can you boot of off a firewire?

[DRAGONGUY83]

hey guys, i need some help. i have xp on my macbook but want to put it on a firewire drive to boot up from, is it possible? thanks guys i am learning alot here

 

[Kash]

When using Boot Camp, you have to install it on your main drive (i.e. the one OS X is installed on). With Parallels, on the other hand, you can have your XP installation on an external drive.

Some people have asked this same question, but it's always come down to nobody knowing a way to installing Windows on an external drive using Boot Camp. So as far as anybody is concerned, it's not possible

 

[DRAGONGUY83]

can someone help me find how to boot of external using parallels? please. thanks guys

 

[kaidomac]

can someone help me find how to boot of external using parallels? please. thanks guys

Are you using Boot Camp or Parallels? Boot Camp partitions the hard drive and sets up a dual-boot scheme. Parallels runs Windows in Mac using virtualization. Rather than partitioning the hard drive, Parallels simply creates a folder with a couple of files in it for the virtual machine (a config file and a virtual hard drive file). If you want to boot to Windows off an external drive using Parallels, all you have to do is copy that folder containing the two OS files to the external drive. That's it, easy as pie. Note that Parallels does have a new feature which allows you to load up your Boot Camp partition inside of it:

http://www.parallels.com/products/desktop/ga/features/bootcamp/

Is that what you are referring to? If you can clarify your current situation and goals that would help immensely.

 

[DRAGONGUY83]

You hit it right on the head. i am just using parallels. what type of speed will i be looking at? should i use firewire instead. thanks for you help

 

[kaidomac]

You hit it right on the head. i am just using parallels. what type of speed will i be looking at? should i use firewire instead. thanks for you help

Firewire is typically faster and more stable than USB in real-life situations. For loading a virtual machine file, it probably won't make much difference unless your virtual hard drive is really large. Can you tell us more about your machine? Do you have a PowerPC or Intel Mac? Desktop or laptop? Do you want the external drive to be portable (i.e. bus-powered instead of A/C powered)? What kind of capacity do you want? I can make a recommendation based on your setup and requirements. At any rate, all you'll have to do is copy the folder of the virtual machine you want over to your external hard drive. The path is as follows:

"Your Username" > Library > Parallels > "Name of Virtual Machine"

Just open up Finder, click your username on the left pane, then click on the Library and then the Parallels folder. Within the Parallels folder will be all of your virtual machines. If you only have one virtual machine and you installed XP, by default the folder name will be "Windows XP". Simply copy that over to an external drive and run it from there. You'll want to click on the .pvs file to launch the virtual machine (such as "winxp.pvs"). There will be some other files and folders in there (the .hdd file, plus a Windows Applications folder if you use the Coherance feature), so make sure you copy the whole folder to your external drive.

 

[Kash]

I would be quite surprised if he was trying to run Parallels on a PowerPC Mac

 

[kaidomac]

I would be quite surprised if he was trying to run Parallels on a PowerPC Mac

Good point

 

[DRAGONGUY83]

Thanks for the replies guys. here is my situation, i have the 2.0 core 2 duo with 80 gig hard drive and 2 gigs of ram(which i love). i will only be using windows to print to my dell printer and running my chacha.com app, which is just windows now. i have only usb hard drives. one is a 2.5 30 gig and the other is 3.5 80 gig(which you need powered). i would like to do it off of a 2.5 fireware, anyone have any reccommendations on one. that preety much it thanks guys.

 

[kaidomac]

Thanks for the replies guys. here is my situation, i have the 2.0 core 2 duo with 80 gig hard drive and 2 gigs of ram(which i love). i will only be using windows to print to my dell printer and running my chacha.com app, which is just windows now. i have only usb hard drives. one is a 2.5 30 gig and the other is 3.5 80 gig(which you need powered). i would like to do it off of a 2.5 fireware, anyone have any reccommendations on one. that preety much it thanks guys.

I'm guessing you have a MacBook? Honestly for Parallels you should be fine with your 2.5" 30 gig drive. If your Parallels virtual drive gets bigger than 30 gigs, here are a couple links:

$30 2.5" Firewire/USB2 enclosure

$63 100gb 5400rpm 2.5" hard drive

Assembling an external drive is as easy as using a screwdriver and then using Disk Utility to format the drive.