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Running Windows XP on a MacBook

S

Stefan Patric

Flightless Bird
On Tue, 09 Feb 2010 19:58:17 -0500, Mike Rosenberg wrote:

> Stefan Patric <not@this.address.com> wrote:
>
>> VirtualBox is the easiest VM to set up and work with, and for personal
>> use, it's free.
>>
>> http://www.virtualbox.org

>
> The price is definitely right, but how is it easier than Fusion or
> Parallels?


Perhaps it isn't anymore. They all have GUI interfaces now.

It has been about 4 years since I last seriously looked at VMWare. At
that time, VMWare--I don't even think they had a Mac version then--was a
very stable, for pay, commercial product designed for running multiple
virtual server servers, although you could run it on a desktop, and
people did. (There is now a free one for non-commercial users, but only
for PC platforms. I hear it's very good.)

Set up was technical--you had to know what you were doing--but was at
least through a GUI and a lot easier than the commandline VM I was using
then. Then I discovered VirtualBox. Its market was for the general
desktop computer user like me who wanted an alternative to multi-booting
OSes. It still basically is that, although they do have a "pro" version
that they sell.

Since VirtualBox is free, even for the Mac, and is designed for the
casual user, wouldn't it pay to try it before buying one?

Have no experience with Parallels.

Stef
 
R

Richard Maine

Flightless Bird
Stefan Patric <not@this.address.com> wrote:

> On Tue, 09 Feb 2010 19:58:17 -0500, Mike Rosenberg wrote:
>
> > Stefan Patric <not@this.address.com> wrote:
> >
> >> VirtualBox is the easiest VM to set up and work with, and for personal
> >> use, it's free.
> >>
> >> http://www.virtualbox.org

> >
> > The price is definitely right, but how is it easier than Fusion or
> > Parallels?

>
> Perhaps it isn't anymore. They all have GUI interfaces now.
>
> It has been about 4 years since I last seriously looked at VMWare. At
> that time, VMWare--I don't even think they had a Mac version then...


They didn't. It was released in late 2007, if Wikipedia has it right. So
no, you don't have any experience with the Mac product. And...

> Have no experience with Parallels.


Ok. So you have no basis for judging whether "it is the easiest VM to
set up and work with".

It might be easy. Not having tried it myself. I couldn't say. (I have
used both Parallels and VMWare on the Mac, in addition to a much older
VMWare product on Linux some time ago). I don't dispute that VirtualBox
might be a fine product, and that the price is right. I just note that
your statement about it being "the easiest" is, by definition, a
statement of comparison, for which you appear to have no basis.

--
Richard Maine | Good judgment comes from experience;
email: last name at domain . net | experience comes from bad judgment.
domain: summertriangle | -- Mark Twain
 
R

Richard Maine

Flightless Bird
Stefan Patric <not@this.address.com> wrote:

> Why don't you try VirtualBox and see if it's "easiest." I would be
> interested in your opinion.


I've thought about it in the past. At the moment, I'm in the position of
having a paid-for copy of VMWare that is doing what I want. My system
not being broken in this regard, I'm not at all sure that I want to
"fix" it just for curiosity about whether another solution would also
work. Yes, I'm also curious, but probably not enough so to risk breaking
what I have now (I can easily imagine conflicts from having multiple
virtualization apps installed.) Maybe one of these days I'll try it on
my wife's machine, as we aren't currently using VMWare for anything
important there. It would be quite awkward if my VMWare installation on
this machine broke; I suppose I'd figure out some way to get the
employees of my wife's small business paid (I do the bookkeeping for her
and the payroll app I'm using is a Windows one), but I really don't want
to have to.

Seems to me that when I first looked at it, it was missing features that
I needed/wanted. USB support comes to mind. Looking at its current page,
USB suport is claimed to be one of the closed-source features, though
that would be ok for my personal use. Hmm, though maybe not, as running
my wife's payroll probably means it doesn't count as completely personal
use. I didn't spend the time to carefully study all the definitions in
the license terms, but at a first guess, I'd say that means that it
won't meet my needs unless I pay for it. That might be fine if VMWare
wasn't working for me. After all, I have paid for both VMWare and
Parallels licenses (though my Parallels license is for an old version
that I don't think will even run on my current machines). But I'd need
more than curiosity to motivate buying it.

--
Richard Maine | Good judgment comes from experience;
email: last name at domain . net | experience comes from bad judgment.
domain: summertriangle | -- Mark Twain
 
S

Stefan Patric

Flightless Bird
On Sun, 14 Feb 2010 15:16:20 -0800, Richard Maine wrote:

> Stefan Patric <not@this.address.com> wrote:
>
>> Why don't you try VirtualBox and see if it's "easiest." I would be
>> interested in your opinion.

>
> I've thought about it in the past. At the moment, I'm in the position of
> having a paid-for copy of VMWare that is doing what I want. My system
> not being broken in this regard, I'm not at all sure that I want to
> "fix" it just for curiosity about whether another solution would also
> work. Yes, I'm also curious, but probably not enough so to risk breaking
> what I have now (I can easily imagine conflicts from having multiple
> virtualization apps installed.) Maybe one of these days I'll try it on
> [big snip]


Here's an idea: Use VMWare to create a new virtual machine; install
VirtualBox on THAT machine, then use VB to create a virtual machine on
it. That way VB is isolated from the host machine, and in no way can it
muck it up, and you can safely play with VirtualBox.


Stef
 
R

Richard Maine

Flightless Bird
Stefan Patric <not@this.address.com> wrote:

> On Sun, 14 Feb 2010 15:16:20 -0800, Richard Maine wrote:
>
> > work. Yes, I'm also curious, but probably not enough so to risk breaking
> > what I have now (I can easily imagine conflicts from having multiple
> > virtualization apps installed.) ...

>
> Here's an idea: Use VMWare to create a new virtual machine; install
> VirtualBox on THAT machine, then use VB to create a virtual machine on
> it. That way VB is isolated from the host machine, and in no way can it
> muck it up, and you can safely play with VirtualBox.


I wouldn't expect that to work. Suppose I could be wrong. Even if it
did, it wouldn't really end up being the particular port of VirtualBox
that I'd have any interest in. I can't do an OS-X guest OS, which is
what I'd need in order to then run in it the port of VirtualBox that
uses an OS-X host. I have no interest in any other host systems.

--
Richard Maine | Good judgment comes from experience;
email: last name at domain . net | experience comes from bad judgment.
domain: summertriangle | -- Mark Twain
 
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