Virtual Windows

[JoesMorgue]

My HackIntosh is still a Winders booting machine. I have to go to the BIOS boot screen to get OSX. I can live with that, but, there are times I want to do something REAL quick in Windows that I don't know how to do in OSX (nube)

I was told by a friend that his Mac runs Virtual Windows better than Windows can run Virtual Mac.

So...

Can I do it with the boot partition that already exists on this machine, or must I do a seperate setup?

[Taisto]

In real Mac, you can. With BootCamp. In HackMac, as far as i know it doesnt work. You can of course install Parallel desktops, or VMWare Fusion and run Windows virtually - it works really great, but you would have to install it again inside the virtual drive which the app creates for the OS ( it gives an option to boot from separate windows partition, but it never worked for me ). There`s free trial of Fusion on their site, so you can try it.

[naquaada]

There are three virtualizers for OS X, Parallels (http://www.parallels.com/) was the first one and is very good developed, Then there's VMWare Fusion (http://www.vmware.com/products/fusion/) and the last one is VirtualBox (http://www.virtualbox.org/), a free virtualizer for MacOS X. All virtualizers are using disk images, so a only a big file will be used as Windows partition, you don't have to repartition your hard drive. This isn't slow, I'd say the Windows in Parallels is booting faster than my real Windows I used. Of course it's again better to store the disk images on a second harddisk. The problem of virtualizers may be the slower graphics, so it isn't too great for games. But there are no problems with applications.

A different solution is CrossOver (http://www.codeweavers.com/). It allows to install Windows programs directly in MacOS with a kind of Windows API emulation called Wine. It's not neccessary to boot a virtual machine every time, but it may be not so compatible as a virtualized Windows. There's also a special version for games available.

[Voyn1x]

In real Mac, you can. With BootCamp. In HackMac, as far as i know it doesnt work. You can of course install Parallel desktops, or VMWare Fusion and run Windows virtually - it works really great, but you would have to install it again inside the virtual drive which the app creates for the OS ( it gives an option to boot from separate windows partition, but it never worked for me ). There`s free trial of Fusion on their site, so you can try it.

It is possible to boot your windows partition on AMD OSx86, at least with Parallels - something to do with editing a plist to bypass the intel check if I remember correctly. This may not be necessary when using the voodoo kernel as this spoofs the system into thinking it's intel.

[naquaada]

Yes, here's a thread how to remove the Intel check in Paralles 4 (http://www.infinitemac.com/f36/parallels-4-on-amd-t1600/page4.html). But Parallels 4 needs a virtualization technique, you have to check if your cpu supports it.

[JoesMorgue]

You people rock!

Now all I needs to do it take care of small details and I will REALLY push this machine!

As a test, I ran EVERY program I could on my Mac. Processor load STAYED low, and memory usage never passed 1/2 of my 3 Gigs of RAM.

[JoesMorgue]

OK, I have VMWare installed, but I don't see an option for using my Vista partiton without BootCamp.

I have VIsta configured to dual boot, and once I gets my MBR straightened out I will use that.

What do you recommend? VMWare, Parallels? VirtualBox? Crossover?

If I can, I would LOVE to use the Vista I already have/use.