Parallels or Virtual PC?

M

Macjen

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Hi everyone,

I'm very new to Mac and recently I bought a MacBook Pro. However, I can't switch completely from PC to this Mac as I still have two statistics softwares required Windows. I know Parallels and Virtual PC are very popular, but which one do you recommend? My MacBook Pro is the basic 2G, but I have increased the memory to 1.5G and 100G for hard drive space.

Thanks in advance,
Jenny;)
 
Short answer: Parallels.

Long answer: Virtual PC is an emulator made for PowerPC-based Macs, not Intel Macs like your MacBook Pro. It was never ported to Intel Macs, so if it would run at all (I'm not sure it would), it would be running Windows under not one, but TWO layers of emulation. That means it would run like a slug. Think ~150MHz Pentium. If even.

Parallels, on the other hand, would not be using any emulation. It's made for Intel Macs, and it runs Windows at full speed.



The real question for you is whether you should use Parallels or Apple's BootCamp. The big difference between the two is that Parallels lets you load Windows within Mac OS X, whereas BootCamp just lets you boot out of OS X and into Windows. The advantages to BootCamp are: A) It's free, and B) It includes drivers for your MacBook's graphics card. If you don't need great graphics performance (like for games) and you don't mind paying a little money, Parallels is a much more elegant solution.
 
Thanks Mikuro. I think graphics isn't a very big concern and I'm not using it for games and my statistics softwares don't produce extraordinary graphs, just some 3D plots in demand. Money isn't a concern as I'll get reimbursed. My big concern is crash/frozen. Will my MAc easy get crash if running Mac and PC together? One good thing about usign Parallels is I can copy or even import the data from Excel:Mac to my stat software; however, I'm afraid once the machine get frozen, I'll lose results or even data. If using Bootcamp, of course I can use this machine as PC and won't have that problem; however, I can't easily do the data transfer.
Sorry for the messy question asked.
 
Thanks Mikuro. Graphics isn't a concern as I don't use this to play high level graphics games, and my stat softwares don't produce extraordinary graphs, just some 3D if demanded. Money isn't a concern either as I get reimbursed. My big concern is crash/frozen. will it easy to get frozen if using Parallels? Good thing about Parallels is I can copy or even import the data from the Excel:Mac to my stat software, but I'm afraid if it get frozen, I'll lose results and may even the data. Bootcamp won't be that but it is inconvenience to trasfer data.
Sorry for the messy question.
 
The question you need to ask, is whether the software currently freezes on your PC. If it doesn't, there should be no reason why it would freeze up on your Mac under Parallels.
 
to clarify, Virtual PC and Parallels are different products, and aren't really comparable.

Virtual PC allows one to run windows on an old G3/G4/G5 mac. Parallels allows one to run windows on a new intel-based mac.
 
That all was clarified in the first answer, I guess. Parallels needs RAM. You'll run two operating systems (plus apps for each) side by side. So if you think you'd want 1 GB if you were only running OS X and, say 640 MB if you only ran Windows, you'll want 1.6 GB, i.e. 2 GB on that MacBook Pro.

I see you have 1.5 GB of RAM. I'd try it with that. You can tell your Parallels' virtual machine to only use 512 MB RAM or maybe even go as low as 384 MB.

The CPU, of course, is also shared. And whenever one app in either OS maxes out the CPU use, not much will be left for the rest. Still: It's a very good solution.
 
Thanks, and your recommendation is very valuable. That means if I want to run the Windows with a bit power, I's better to add to 2G then. Another question, say if I tell the Windows to use 512 and Mac OS to use 1G, will this configuration be fixed like this? What I mean is when I'm not using both os at the same time, just Mac OS, will it be back to use 1.5G?
Thanks!
 
Hm? Well: If you quit Parallels, the RAM is free again. For Mac OS X, Parallels looks just like any other application. For Windows (within Parallels), it doesn't actually look like something else is using anything. You simply define what the virtual machine "has".
 
Hi fryke,
Do you know a way or a button to turn off the screen on a MacBook Pro when using an external monitor? I don't want both displays on at the same time.
Thanks.
 
Hm. You could choose mirroring, so the internal display shows the same thing as the external, and then simply turn the brightness down on the MacBook Pro. If you have an external keyboard and mouse, you can also run it lid-closed by waking the computer up with the external keyboard while the lid is closed. (And then re-open the lid for better airflow once the computer is running.)
 
Thanks again. It sounds like the attached screen can't be off totally, doesn't it? Hmmmmmm, a little deficiency! Shouldn't say this in a Mac forum, but my previous PC notebook can choose attached display, external display, or both together.
 
I need to run SPSS in my new intel macbook. Do I need to Parallels as well? Someone told me that because it is an intel mac it could run microsoft based programmes like SPSS. Please help, I'm really confused and I need to be up and running by monday! :teers:
 
SPSS 13.0, the latest Mac version of the app, is PPC-Mac native but is unreliable on Intel-based Macs. Intel-based Macs cannot run Windows software natively within MacOS X. To run SPSS 15.0 for Windows on an Intel-based Mac, you will need Parallels Workstation, VMWare, or Boot Camp.
 
Thanks for that,

As far as I know, the uni only has spss14 at the moment and spss11 for mac.

If I got bootcamp or VMWare, do I need to run windows as well? I downloaded the trial version of parallels, but I need to run windows, so I'm going to trash it.
 
You will need a copy of windows for Bootcamp, VMWare and Parallels. You say you are a student, my wife was able to get a copy of XP Pro from the university for like $16 or something obscene like that.

No matter what you will need a copy of windows. It sucks but that is the way things work.
 
Thanks for that. Hadn't occured to me (in my ranting on other threads about my intel teething pains) that I could get a cheap or free copy of windows. I'll go and see 'em.

Feeling slightly less freaked out now :)
 
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