02-22-2007, 11:16 AM

I just purchased a new MBP, the 3rd Mac I have purchased in 5 years, and I am hoping this one will replace my PC. Unfortuneatley, there are still some applications that will require me to use Windows, so I am searching for the best scenario in regards to setup.

I know, the ideal set up would be not to have Windows at all, but that is not an option.

Here are the applications/uses I belive will require Windows:

1. I work for a Online Advertising Solution provider that has a web based interface. The full functionality of the interface only works in Windows. This will require the viewing of storage of flash video and animation files.

2. Office products: Outlook, and minimal use of Excel, etc.


Should I install Boot Camp or Parallels or both? Your guidance is appreciated!

02-22-2007, 11:46 AM

I as well have apps that are native to Windoze for work including AutoCad , MS project, primavera , fast track and some other construction related programs. Because Autocad can really tax a system I chose to install boot camp which allows you to boot in either windoze or OSx . It works perfectly for me as it runs any windoze app I throw at it.

I dont know a lot about parallel but I believe it is an emulator and runs windows within OSX . The advantage is that you dont have to reboot to access windows and you have cross platform access instatntly . But in the past I have run emunlators and they simply would not run the programs at an acceptable speed that I became use to running these programs on a windoze machine.
So in summary if the programs you need to run in windows dont require a lot of horsepower maybe you would rather run parallel . I cant really speak for the program as i mentioned before I have not run it, but I am sure many here have .
good luck
Wrath

02-22-2007, 11:47 AM

Since your requirements are fairly basic, Parallels would be just perfect for you. You can run Internet Explorer to access your work webpage, and can definitely install Office.

The best part is that with the latest version of Parallels, you can have Windows programs running side by side with your Mac applications via something called Coherence mode. If you change the theme in Windows to make it look like a Mac, it'll look like Internet Explorer and Outlook are regular Mac apps :black:

Edit: Looks like wrathlon beat me by a minute and I felt compelled to touch upon the point he brought up about emulation. Since Macs are now Intel based, there is no hardware emulation required, as was the case with VirtualPC. So under Parallels, Windows will run at near native speed, which means little to no slow downs compared to a PC running Windows.

I personally have found Windows runs quite fast under Parallels. The only problem I can admit to is that my machine needs more RAM so that I can dedicate more than 256MB to Windows :bomb:

02-22-2007, 11:55 AM

Thanks for the insight thus far, very helpfull.

Isn't there an option to run Boot Camp with in Parallels? What are the pro's and cons to this?

02-22-2007, 06:55 PM

The latest version of Parallels allows you to virtualize your Boot Camp partition. This can be a benefit for those who want to run both Boot Camp and Parallels as you would only have to maintain a single copy of Windows rather than two different ones. I can't really think of any cons to this :bomb: