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Saturday, June 17, 2006
As previously reported on SvenOnTech, you can run Windows or any other x386 operating system right now on your Mac. The company that’s making this all possible, Parallels, has just went gold with its Desktop for Mac product. This means two things, really. One, a really stable way to run Windows, or OS/2, or Linux, on your Mac is here. Two, you have less than 30 days to score a discount on this otherwise expensive software solution for your Mac.
If you were smart enough to buy your full license during the beta like we were, than you should have already received your license via e-mail. If you don’t score on this deal now, the $49.99 price will soon become the full retail price of $79.99. Don’t forget, Parallels Desktop does not include the operating system, that is extra (from another retail source.) If you’re running Linux or have an old copy of an OS lying around, no biggy, but Windows XP ain’t cheap. So you’ll want to do all you can to save money now.
We’ve been running this solution and it’s various betas for a few months now and we love it. It’s fast, lean, and stable. Installing operating systems that don’t have bootable CD-ROM installs, such as OS/2, suck, but hey, just to be able to run our old beloved IBM operating system on our MacBook Pro makes us happy in the end.
June 17th, 2006 at 18:59
You stated that without the discount this is expensive software??? Uh, I don’t think so. After the 30 day discount of $49.00 the price goes up to $79.00. That is a steal! Virutal PC costs hundreds more… and it doesn’t even come close to the speed and beauty of Parallels.
June 17th, 2006 at 19:24
Of course, as the original article mentioned, Parallels does not come with a copy of Windows operating system, you need to provide that yourself, and Windows is the “expensive part of Virtual PC. That is the reason Virtual PC “costs hundreds more” is the inclusion of the Windows oprating system. Without that included, it would probably, cost-wise, be on par with the full price of Parallels, though not at all close to the speed and ease of use of Parallels.
June 18th, 2006 at 0:29
The future 10.5 may include such capability to run windows system as parallel provides.
June 18th, 2006 at 0:50
Let’s see $50 (now) or $80 (in the future) for virtualization software that works well from Parallels. Or…. nothing.
Yep, that’s right folks there is no VPC that works on Intel Macs. Right now Parallels is not only a good bargain, it’s the only game in town for virtualization on intel macs.
Buy XP online for $90 with a license and you have just spent $160 for a 2nd computer.
June 18th, 2006 at 4:03
QUESTION: If you do BOTH BootCamp AND Parallels on one computer, do you have to re-install Windows into the Parallels virtual location? I’m guessing you do. Can you use same Windows registration/activation codes?
QUESTION2: Is there any risk to computers running BootCamp having different partitions formatted differently? How is computer keeping them separate?
I have MacBook Pro 17″ and used BootCamp to set up Windows partition. I don’t use it much, as the lack of drivers and full functionality is deterrent. I’d use it move virtualized. But not sure I want to take the memory up to do that
David
david@ferleger.com
(please ALSO reply to my email address if possible)
June 18th, 2006 at 8:02
David. Yes, you can use the same license of your XP install with both Parallels and Boot Camp since they are on the same machine. However, Microsoft may have some stipulation concerning VM (vitual machine) so you may want to read the EULA on that.
OS X manages your partitions and simply ignores the Windows NTFS partition (it actually can’t read it.) It’ll leave those alone and you should be fine with them.
Parallels creates a file for your VM, so it’s not even a file system. Nothing to worry with the various installs you do with Parallels.
As to the resource draw of Parallels, I use Windows98 and other low system requirements operating systems. XP only applicatons are very few (such as Media Player 10) and I have no use for them. The applications I do use run fine in Windows98. You may wish to go that route if you’re looking to save on resources.
BTW, you subscribed to comments, so you should get this via e-mail, too.
June 18th, 2006 at 11:00
The future 10.5 may include a hyperthrust vector interociter, but until Apple mentions such or, better yet, rolls such a beast into their beta program, it’s pure speculation.
My own opinion is that while Apple is happy to support Windows as a last-mile solution for vertical applications there’s probably a limit to how much they want to let Windows developers off the hook in creating native Mac applications. Enable Windows co-existance, sure, but probably not encourage.
Furthermore Apple shipping a virtualization system, particularly after tacitly endorsing the Parallels one, would be widely seen as Apple poaching on their VARs. They’ve taken enough heat on this over Sherlock, Widgets, and iWeb, that they’re aware of the concern and would be wary of repeating it.
June 18th, 2006 at 23:34
Ummm… “OS X manages your partitions and simply ignores the Windows NTFS partition (it actually can’t read it.)” … care to review that statement? …