Norm Wattenberger: Virtual machines at last?

[Norm Wattenberger]

The below is a new product that will allow Mac OS X and Windows to run concurrently on the new Macs. The concept goes back at least a quarter century on IBM mainframes.

Parallels Desktop released for Intel Macs

[Parker]

> The below is a new product that will allow Mac OS X
> and Windows to run concurrently on the new Macs. The
> concept goes back at least a quarter century on IBM
> mainframes.

It's nothing really new on PC's, either. I'm presently running a virtualization program called QEMU on my Linux system under which I have installed Windows 98, and thus am able to run Casino Verite, CVCX, Frugal Video Poker, etc. without booting up a Windows box. QEMU has been around a few years, as has VMWare (although nothing close to a quarter century).

[Parker]

Hasn't "Virtual PC" software for Mac's been around for quite a while? I seem to remember Viktor showing me Windows XP running on his Mac back when XP was first introduced.

[Viktor Nacht]

> Hasn't "Virtual PC" software for Mac's been
> around for quite a while? I seem to remember Viktor
> showing me Windows XP running on his Mac back when XP
> was first introduced.

The difference is that Virtual PC runs on Macs using IBM Power PC chips and must software emulate an Intel processor, while the newest Macs (just the laptops for now) use dual-core Intel processors, so they can run virtual instances of Windows natively, and can be even be set-up to dual boot between Mac OS X and Windows (and any *nix for that matter). And yes, I'm buying a Macbook Pro soon.

Good Bits,

V

[Parker]

> The difference is that Virtual PC runs on Macs using
> IBM Power PC chips and must software emulate an Intel
> processor, while the newest Macs (just the laptops for
> now) use dual-core Intel processors, so they can run
> virtual instances of Windows natively, and can be even
> be set-up to dual boot between Mac OS X and Windows
> (and any *nix for that matter). And yes, I'm buying a
> Macbook Pro soon.

I see. This is actually what QEMU does - emulates an x86 virtual machine on x86 hardware. Since this doesn't require a whole lot of software emulation, it makes QEMU quite fast. I would guess that this would also be true for the Intel Mac VM software.

BTW, my first dual boot machine was a 486 that booted Windows for Workgroups and Slackware Linux. :-)

[Trapper]

Parallels Desktop works great on my MacBook Pro. I notice very little difference in speed running PC programs in Win XP on Parallels compared to running the same programs on XP via Boot Camp. Much quicker than Virtual PC ever ran for me on a Power PC. CVCX and CVBJ run just fine. Like Virtual PC, you can save the state of the PC when you quit so it makes for very quick start ups. Dual booting is a pain so unless you want to run high end PC games or 3D Graphics programs you will probably be satisfied with the performance.

Virtualization software is rumoured to be included in the next release of Mac OS X but for $50 (not including the Windows disk) Parallels is a good deal and all the Windows PC I will ever need.