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

I remember reading just a few days ago, that for some reason under windows, the fans don't operate at the full speed, and to use a 3rd party utility to control fan speed.
It could be, perhaps your system is overheating?

 

Thanks! Yeah it's VERY possible, because the computer gets noticeably warmer when I'm using Vista instead of Mac OS. Do you know where I can find a reasonable utility to help me with this?

 

has nothing to do with fans, i had the same problem and my temps were pretty low, i even created a thread http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=316137, i tried XP and never had the same problem again, but now i decided to uninstall windows and try using only mac now, as i got office 2004 (i needed the solver tool for classes), so i have no reason o install windows.. (crossover games let me play TF2 )

but yeah, that should be fixed, made me lose important work

 

do you guys know where I can download the drivers?
I bought a MacBookPro openbox and came barebone, with nothing, just a mouse, no cd's, no nothing

I installed WinXP SP2 with BOotcamp

and WinXPSP2 isnt detecting my wifi, nor my bluetoothmouse :S plz help

 

Several reports I've seen indicate that OSX is able to more aggressively underclock the cpu than Windows, and battery life also bears this out with OSX gaining 1+ hours more than Windows on the same notebook. Vista/XP running the cpu at a higher multiplier/voltage obviously generates more heat as a consequence.

I haven't seen whether anyone with dual boot on a late 08 MB/MBP has been able to undervolt with something like RMClock and what their results were, but RMC works well on cpu heat in Windows systems.... it's going to be a few more weeks before I start playing around with Vista in bootcamp, but I've used RMC before so this is something I'm anticipating working on if I get similar symptoms on my MB.

 

Does anyone know any easy way to share files from my Mac Partition to Windows while in Boot camp or Fusion? Essentially, I want to use orb in windows to share files that are located on the Mac side. I thought of using MacDrive and just sharing the folders that way, although I could set up a shared folder on the Mac side and just network it to the Windows side, although that seems a bit roundabout. Any ideas?

 

Fusion is the easiest in my view since you can drag and drop files between the two, and Fusion even has a setting to share folders between OSX and Windows.

I haven't used MacDrive though, so I can't comment on whether that is a viable option as well.

 

Bootcamp tends to crash a lot soo
Parrallel or fusion ftw

 

Really? And how does Boot Camp crash...don't you just boot into Windows, so isn't Windows the one crashing?

 

Get the MacDrive, I can access my Window (FAT32) partition and Mac OS X partition in both OS....I believe this would be the easiest way.

 

i never had it crash on me under XP. and with vista, i only had the occasional crash using firefox, apart from that, bootcamp ran really smooth and gaming was really exceptional

 

I think this is a pretty lousy sticky on this subject.



1. What about drivers, where to find them, update them etc?

2. What will not work in windows?

3. How to right click?

4. How to use the non-existing DEL button in windows?

5. How to press CRT-ALT-DELETE

6. How will the new zero-button track pad work? What about gestures?

7. Will software overclocking of graphic card work?

8. Do you need to install OS X with boot camp, or can you just install windows?

9. Is there somewhere you can download the entire driver package for windows so everything will work?

10. How well does vista work compared to XP (in terms of driver compatibility)

11. Is there any compatibility issues with external screens or 3rd party products, printers etc. There must be a list with known issues.


All these questions should be answered on the first page, so you don't have to browse through 50 pages. Everything is probably covered 100 times already, but the sticky should have it.

 

No, the sticky is very well made . It's meant to give an overview of the various options available for running Windows on a Mac, but not intended to give all the nitty gritty details on actually going about setting it up. In fact, it's very simple to get VMWare/Boot Camp/Parallels setup to run Windows to begin with.

If running on Boot Camp, you'll find the drivers on the Leopard DVD. Startup Windows, and run the boot camp setup in there. Think it pops up automagically...

If running Parallels/VMWare, there is a menu option to install the drivers auto-magically as well. Couldn't be simpler.

Single-tap on trackpad for clicking is mysteriously not supported when running via Boot Camp.

Besides that pretty much everything works in Windows in Boot Camp.

When running via Boot Camp, put two fingers on trackpad and click the single mouse button. When running via VMWare/Parallels, do the two-fingered tap on the trackpad (assuming that is enabled in OSX preferences).

Hold the function key and press back-space.

Function Key + Control + Alt + Backspace

It's not really zero-button, since the entire trackpad is the button anyway. Not sure on gesture support... probably not there yet.

When running in Boot Camp, I believe there are utilities on the web you can find to do overclocking. I don't recommend it as Windows runs a bit hot on the Mac.

Yes, OSX is required for Boot Camp to work. When creating the Boot Camp partition, you can shrink the OSX partition all the way down. I think the smallest you can make it is about 5 GB.

