Running Windows on a Mac: Boot Camp, Parallels Desktop & VMware Fusion

Diablo 3 runs fine in OS X, and IIRC Blizzard recently released a patch that addressed a few performance issues. The game might run in a virtual machine, but it will be far less optimal than running in OS X natively.

 

if you really don't want to play in OSX, then you need to install Windows directly (like with Bootcamp) to actually get better performance than playing in OSX. Some games run ok in a virtual machine, but they are still MUCH slower than native OSX or running in Windows natively.

 

How far has Parallels come? Will it be able to run GW2 effective I wonder? (on the new MBPR!)

 

Highly doubtful.

 

no one knows how GW2 will run until they try, but it will probably be playable at lower settings... typically games run anywhere from 20% to 80% their normal speed when in Parallels. Being there is such a wide range of performance in different games, we cannot accurately guess on GW2 until someone actually tries it.

 

It should not be a problem at all. VMWare can pipe USB devices to the virtual machine, and the virtual machine's operating system should detect the device normally and install necessary drivers (if the guest OS is Windows).

 

I just bootcamped Windows 7, but was unfortunately 32 bit, I'll be getting 64 bit soon enough.

I just wanted to try ArmA 2 (because of the sheer GPU and CPU intensiveness of the game) and monitor the temps. With only 2GB of 8GB of RAM available, I got pretty good FPS with a mix of medium/high and temps never went above 90C during gameplay. I'm expecting much better performance with more RAM considering I had none available/free when playing.

I was also not able to apply the new 304(?) beta drivers.

 

You may want to try re-downloading the 304 drivers as NVIDIA posted an update saying they added a bunch of new GPUs that were not part of the initial release.

See here for info and download links.

 

I actually had to manually put in the GT650m into the driver code, because it wasn't recognized.

Got it to work though, made an impact, but the limited RAM is killing me.

 

Firstly sorry im new to the whole Mac/OSX thing, but I do have a wild question.

What is currently considered to run the best performance and overall between Parallels and VMware? thanks

 

I'm not sure you'll get consensus on that question. I run Fusion but I typically don't care much about "best" performance. As long as the VM isn't a dog and works well, I am quite happy. Fusion runs very well on the rMBP.

 

I've tried running Windows 7 as a VM on both Fusion and Parallels. Both actually perform quite well, but I give Fusion the edge for a better gaming experience through a VM. The biggest factor that will drive your experience is if your VM is sitting on a solid state drive along with a decent amount of RAM as well.

I recently upgraded my MBP 13 (2010) to a 256 GB SSD alongside 8 GB of memory and it performs admirably running Windows 7 as a virtual machine. I tend to leave the VM running most of the time. I run Visual Studio on it and the machine is able to handle it nicely.

Current setup of my VM is like this: 1 core assigned with 4 GB memory, and a 100 GB virtual disk.

I tried assigning both cores to the VM but thats when problems occurred. One core is recommended for dual-core machines.

 

Thanks a lot for your article.I want to buy a rmbp 13 recently.I am a engineering student so there are many softwares that I have to run under the windows os. Is it smooth to run windows os with a 13.3 rmbp?

 

Then a Windows laptop is what you want. For professional applications, consider a professional-grade machine, such as the HP EliteBook or Dell Latitude.

 

I've been using a MacBook Pro 15" Retina to run some selective applications on Windows 7 via Parallels Desktop (Coherence mode). The experience is "smooth" with the hardware resources given to it.

Or, you could use Boot Camp and dedicate the whole machine directly to Windows and its applications. This is the case where you love the design, screen quality and fit-and-finish excellence of a MacBook Pro 13" Retina.

Now, if you have "many" applications that you "have to run under Windows," another approach is to buy a Windows notebook, such as Dell XPS 13, Dell XPS 14 or Lenovo ThinkPad T430.

 

How can one install Windows 7 using boot camp with an external blu-ray drive? I have a secondary (actually primary HDD that was replaced by an SSD) in the optibay so no internal dvd drive there.

