Boot Camp or Paralells

Founder_film

Founder_film

Founder_film

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Ordered a 1.83 MacBook with 1Gb or RAM and Apple Care for £762 the other day on student discount, got to wait 2 weeks though :(

Anyway, not sure if this has been covered already but what would you guys recomend Boot Camp or Paralells?

My main question is does Paralells share the file space with OSX meaning can I not partition my hard drive? My problem is I dont want to take up say 20Gb of my hard drive for windows and then not use it!

Thanks in advance.
 
Parallels is a virtual disk. Bascially looks like a file that sits on your Mac hard drive. You allocate x MB of space to represent the hard drive.

My Windows XP setup in Parallels has 8GB - the drive in Windows shows as an 8GB drive. The actual file on my hard drive is 3gb. The file gets larger as you put more stuff in up to the size you specify in the Parallels config.
 
If you need performance from Windows - Bootcamp otherwise Parralells will be quick enough for any normal office applications for example :)

Thats what I've heard...I haven't had chance to try it..yet :p

BeatMaster :D
 
Oh ok so there is a definate performance difference even though windows is running natively through Paralells? I kind of like the idea of being able to switch from OSX to Windows easily.
 
For Performance use Bootcamp.

If you just want to run something that isn't intensive (like editing videos or music etc) then use Parallels. Parallels will not run games either... yet :)
 
Founder_film said:
Oh ok so there is a definate performance difference even though windows is running natively through Paralells? I kind of like the idea of being able to switch from OSX to Windows easily.
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Parallels is a virtual machine that runs inside Mac OS X, meaning performance is not as good as it being installed properly. Also there is no GPU emulation (as stuppy said yet), so 3D tasks are out the window.

Boot Camp allows you to properly install Windows on your Mac so it takes full advantage of all your hardware.
 
Personally I use Boot Camp, as well as it being free you get everything working in Windows (for example your superdrive, usb's etc.) where as with parallels you only get some of your usb's working and i don't think your superdrive works.

Besides, whats the point in paying $79.99 for Parallels when you can install Boot Camp completey free and with the release of Leopard will bring a massive improvement (so you don't have to reboot).
 
MagSafe said:
Personally I use Boot Camp, as well as it being free you get everything working in Windows (for example your superdrive, usb's etc.) where as with parallels you only get some of your usb's working and i don't think your superdrive works.

Besides, whats the point in paying $79.99 for Parallels when you can install Boot Camp completey free and with the release of Leopard will bring a massive improvement (so you don't have to reboot).
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Because people who just want to use it for applications like Office, or pretty much any application that isn't a system hog (for instance if you need a specific piece of software that you can only get for Windows) don't have to shut down MacOSX, and reboot into Windows. Parallels sits nicely next to MacOSX. With VirtueDesktops aswell you can assign Parallels to a different desktop, hit a defined key on your keyboard and boom you are in your Windows environment. No rebooting, no loading times. Just there. Then to go back to MacOSX, hit the key again and you're there.

You will also find that you will not be able to access your HFS+ formatted volumes from Windows without the use of extra software (MacDrive). I use MacDrive for when I connect my External HDDs up to my PC and it works nicely, but you have to pay for the software. Parallels you can simply access your drives connected through MacOSX over the "Network". But because the drives are physically attached to the computer, you actually get transfer speeds as if the drives were directly connected to the Virtual Windows machine.

Basically - if you are going to play games, or use apps that require a lot of power like video editing, go bootcamp. Otherwise use Parallels.

Try Parallels anyway - there is a free trial version on their site.
 
stuppy said:
No rebooting, no loading times.
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It takes around 10 secs to switch between OS's with Boot Camp ... with the hascel involved with Parallels and 80 dollars is it really worth it?
 
I do wonder if the full blown bootamp in leopard will allow users to launch less intensive windows apps from within macos. There's meant to be some more features added before it's final.


A.
 
Andy C said:
I do wonder if the full blown bootamp in leopard will allow users to launch less intensive windows apps from within macos. There's meant to be some more features added before it's final.


A.
Click to expand...


That won't be part of Boot Camp - that is virtualisation. There is talk of that being included in Leopard.

Anyway - 10seconds to boot into Windows XP? I think not. And its not JUST about the loading times, its the fact you have to completely stop what you are doing in MacOSX, close all your programs, effectively shut down and restart in a different OS.

Lets just face facts. Gaming, Bootcamp, anything else, Parallels. I cannot believe you are even arguing this point?
 
Right I think I will go with Boot Camp as it means I can run games cause I wanted to try Half Life 2. I think I will have to sacrifice 20Gb of my hard drive which would leave me a nearly 40Gb left for OSX. I am going to try to keep my MacBook light on stuff like music and photos as they are all on my powermac anyway and I have my iPod. I really liked the idea of switching between the two OS' but this way I can work more separately.
 
Founder_film said:
Right I think I will go with Boot Camp as it means I can run games cause I wanted to try Half Life 2. I think I will have to sacrifice 20Gb of my hard drive which would leave me a nearly 40Gb left for OSX. I am going to try to keep my MacBook light on stuff like music and photos as they are all on my powermac anyway and I have my iPod. I really liked the idea of switching between the two OS' but this way I can work more separately.
Click to expand...

Good choice :)
 
Well I got the RAM upgraded and got Apple Care. It always takes longer with Apple if you get upgrades. Also I got it a couple of days later as I had to get it sent to my parents with me being a student and all its still my billing address. Actually it was about 6 days later. You might be lucky for 2 weeks, but not sure, is it stock? Or have you added upgrades?
 
I doubt you will be lucky enough for 2weeks. Apple must use the cheapest delivery service TNT offer!!

At my work we use TNT and we ship worldwide with them and all the packages they offer are half the time of when they ship apple's stuff! I can't see why shipping takes so long!

Its about 3-5days to build and 2weeks to ship! If your lucky.

Hopefully my macbook will arrive soon! I'm sure BeatMaster feels the same!
 
Having used the Parallels trial version, I decided to buy it - £35.99 inc delivery.

I may try BootCamp in due course.
 
I use bootcamp - only because I boot to Win"Game"dows for ;) games.

Bootcamp is annoying as some may have pointed out, one have to basically shut down on OSX and reboot into Windows, so one cannot run OSX programs whilst gaming on Windows.

Also, one cannot read OSX HDD unless one gets a third party program - but funny enough, if Windows is formatted in Fat32, OSX can read and write a Windows partition.

Will try Parallel's trial version soon - too many things at hand.
 
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