Questions before I put Windows on my mbp.

I've decided to put Windows on my mac and have access to xp and 7. I'm not really interested in SL at the time because of some of the problems I've read about.

Do I need to upgrade to SL before installing windows or can I do it later when more of the bugs have been worked out. Also, I know 7 isn't officially supported but seems to be working for most that have tried it. Should I go with xp or try 7. They both cost me the same amount.

Also, I've ordered a 4gb ram upgrade. Does this need to be installed before installing Windows?

While 7 works fine with the latest version of Boot Camp (3.0, included with Snow Leopard), the drivers supplied with earlier versions can be flakey.

At this stage, Snow Leopard's initial kinks have been worked out, so I wouldn't let those anecdotal comments deter you from upgrading. Most of the issues are related to third party software that just hadn't been update for SL.

Windows 7 runs fine with 1GB, so if you have that or more already, I wouldn't be concerned about waiting.

As far as XP vs. 7 goes, if you were running it in virtualization, I'd recommend XP. But since it seems like you intend to do Boot Camp, I think you would be fine either way, provided that you at least have the Snow Leopard disc to use the most up to date drivers from Apple.

Thanks for the reply. This is the kind of info I was looking for.

Agreed. No reason not to upgrade to SL, by the way. Its fine. I have been very impressed with Win7 and would recommend it although XP is also fine. I use both on my Mac in VMs.

I'm likewise pleased with Win 7. Although I had to scramble around a bit to get several pieces of hardware that previously worked OK in XP up and running again in Win 7.

I also agree that XP is fine. If you have a copy of XP that you can legally use with Boot Camp, I would recommend sticking with that rather than spend the money for a Win 7 upgrade.

Regards.

The price of Win 7 isn't a problem. Through the college my wife works at I can get it for $20.00 + tax. XP is the same but they are telling me we already have it and can't get it again. The problem is the college put it on the computer and never gave us a disk like they were supposed to. Since it doesn't look like they are going to give us a disk for xp I'll more-than-likely be upgrading to SL and using Win 7. I figure if there are a few things that don't work right I'll get them sorted out eventually.

Thanks for the replies. I really appreciate the input.