Windows Vista or XP under Fusion or Parallels?

[seasurfer]

I have an OEM copy of Vista which I just bought from newegg.

I also have an OEM copy of XP which came along with my Dell and my Fujitsu tablet 1 year ago.

I really don't which to buy another copy of XP.

Can someone kindly tell me which is the best combination?

Vista running in fusion or parallels? Which has better support and which one is faster, more stable?

XP running in fusion or parallels? Which has better support and which one is faster, more stable?

I had already installed my Vista under Boot Camp but I have not connected it to the internet yet, therefore not activated yet. My question is if I get it activated under boot camp, will I be able to use it in Fusion or Parallels? It is the same computer, therefore same hardware, I really don't want to get into those activation trouble, anyone has any experience in this?

I have a MacBook Pro 15.4 2.6GHz, 4GB RAM 200GB HD.

I will be using windows mainly for Office, running some small files that are not able to run in leopard, occasionally playing games....not sure what game yet.

 

[louishen]

I believe that fusion or parallels can run off your existing bootcamp installation, but others may be able to help more

Of course if you have 2 copies of Windows running, MS will say you need 2 copies of windows, so make sure you can run the bootcamp windows from the other programs.

As for XP versus Vista - that's up to you, me personally would use XP for any windows stuff, but stick to OS X for all other tasks

 

[NolaWegs]

Both OS's will be able to run off your existing bootcamp partition (at least through fusion as that is the only virtualization program i use). You shouldn't have any activation problems, although you may need to go through the procedure more than one, this is a hassle but VM claims that it is a necessary step.

I agree with louishen, in using xp of vista it's just a better OS. also, if you're looking to use xp for office, I would strongly consider making the investment in macOffice. It'll make you're life loads easier. As far as the gaming goes, I would recommend fusion for that as it seems to work a bit better with games in general; however, for more advanced gaming it would be better to just run those through an xp boot rather than fusion. hope this helps.

 

[louishen]

if you only need to open and edit a few office docs, NeoOffice is more than capable

its a port of open office and offers a fully compatible Office set of programs for OS X for no money

www.neooffice.org

 

[seasurfer]

I just installed Vista under Fusion, the speed of vista is slow compared to boot camp. Is there anyway to make it faster?

 

[jayr41]

i do have a macbook and just switched, i tried both vista and xp on parallels. all i can say is that xp is much faster and vista kept on giving me problems??? for my expierence i say go xp or try both...

 

[PerryLynch]

I've got Vista and XP installed using Fusion. I've got to say that Vista is as big a disappointment on virtual hardware as it is on the real thing. Microsoft has even changed their tune and actively developed Service Pack 3 for XP, as so many people are rejecting Vista.

Don't get me wrong: Vista can be a great OS. But when you've bought sufficient hardware to allow it optimal performance, you may as well by a Macbook Pro...

 

[NolaWegs]

I'm not so sure how to get vista to run faster (maybe commit for of your processor to the virtual machine), this can be done in the preferences setting in fusion. it might be better for you just to run xp, as there aren't really that many reasons to use vista over xp.

 

[Aqua]

Most ppl are avoiding vista... as was said earlier xp3 is on it's way soon too but sp2 is good. As with XP when it first came out it took a long time to get bugs worked out and for companies to make drivers for it. It seems tho that Vista is proving to be slower for this and might also be a like Mellenium was in the xp world (a dud and bad choice which a lot of manufacturers even refused to make drivers for) a lot of things are still not compatible with vista yet, but there are still PC users who are baffled as to why vista seems to run better on a mac lol that being said, if the above posters are saying it's slow on the vm then xp might be your safest choice if you know it will run what you need it to run and just wait until it becomes more compatible with more later...