What does everyone think?

O

oswaler

Member
I am a PC developer and I am just about to buy a Mac in a few day for the first time. My main purpose in buying the Mac Is to be able to use Windows with Parallels so I can work in both systems at once.

In looking at this forum, I'm getting the impression that Parallels is ineffectual and the tech support seems to be almost intentionally horrible. Does anyone at the company read these forums? But this could be because people don't usually post messages when things work.

I'd be interested in seeing success stories. Are there many people out there with Parallels working well? I saw a working version of it at the Apple store on an iMac with 1GB memory and it seemed to work well and very fast.
 
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oswaler said:
Wow, again I can't believe how polite people are on here. This is very nice.

You are right that I can try the trial. My problem is this: both Parallels and Boot Camp seem to have a lot of major problems.
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OK ..... Where to begin ....

Parallels 3.0 was rushed out the door, and yes it has some issues which were reported in the Beta forums and which still need to be addressed. That being said it works, and mostly works well.

Where are you reading that Bootcamp has issues? I've NEVER had an issue with Bootcamp, although there are issues with Bootcamp and Parallels (when using the BootCamp partition). Say it with me ..... An Intel Mac is a PC. Say it again .... An Intel Mac is a PC. BootCamp is no more or less stable than the OS you throw on it. There are some Apple drivers you need to install (doesn't most hardware require drivers?), and there is a piece of code installed to make XP think there is a BIOS when in fact there is none (Macs are EFI, no BIOS).

When reading threw here remember this is a support forum, people with no problems usually do not post in a support forum.

You may also want to visit the VMware Fusion forums. Fusion is the main competitor to Parallels. The software seems more stable, but it is less advanced. I have both installed. :) I own parallels, I have not "pre-ordered" Fusion.

Again, you cannot base your decision to purchase a Mac on ONE forum's postings. That is insane. I'd kill to have the stability of OS X at work, and I'm a MCSE.
 
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Bootcamp major problem: # key doesn't work for UK Macbooks under XP - easy to fix.

Parallels problems: V2.5 - Sometimes a bit sluggish to start a bootcamp partition. A bit too much CPU use when paused (~0.5-1.5% -- fixed in V3.0 according to release notes -- only really an issue in keeping laptop battery maximal). GDI resource leak occasionally when using Matlab (fixed in V3.0 ...).Bug with accessibility tools (universal access in OS X) which is not fixed AFAIK.

Having switched a few months ago, I cannot regret a thing -- the experience has been wonderful, OS X is simply *great*, and using bootcamp / parallels has been an almost effortless experience for running XP (I avoid Vista as it is superfluous for my needs, and has performance and compatibility issues galore). I find both Parallels and Bootcamp to be rock-solid and dependable overall.

The substantial new features in V3.0 (snapshots, undo, resource allocation, better dock integration with coherence 2) look great (ignoring the dumb marketing gaffes from Parallels and the ensuing hot air here from exasperated gamers) -- though I'll wait for the dust to clear and some more sensible analysis is done to see what may have broken anew and what is really fixed/improved...
 
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dan said:
I actually didn't have you in mind in particular, and in any event "nut case" is perhaps not the right term. Nut cases aside, your issues with the upgrade appear to stem from the fact that you failed to read the update notes that included a list of supported games. Indeed, many of the "problems" that generate most of the complaints on this board have come from people who simply do not read directions. This has been true since the first public beta. On the other hand, the Parallels team should certainly have been more up front with the limitations of 3D in version 3. By simply saying you can run "the most popular" 3D games, they left themselves wide open to the wrath of a lot of discontented, too-hopeful customers.
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Thse update notes were not included until AFTER I paid for the product and downloaded. It was never in ANY of the emails i got reminding me to upgrade NOW. I'm very happy for you that you got an inside tack or that you already knew not to trust there guys. Well good for you. Many of us weren't so lucky.

And, by the way, They (Parallels) is STILL saying they can "run the most popular 3D games". And many other claims their software can't meet. They don't even have these forums available on their site. You have to google just to find it. What are they hiding?

Outside of these issues Parallels is fine. I mean, I'm running XP with it. It's not really the product I have a problem with it's the company. VERY shady.

But all this is known already. And I suggest we all just drop it. For now.

Now back to the topic:

What problems with Boot Camp? i mean, you got a PC. You are running Windows natively. Get the Mac. Trust, you won't regret it.
 
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This has been really helpful. It has brought out some good issues.

Thanks Reality Explorer, that was a lot of useful detail.

Dan - yes I'm basing my decision on a tech support forum and yes I know that people with working software don't visit forums, but I don't know anyone who uses a Mac, so unfortunately this is my only resource, so in my mind I'm kind of counting any positive comments 10x for every one negative. I'm keeping a pretty good balance. The big thing I noticed was how the people at the Apple Store wanted to distance themselves from Parallels and that made me nervous.I guess once I get a Mac I'll have to make a new set of friends :) .