No need to. The Leopard DVD has them all.

Very well, at least when running the 32-bit version. You can get the 64-bit edition working, as many have claimed success with it but needed to do some driver hunting.

None really, Windows (via Boot Camp) works normally with all the Mac's hardware (except for the trackpad thing). In my experience, Vista handles external screens much better than OSX does.

 

thanks for the answers. Really helpful

it might be nitty gritty details, but boiling the answers down to a small list in the sticky could be helpful.

Important info in the sticky IMHO:

- single tap will not work
- gestures will not work (maybe)
- OSX is required and takes up minimum 5 GB
- Windows vista 64 bit will not work out of the box, but needs special drivers. (more info needed)
- instructions on how to do basic stuff like right click or press DEL.


but thanx anyway

 

I have a question regarding bootcamp and vmware fusion on the new macbook pro. For each method of loading windows, can I (and should I) update the graphic card driver? I am currently using the driver from the mac os disc that came with the unit for bootcamp. I noticed that in vmware, the graphics card is list as a vmware graphics card. Also, if I'm using the 9400M card in mac os and running vmware, will it also use the 9400M or will it use the 9600M GT? Is there software in mac os that is similar to fraps for windows to measure frames per second?

 

It's perfectly fine to install the VMWare graphics driver even if you have the drivers for boot camp installed already.

 

Can I install nvidia drivers on the vmware xp image or can I only use the vmware drivers as the graphics card is listed as a vmware vga card?

In regards to the actual graphics card that is running while in vmware, is it the same as what's running in mac os or does it use the 9600M GT (while the mac os is using the 9400M when set to better battery life)?

 

When running using VMWare, it is required to use the VMWare graphics drivers. These are special drivers that in the background use the actual graphics drivers used by OSX.

I'm not sure on this one.

 

I found that VM fusion is the best virtualization software for the mac. it works great with spaces

 

Thx a lot!

 

I am currently running Parallels but i am lead to believe that Fusion might be a bit better. Can i remove Parallels and than load Fusion and not lose my Bootcamp partition and data?

 

Yes, removing Parallels does not harm the boot camp partition. Remember to uninstall the Parallels driver(s) from Windows, so that when you go to install the VMWare Tools package on Windows it doesn't run into any conflicts.

 

Has anyone gamed with vmware?? Just wondering how well it performed for you.

 

I really wouldn't recommend gaming with Parallels or VMWare, as you have to share the system resources between Windows and OS X. Bootcamp is the best because it dedicates all of you resources to one OS, therefore a more pleasurable gaming experience. As for anyone gaming on VMWare, i assume it would be a bit laggy compared to Bootcamp.

 

^it will be very laggy

 

I'm not sure but VMWare Fusion does have support for games built with DirectX 9.0c. My guess is that as long as you have 3 GB of memory and nothing else running in the background then you can achieve good results with gaming through Fusion on an XP virtual machine. With Vista, I'd say 4 GB of memory is required, giving the virtual machine 2 GB of space to work with.

 

Any news on how to fix the audio distortion and freezing with the New MBP in Vista? Also anyone know if this issue is also happening in windows XP?

 

I have XP (SP3) and there's no audio distortion on my 2.53 unibody...

 

Okay Thanks. I've heard alot about vista issues (and experienced them), but nothing about XP. Hoping not to have to downgrade to XP.... or would that be an upgrade.

 

I am getting a Macbook Pro (Early 2008) for school this January, and I already own a copy of Windows Vista Home Premium 64-Bit, do I need to purchase another copy if I am already using the license on my Desktop?

I also wouldn't mind an opinion on which program I should use. I owned a Macbook several years ago when they first were released and ended up using XP on Bootcamp. I found it fairly annoying having to switch between the two and ended up never using my Mac Partition. I will now be forced to use Mac programs due to schooling, but still want to use applications like Zune (Music), Xfire, Ventrilo, and several games. None of the games are DX 10.

 

Hey Sam, still here?

Have you done any testing with BootCamp/Fusion and Windows 7 beta yet?

 

Generally this is true, but VMWare's build as of December (possibly earlier) sometimes introduces a bug where you irreversibly overwrite *something* that disables Windows Aero Glass and Windows Desktop Management functions if you're using Vista.

You will meet all thresholds for Aero (WPI, GPU, activation, refresh rate, color depth, RAM, edition, registry keys, power management, settings, etc.), but it just won't be there.

Standard ways to fix this (reinstallation of NVIDIA driver, reinstallation of VGA driver (both with full reboots, driver sweeper, registry cleans, etc. of course), reinstallation of Boot Camp, uninstallation of VMWare Tools, etc.) all fail.

