Quick Parallels Q.

TriedandTested · 5 Jul 2006 at 12:36

Am i right in thinking that if i was to have OSX and WinXP running on a Mac that XP works EXACTLY like it would on a standard laptop/PC? I basically need to know that if i have a Mac on an Win2k3 server that i can switch to XP, load outlook, check emails, sync my PDA etc etc...exactly as i would if i was using XP on it's own.

i understand that apps using non-universal binaries may suffer from being a little slower than 'normal' but other than that it'll work in the same way, yes?

Same goes with adding hardware to WinXP..autodecting etc?

Thanks

CocoPops · 5 Jul 2006 at 12:58

Correct

Everything is "passed thru" so all usb devices etc, networking etc etc.

XP doesn't even "know" it's a virtual machine.

TriedandTested · 5 Jul 2006 at 15:44

Thank you kindly...just needed reassurance as i'm thinking about getting one and we're ordering some for work.

stuppy · 5 Jul 2006 at 20:25

Instead of me starting a new thread,

When Parallels is running Windows XP, is it running it "natively"?

punky_munky · 5 Jul 2006 at 21:01

It's virtualized - http://www.intel.com/technology/computing/vptech/

Faster than emulation, not quite native.

RobH · 6 Jul 2006 at 00:00

Another question, what happens when you plug in something like a USB Flash Drive, how does it work out if it should go to the Host or Guest OS? I am guessing it is shared somehow as a USB mouse may be needed by both.

Beepcake · 6 Jul 2006 at 08:44

RobH said:
Another question, what happens when you plug in something like a USB Flash Drive, how does it work out if it should go to the Host or Guest OS? I am guessing it is shared somehow as a USB mouse may be needed by both.

You don't pass things like mice and keyboards through, parallels sorts all that out automatically with it's mouse and keyboard drivers. For other devices you have a menu where you can pick which things to 'connect' to the host from a list of things plugged into the Mac.

Hope that makes sense

fearby · 6 Jul 2006 at 22:17

Not quite perfect

There is no 3D video acceleration with this emulation although I think they are working on it.Gaming is therefore not as good as on a proper Mac.

Beepcake · 6 Jul 2006 at 22:21

fearby said:
There is no 3D video acceleration with this emulation although I think they are working on it.Gaming is therefore not as good as on a proper Mac.

Lol, gaming via a virtual machine is just silly

There's always BootCamp or possibly CrossOver if that's what floats your boat.