The negative comments I've heard about Boot Camp came from a PC Magazine review - they said it worked well, but the drivers disk that Mac creates had some bad/missing drivers -- say it with me -- Windows running on an Intel chip with bad drivers doesn't work:D . But I haven't heard anything negative beyond that.

I hadn't realized that you could install Windows XP both as a Boot Camp partition AND as a VM. That is great. Don't you have to register Windows twice then, or can you point the VM to the Boot Camp installation? I've been using Parallels on the PC to run Linux as a VM (and, by the way, that has been working very well, but I haven't done much with it), and I wasn't paying much attention at the time, but it seemed like when I created the VM, it wanted me to install the Fedora OS at that time.

This is a question completely irrelevant to this forum, but if you install Win XP on Boot Camp, can you make use of the multimonitor feature? I would have a 24" IMac with 2GB RAM with a second monitor plugged into the back so I can extend the desktop. Would this work if I boot to XP?


I guess the big question is: Will owning a Mac make me a better human being?;)
 
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Just my $0.02...

I've always liked the Mac, but was limited by the apps that I needed to run on a PC. As soon as Parallels came out with the Intel-Macs, I switched to the Mac (Macbook), and have been generally happy with the switch as I have had no problems runnings windows specific apps on my Macbook. Not to mention the bevy of apps that are available as a Mac user.

OSX is rock solid as a unix variant. There are a number of high quality GNU licenced programs out there.

My take is that Windows as it is whatever version you look at, is a crappy OS. The problems that exist is in trying to get a crappy OS to talk through OSX to the hardware a la VM (Parallels or Fusion), and in any way you slice it, it is not an easy feat. You can't just shut down your PC without corrupting windows, and I'm sure this contributes to some instability issues that people see for Parallels and Fusion when you try to put it to sleep. Not to mention the fact that the Intel-Macs and the dual cores are relatively new beasts, so some growing pains must exist. But booting windows XP on a Mac via the VM is fast fast fast and that is probably because of better hardware compatibility on Macs.

I suppose if you are a developer, you can just use Bootcamp without going through the VM (I don't know why people would add yet another layer of potential problems IMHO), and with the new release in Leopard, the need for a VM is less now that you won't have to shut down and reboot to toggle between OSs. But having the VM is sweet, and backing up, reverting, etc. etc., totally removes the hassle of Windows crashing on you when all it is is a file in OSX.

Performance wise, I don't see any real difference between Parallels 3184 (2.5) and VMware Fusion beta 4. Both are a bit buggy, but more from a UI angle more than anything else. People seems to want to have the Mac+VM run exactly like their PC, but I don't see this as justified.

FWIW

Austin
 
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There *were* some issues with BootCamp and Vista. Those have been resolved in version 1.3. Remember BootCamp is a beta as well. I've had no issues running XP SP2 under BootCamp.

I've been using PCs for 20 years (god that hurt to say), and I've been a Mac owner for 8 or so. I can honestly say my MAcBook Pro Core 2 Duo is the best computer I have ever owned.
 
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If you really want to get yourself a Mac, then go for it. I've never heard of bootcamp causing problems, not counting the post immediately above.

Just read release notes before doing anything with Parallels. It seems to work (and reliably) most of the time; I've had an excellent history with it (besides when I temporarily bricked my Macbook because I read the user guide but not release notes -- on a beta no less). Though some functionality isn't yet up to snuff, a lot of what you hear in these forums is, I think, just rage against deceptive advertising.

Bootcamp + Parallels is how I use it. Mostly I use Parallels, and I occasionally boot into Windows for games and what have you.

Owning a Mac won't make you a better person, though it may bring out your inner snob, if you're prone to that sort of thing.
 
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crag said:
Thse update notes were not included until AFTER I paid for the product and downloaded. It was never in ANY of the emails i got reminding me to upgrade NOW. I'm very happy for you that you got an inside tack or that you already knew not to trust there guys. Well good for you. Many of us weren't so lucky.
Click to expand...

The list of 3-D supported games and apps is on the version 3 information page. I suppose you can continue to insist that all pertinent information be included in the email, and perhaps it should. But the information was there for those interested in learning more before buying.
 
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Well, I'm writing this from my brand-new IMac. I finally decided what the hell and I went for it. After hearing about the good and bad for Parallels and the pretty much all good for Boot Camp, I went and bought one.

So now I am a complete human being;)

Thanks for all the input from everyone, it was extremely helpful in making a decision on what to do. I'm going out of town tomorrow, so next week I'll be getting Parallels and then I'll be back in here with the problems.

Thanks again!

-Eric
 
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