Parallels 7 needs i5 or i7 Mac to run properly?

J

JoelRubio

Member
I have a MBP 13", late 2010 model, 2.66Ghz Core 2 Duo, 8GB RAM, nVidia 320 256MB, running Lion 10.7.4. Whenever I run Parallels 7, the fan starts to spin faster and prl_vm_app is averaging about 77% CPU usage. The MBP also runs a little hotter. I have the Guest OS (Win 7) set for 2 CPU's (if that matters) and allocated the recommended 1GB RAM.

On my friends MBP 15" with i7, there are absolutely no such issues as I described above.

So my question is, should the recommended spec to run Lion and Parallels 7 be an i5 or i7 equipped Mac? I feel like I'm running Win 7 on a Pentium 4 machine here. Is it time for me to buy a new machine?

What do you guys think?

Thanks!
-Joel
 
No, the CPU is perfectly fine for running Parallels, however, set the virtual RAM to 2 or 3 GB, you have plenty of RAM and it will increase the performance greatly, set to just 1 CPU, the Core 2 Duo has 2 cores, giving them both to Windows will actually degrade performance overall.
 
Wow! That made a huge difference. the prl_vm_app CPU is down to an average of 18%, the fan hardly spins, and it is running much cooler. Thanks, Specimen! I guess I won't need to shop around for a new Mac for awhile.

Quick question, how should I set the Options>Optimization? I read somewhere to set it for Faster Mac and turn on Enable Adaptive Hypervisor. Is that good?

Thanks again so much, Specimen!

-Joel
 
Thanks so much, Specimen. After switching it to Faster Guest, I found the Mac side to slow down considerably (enough). I only use the Windows side for any absolute Windows apps and testing for my clients. So I've switched it back to Mac side being Faster for now. So I think for my use -- Mac first, Windows only if absolutely necessary, then Faster Mac is optimal for me.

Thanks again so much, Specimen, for sharing your great knowledge and experience.

-Joel
 
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