The only method that works is an exceedingly clumsy workaround where you uninstall SP1. This will restore Aero, and you can reinstall SP1 afterwards. (Presumably System Restore might work--but I've never tried this myself; also some people have had luck with a full uninstallation of Boot Camp and reinstallation using the 2.0 drivers, but others haven't).


Also, for at least 6 months before this build, VM Tools had a number of other bugs with Boot Camp compatibility depending on your system settings, including reactivation problems, driver problems, etc.

In other words, VMWare Fusion is a great tool, but it has a lot of bugs (even its non-beta releases, so be prepared to do a lot of tweaking yourself and have good backups.

 

I know this is a common topic, I've been searching and reading all over for the past 2 days from different tests done about both VM's so far I'm leaning toward VMware.

I just want to install XP and run some office programs thats it, my biggest concern is USB support is VMware pretty good with hardware you plug into USB to use in the window VM?

It's crazy how flip sided this topic can be, most mac uses love Parallels while most bloggers love VMware fusion. I'm very picky and this decision is hard!!!

 

I use VMware Fusion on my MBP and it runs very well. You can plug in any USB device and have Fusion transfer control over to Windows easily.

 

Why no Virtualbox info in this thread?

 

That's exactly what I was going to say. Virtual box can be slow, but its free.

 

Will windows live messenger work natively on a mac using VM ware/parralels/bootcamp with no problems (macbook pro 17 inch new model)?

If so, which would be better/ (VM ware, Parallels, bootcamp)?

Can you stream video with windows in the above scenario with Linksys router and Xbox 360 to HDTV?

 

can u set(MBP) both video cards on Windows?

 

Hey guys, I was wondering why Windows 7 is taking 3 minutes to load up in VMware Fusion. Any ideas, or is this just how it's going to be (like Vista)

 

Strange, I have been using VBox for a year now, along with Parallels and VMWare Fusion.

While I have found VMWare Fusion (now 2.0.1) to be the most reliable and polished, Parallels (now 4) to be crashy, but polished and feature complete but slow, VirtualBox to be the speediest and reliable while missing complete features that Parallels and Fusion have.

Speed = VBox
Reliability & Features = Fusion
Features = Parallels

 

nothing is perfect...

 

I have finished installing all the software I need on my new MBP, and want to now use Bootcamp to create a partition on which to install Vista Business 64 bit. I will be using the partition to run AutoCAD, and don't intend to do any other work on it (I will install NOD 32 antivirus). I have a 320Gb hard drive, usable capacity 298Gb, and with a free space of 255 GB. My question is, what size partition do I need to make?

I am running NTFS-3G with MacFUSE, so I don't intend to store any data on the Vista partition, I just want to run AutoCAD comfortably. I have read that 30Gb is on the small side, and was thinking to take 50-60Gb. Is this too much? Any thoughts are much appreciated...

 

You should be fine for what you are doing with 30GB, as long as you don't store ALL of your AutoCAD data on the HDD. It's generally just a personal opinion though, based on your data capacity.

 

Hi,

Thanks for a great thread. I've learned a lot already. I have one question though:

For running Visual Studio 2005 - I realize booting up natively in Windows using the Bootcamp partition is the fastest option. Which is the next fastest option?

a. Running the bootcamp windows through VMWare
b. Running a virtual machine on the Mac partition through VMWare

Thanks for any advice.

 

Although the difference is going to be negligible, booting Windows in VMWare from a VMWare optimised partition would be a faster than from Boot Camp. The benefit of using the Boot Camp partition is that you will be using the same copy of Windows in both Boot Camp and VMWare.

 

This fix might have been addressed already but I'm having trouble finding it. I'm running Fusion with Vista but I want to setup bootcamp now. However, it will not let me proceed saying "Back up the disk and use Disk Utility to format it as a single Mac OS Extended (Journaled) volume. Restore your information to the disk and try using Boot Camp Assistant again."

I only have one partition on my macbook pro and it is in the right format. What should I do?

 

How many of you guys here use Parallels or Vmware Fusion ?

 

I use VMware Fusion, and it's been great for me!

 

My girlfriend just bought her first computer, and it is a Macbook. I picked it out because it was the best laptop for her needs. She is away on travels so I have had some time to play with it since it arrived.

This is the first time I ever use a Mac, and I must say I REALLY love it, so much that I myself would like to switch, the problem is that I'm a poker-player and therefore can't make it without windows.

How stable would you say running windows XP in parallels is, are there any complications if you just want to run some pokerclients? (Can't really afford any crashes)
How about boot-camp?

 

A Mac is a PC - it runs Windows just fine in Boot Camp. All of our MacBook Pros have Boot Camp and Windows XP. I have no experience running Windows in a VM on a MBP.