Running Windows on a Mac: A Switcher's Guide

cross post - responded to in your other thread. please only post things once, ok? Thanks

Bootcamp or Fusion?

I'm trying to decide whether I should use bootcamp or fusion or both. I currently won't be running anything big on windows, just simple stuff. However there is a possibility in the future of running a program like CAD, or Revit.

What do you recommend between the two?

Also, can I run windows 7 64bit on fusion? If I can what version can I use?

Can I run 64 Bit on bootcamp?

Thanks for the help...

On my MacBook Pro (2009 Unibody) I have OS X Snow Leopard and run Windows XP Pro under VMWare Fusion 3.0. My Windows programs like Lotus Word Pro and Yahoo! Web Hosting run SLOOOOOOOOOW. It's scary, really... feels clunky. BUT... I also have a 200 GB Bootcamp partition running Windows 7 Professional and it absolutely BLAZES!
Wonderfully, when I have booted to Bootcamp and need a file from the Mac HDD, I can use Windows Explorer and DRAG IT RIGHT OVER to the Windows side.
So, I've got the best of two, er.. THREE worlds! - LongJnSilver - London, UK

Express Card driver

This is my first post and I'm a new to the mac scene. I apologize if this is a repost, but I did a search and didn't come up with anything.

I'm currently running Windows 7 on my 17" Macbook Pro using Virtualbox. I wanted to know if Windows 7 should be able to recognize the express card/34 slot.

Thank you.

hmac686 said:

This is my first post and I'm a new to the mac scene. I apologize if this is a repost, but I did a search and didn't come up with anything.

I'm currently running Windows 7 on my 17" Macbook Pro using Virtualbox. I wanted to know if Windows 7 should be able to recognize the express card/34 slot.

Thank you.

Click to expand...

Theoretically, yes. But VirtualBox is still relatively immature, so I'm not sure if it's got support for all of your system's hardware. I know VMWare will.

I just had a quick question to do with this Boot Camp update that came out today.

I still need to get a copy of Windows 7, but as I was reading up on this update, it was saying that the new utility was to be used when upgrading from Vista to Windows 7. Does this mean I also have to buy a copy of Vista to be able to use the update? Or can I just get a copy of Windows 7?

I had been so excited, but that quickly vanished as soon as I saw the details about Vista. If I have to get a copy of Vista as well, I might just go back to XP.

EDIT: Just looked on Mac Rumors and it appears that the "Boot Camp Utility for Windows 7 Upgrade" which requires Vista may be a separate tool. Anybody care to confirm this for me?

Thanks!

Pud said:

I just had a quick question to do with this Boot Camp update that came out today.

I still need to get a copy of Windows 7, but as I was reading up on this update, it was saying that the new utility was to be used when upgrading from Vista to Windows 7. Does this mean I also have to buy a copy of Vista to be able to use the update? Or can I just get a copy of Windows 7?

I had been so excited, but that quickly vanished as soon as I saw the details about Vista. If I have to get a copy of Vista as well, I might just go back to XP.

EDIT: Just looked on Mac Rumors and it appears that the "Boot Camp Utility for Windows 7 Upgrade" which requires Vista may be a separate tool. Anybody care to confirm this for me?

Thanks!

Click to expand...

You don't need Windows Vista to install Windows 7 using the new update to Boot Camp.

Simply install 7, install the existing Boot Camp software package and then let the Apple Software Updater run and install the latest update. That's all there is to it.

bootcamp, win 7, .exe

I have a MBP and I am about to install windows 7 via bootcamp, (for various reasons) however, I only have the .exe files for windows 7. My question is; can i just use these or do I need to burn them to a bootable disk?


MBP 15" 2.83

Did you purchase Windows 7 online?

I just had one other question now.

Do I need to buy Snow Leopard (10.6) if I want to use windows 7? Because I was looking at my disks and realized that I only have 10.5.6, so I am assuming this wouldn't work.

I have a digital download from my university.

If I'm not mistaken, you would need to run that on a Windows machine and it will generate and burn a disc image. But to answer your question directly, yes, you do need a disc to use Boot Camp.

Thanks a lot. I have managed to get my hands on a disk now so it doesn't matter but thanks for the help anyway

Installing Win 7 on a MBP with downloadable file

Ricardo99 said:

I have a digital download from my university.

Click to expand...

I am brand new to the forums, and have tried to do some reading as to keep from posting a reply in the wrong thread, and this may be more Microsoft related...But I haven't been able to get much direction from any articles I have found online.

I have a similar situation to this, I purchased Windows 7 from my Microsoft's Student store through my university and they sent me an email with the links to the downloadable .exe files in order to install. One of them is an ISO supposedly but it is an .exe file also. I want to install Win 7 on my MacBook Pro via Bootcamp but I don't know what I can do to burn that ISO onto a disc I can use to install on the Mac. I have a PC, how would I go about burning that onto a disc in a way that would be recognized by my mac?

Any help is appreciated! Thanks

To burn an ISO file to a disc in Windows, simply open the file with your favorite burning software. If you don't have a particular CD/DVD recording program, you can download the free Infrarecorder software here. For Windows 7, you will need a blank DVD.

Once the disc is burnt, be sure to run Boot Camp Assistant from Applications => Utilities on the Mac.

This is key: When prompted, print out the documentation for Boot Camp. It is essential to read through and understand it before you proceed. Additionally, it is STRONGLY recommended that you backup your data before you begin. Any time you make a major change to disk structure, it's important to back up as the risk of data loss is higher than normal.

If you'd like to take a look at the instructions before hand, they are also available here.

old thread, but a great one. im loving fusion. works great and its so good to snap in and out of windows and back to mac. Love it! thanks for the post anyway, i wanted to see what others were doing!

I am running an iMac 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 1 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM.

Because I require Explorer for work (real estate programs non compatible with Mac) I purchased Paralles4 and Windows 7. After three days of total frustration I am at my witts end.

Each time I start Windows 7 my computer grinds to a snail pace and is basically unproductive. I also get a error through my disk utility program of:

Invalid volume file count
(It should be 594561 instead of 594562)
Invalid volume directory count
(It should be 157800 instead of 157799)
The volume Macintosh HD was found corrupt and needs to be repaired.
Error: This disk needs to be repaired. Start up your computer with another disk (such as your Mac OS X installation disc), and then use Disk Utility to repair this disk.

I repair it but it only comes back. I do not want to buy a PC but fear I may have to as this is starting to affect my work and loss of revenue.

Any feedback appreciated!!!

I can't help with Win7 But I can tell you that XP with SP2 or SP3 works brilliantly and is very stable and happy on a Mac.

If you use bootcamp it is possibly better to set windows up using FAT32. I use parallels now and moving between Mac OS and Windows is a piece of cake.

to mzelenski: you don't have enough RAM both operating systems at peak efficiency. You should check how much RAM you have allocated to each OS in Parallels - I know I can do that in Fusion. I run these on a Macbook with 2 GB of RAM and they work fine. 1 GB is a bit small. Even though Win7 is more efficient, it is basically a more efficient version of Vista and you are really running at the bare minimum. Not surprised you are having performance issues - but it's not Parallels or Windows - you need at least 1 GB more of RAM.

Great Thread

I have recently changed to mac pro, and was curious as to how i could install windows 7, this answered everything i could think of. Just a couple of things still puzzle me. I am planning on using the bootcamp utility for the installation.

Firstly i assume the macbook would have 2 operating systems, thus giving me the choice of which one to run...how do you choose which operating system to boot up.

Do features such as the bluetooth capability and everything else still work, whilst in the windows o/s.

Thanks