Ok, so I used imagburn to make a bootable Windows 7 install cd and I verified it in my Sony laptop and a tablet pc (had to play with boot options) and it does work. Now, when I pop it in after partition the SSD drive (primary drive) into two parts (70 gb for Mac , 50 gb for Windows) and then restart through bootcamp, I get a blank screen with a blinking cursor.

I googled and then installed rEFDit and after a restart, rEFDit appears after pressing the option key at start and tried installing windows from the DVD and a small partition (a second partition aside from the bootable partition) and I am still getting a blinking cursor on the screen. I made a USB drive using the Windows 7 usb tool on my Vaio and it isn't even bootable on my sony computer. I wonder if it because the ISO file was altered with the bootmgr.efi file made "bootable" in imageburn before the DVD was made that is causing the issue? I thought that it would actually help since doesn't the computer need a bootable EFI file even in a usb drive?

I haven't run the USB drive in my Macbook Pro yet, but I doubt that it would work if it isn't working in my PC. I seriously hate how Apple locks down this $hit all in all to make more profit. So much for being user friendly. Is my only choice to buy an external super drive now?

 

actually no, you are doing wrong things you get wrong results.

if you are going to use EFI, you dont use bootcamp, since it emulates the bios.

that was your problem, this was made to simplify things and it has been kept since win xp days, they should have removed that by now

but in the end, do this

get the MS usb tool let it do its job and voilla its going to work

 

If you're going to use EFI, yes. If you're going to use Boot Camp, you need to put the SuperDrive back into the computer and install from a DVD.

 

i can do that without the superdrive, I install windows via USB

 

Do you have an Air because the Mac didn't even recognize the USB. I have read that apple disables the USB option if you don't have an iMac or an Air i.e. devices that don't come standard with optical drives.

 

no I have a mbp 13, I dont even need to do the hack on the bootcamp pllist, but surely if you want go ahead and add your model to that

however if you really wanna go and have the trouble to install windows without bootcamp

http://forum.notebookreview.com/app...tion-installing-windows-without-bootcamp.html

and thats with EFI install off course

 

You can hack so you can use the USB super drive

How to use an external USB Apple SuperDrive on a Macbook Pro running Mountain Lion - vmware admins

if you're on Maverick there is a link further down in the comment section

 

Does Apple limit using any USB cdrom? or is it just the apple Superdrive that is limited to which computers it can be used on?

 

That only makes the drive operational from within OS X. It cannot be used to install Windows.

 

It's just the SuperDrive. Right now, I have the Toshiba HD-DVD drive made for the Xbox 360 hooked up to my Mac via USB 2.0. It recognizes everything just fine as it should. Audio CDs, DVDs, HD-DVD titles (both single and dual-layer), DVD-R, DVD+R, CD-R, and CD-RW discs (though not for burning) are all accessible through OS X. It does get confused when I put an HD-DVD disc in as OS X recognizes it as being a DVD. However, the HD-DVD software I have plays them back without issues.

I'm pretty sure it's just the USB SuperDrive. I've seen people put their internal SuperDrives in a USB enclosure and they work, it must be something in the external SuperDrive that limits it to compatibility with just Macs that don't have built-in optical drives (without hacking).

 

I know this probably gets asked a million times, but are there any real disadvantages to running windows full time on a MBp? With the lightness, thinness, battery life, screen, mag charger, keyboard, and touch pad of the MBp, im considering just getting a MBp and running windows on it full time. Is this a bad idea? Are there any hidden things im missing? Basically I dont want to switch to a MBp becuase of one of the above features and it not work in windows.

I do a lot of document creation (word + corel), web surfing (chrome), and some mild gaming (guild wars 2).

