Bootcamp for a noob

Hey everyone. I just ordered my first mac...a MBP, and I'm very excited. Part of the deal with getting help paying for it is that I give up my pc laptop to my dad and he will help pay for it. At first I was going to be keeping the pc for certain programs etc. but it wasn't happening and I am going to give up the pc. I am thinking I'm not going to miss it once I get rid of it, especially since I can run bootcamp.

My questions are:

1. Do I have to buy a version of Vista or XP to install on the mac?

2. If I have a version that is part of my reformat disc for my pc can I use that to install it on there??

3. Do I have to buy a special version of windows to install onto the mac?

4. Is it worth buy or setting up boot camp or does it use a lot of resources having it on the computer even when not in use?

5. Any other helpful bootcamp info would be great!

Dude I'm in the same situation.

1. Yes
2. No
3. No
4. Yes and No

Installing Windows via Boot Camp is to have it as a second OS on the machine, not have it side-by-side with OS X. So you would have to restart the computer and use only one at a time.

I would actually suggest you use your Mac for a couple weeks before installing Boot Camp, unless you have a specific Windows-only need that would require you to install Windows right away. You might find that you don't actually need Windows at all. This saves you the trouble of buying a Windows license and spending the time and space getting it on the machine.

how much does it cost for a version of windows?? And how much room does it take up on the comp? Is it significant enough to not be worth doing at all??

heres vistas cost, and heres xps cost. i pretty sure it takes around 7GB to install (could be wrong) and i would ony install it if you really need it. OSX has programs that are compatible with windoz based software. a simple search on google will help you find that software. if you need it go ahead and install but if you dont, dont touch anything and enjoy the simplicity of OSX

I was in the same situation and eventually binned Boot Camp as I found that using Parallels Desktop, a copy of XP ran nearly as quickly in a virtual machine as it had been doing on my Acer laptop.

I purchased an OEM copy with a piece of meaningless PC junk (to keep it legal) off eBay and (as stated) I ended up with a genuine copy of XP Professional for about £100 or so.

I NEED Windows for one or two legacy programmes essential for my job, but am more and more drawn to the Mac applications - they seem simpler to use somehow and fairly 'fly' on this MBP.

As I understand it, you can't use a rescue disk from you old PC, you will still need to activate windows (there are ways around that which may work by copying a file from your PC but I am not going into that here - Google 'Bypassing Windows activation').

I find in practice, that I get back out of Windows as soon as I can, back to the Mac environment, but the ability to move files backwards and forwards in and out of Windows/Mac is most convenient.

So in summary - if you're going to game, you probably NEED the Boot Camp system to get native speed from the hardware.

If you just need access to Windows applications (which obviously need installation in the orthodox manner), then a virtual machine is and elegant solution - which also leaves more disk space for the Mac. The virtual machine defaults to expand its size to cope if you add more applications into Windows (in this case - could also be Linux etc etc - it really IS very versatile).

If you've not operated in a VM before (and I hadn't until two weeks ago) it behaves 99% the same as your PC with one or two enhancements - I run mine in full screen and it's indistinguishable from the 'real' thing.

Parallels is easily worth the money giving you the ability to swap in a second or so back to Mac - perhaps to use its applications for something then switch back to windows again. In Boot Camp, you'd have to reboot.

Hope this helps as much as the help I've had since I've been on this forum.

I've bought a Imac after years of windows use, one of my questions was, "Can I switch off Windows just like that?" probably no. one of the things "from many" that make me to go for Mac was the possibility of Running Both OS on the same machine, I start reading posts and getting information and the best compromise looks to be this one "http://www.vmware.com/products/fusion/", not only you can run both OS at the same time as you can copy from Mac and Past on Windows, also you have the possibility to try for a month, and if not happy just let go. However and in my case I'm delaying the need of that, so I didn't go for it, but still remains as an option for me will see.

at the moment I'm using only the office 2008 and I'm loving my new machine.

best of luck
Dip

Okay so I have another situation:

There are programs I decided I am 100% going to need that only run on windows. But I am also buying this mac for the use of graphic design for school and eventually professionally. I can either pay more and keep my windows based laptop, which I could use to keep many of my windows apps on and other heavy running programs to keep my mac running smooth or I can trade the windows based pc, pay a decent bit less for the mac, help out my dad by giving him the laptop. But then I would need windows on my pc...if I got bootcamp it would cost about $200 for a new version of windows to run on it, which isn't a huge concern...that way I could keep all my windows based programs. But my biggest concern is that it is going to slow down my computer a lot, and in the end would regret getting rid of my pc. What do people think? Is it worth keeping my pc based laptop too if possible rather than cluttering up the mac??

Whoa, where are you getting that $200 price tag for Windows? An OEM copy of XP Home and Vista Home Premium is only $89.

Having Windows on your machine via Boot Camp is not going to slow down your computer. It's just like installing Windows on a PC, it's as fast as the machine is physically capable. The only way it will slow down is if you accumulate a lot of garbage on the Windows side. Installing Windows is not adding "clutter" to your Mac.

sorry...I did end up seeing a version for 200 somewhere but you are right...it is 80.