance hit on the Windows side like there is for the mac users of programs that arn't Universal?No. A MacBook is a PC. (Well, it uses EFI instead of BIOS, which causes some weirdness, but other than that...)

The biggest problem I've had with my MBPro was when I tried to get clever with the partitioning. Basically, you really really don't want to try and set up more than 2 partitions. You're likely to roach the boot process if you do, which often means a reinstall of both OSes.

If you don't want to bounce files off a file server, this means that to share files between them you either have to elect to use FAT32 on the XP side, or buy MacDrive so XP can see the OS X side. The default is to use NTFS on the XP side, which means that the only way data will flow is read-only from the XP side to the OS X side: OS X can't send files to the XP side, and XP can't see the OS X side at all. One downside of using MacDrive is that if your XP install is infected by a virus, it can affect the OS X partition through it. I prefer not to go that way, to keep a kind of data firewall around the XP side.

Oh, and don't try to run Vista beta 2. It can be done, but it's pretty flaky right now. Or if you must try it, do it early on, before you've got important stuff on the laptop. There's a high chance you'll need to reinstall, so get your play-time out of the way early, where reinstalls aren't so painful. :)

[CGTalk Moderation]

This thread has been automatically closed as it remained inactive for 12 months. If you wish to continue the discussion, please create a new thread in the appropriate forum.