Alternatives would be a MSI gs60 with 3k screen or lenovo y50 with 4k screen

 

These four items are reasons to not run Windows full time on a Mac. Let's break it down:

Battery life: OS X has many under-skin optimizations to squeeze maximum battery life out of the system. If you run Windows, you will see a decrease in battery life. How much depends on which Mac you are looking to purchase. Models with only integrated graphics (Iris on the 13-inch, Iris Pro on the 15-inch) fare better than the MacBook Pro that has GeForce 750M. This is because the NVIDIA GPU is active at all times while running Windows; there is no graphic switching like you would find on a comparable Windows-only machine.

Screen: The Retina display doesn't work exceptionally well in Windows. You need Windows 8.1 in order to have acceptable quality and proper scaling. With Windows 7, you need to run the display at its native resolution (2560x1600 on the 13-inch, 2880x1800 on the 15) with zoom/scaling jacked up to 199% (beyond this, it looks very strange) in order to have a fighting chance at being able to see what you're doing.

Keyboard: The keyboard takes some getting used to as there's only one control key. You could re-map the alt/option key, as there are two of them, but again, this won't be an issue on a standard Windows notebook. Also, if you're going to be number crunching in Excel, the Mac's lack of a built-in number pad is a pain.

Touchpad: OS X is what makes the Mac's touchpad great. You won't get this with Windows. Someone has tried to hack OS X style gestures into a Windows driver set, but it doesn't always work correctly.

 

wow... THANK YOU. I would have been sorely disappointed....

 

I definitely agree with what saturnotaku wrote. If you want to run Windows, get a Windows laptop.

I have BootCamp Windows and VM Windows on my MacBook Pro (so that's $250 that I paid to Microsoft for licenses) and I never use them anymore because there is so much software that runs on Mac OS X. My last holdout was my tax software but I switched to TurboTax Mac. I used to use the Windows VM to log into the office but I use Ubuntu now instead because it has the nice, native X-server. BTW, I can log into the office directly using Mac OS X but then the Mac is on the office network. The advantage to using a VM is that I can run two separate networks at the same time.

 

Has anyone downloaded the Nvidia 337.88 drivers for the 750m? Are there any problems?

 

My rMBP 13 is running very hot under Windows. I've tried to install Intel DPTF, but the installer told me, that my hardware isn't supported. Did anyone knows, how to make Windows run cooler on rMBP?

 

How hot?

10

 

Very hot. I cannot hold it on my laps

 

i am pretty sure i've decided to get a macbook 15 w/ nvidia as I can't find any newer ultrabook/gaming windows notebooks that aren't using intel's 7260 wireless card which i can't stand. I'm aware that battery life as well as trackpad are two issues running windows through bootcamp. How bad is the trackpad exactly..Can i use two finger scroll? That's about the only gesture I use. Aside from that, I've read a lot about the 15 w/ nvidia getting really hot and throttling in windows, and even getting really hot in os x just doing casual surfing. Does anyone have any input on this?

 

I have never had my MacBook Pro w/Nvidia 750M get hot while generally surfing using OS X. It does get kind of hot while using a VM though, so that is something to consider.

 

It shouldn't be this bad. Are you sure you're not having background programs eating your CPU usage? I have the Late 2013 MBPr 15 bootcamped with windows 7 x64 running graphic intensive software, it never goes beyond 75C

 

Hi Gents,

I'm planing to run Windows VM through Parallels with some heavy programs.I am concerned about some UI in Mac OS. How smooth will be user experience? I've heard that late macbook pro 13 still have some issues with UI due to Retina display. Is this true?

 

Depends on what you run, a VM is always a bit slower than native. I was playing with a windows 7 image and some of my autodesk animation applications and the redraws were very jerky.

 

Does it annoy you or does it happen some times so you can leave and work with it? The VM will run Windows Server, MS CRM, Visual Studio, SQL Server. I hoped that Apple's SSD can handle it and even 12 Gb RAM should be enough (going with 16 GB in total ) I was inspired by this article. Though I'm considering the 13' version and I've figured out that it still have some user experience issues due internal GPU not being able to handle the Retina resolution..

 

PM Sent so we don't clutter up the thread too much