Questions about Macintosh, Windows Parallels, Office and other good stuff!

Ronald Epstein · 01-05-2007, 03:36 PM

Okay....

I'm still considering buying a Macintosh desktop
despite the fact that my biggest fear about doing
so is the huge amount of Windows software that
I need to run on it without straying away from the
Mac OS environment.

Fortunately there is Windows Parallels, an $80 piece
of software that opens up a window inside your Mac
OS that allows you to run Windows inside of it.

So, I suppose this question is for those of you that
are actually using that program....

1. Does Windows run pretty fast in the parallel environment?

2. Can I install Microsoft Office in the Windows parallel
environment and run all my Office files? Someone had told
me that I would need to buy the Office for MAC in order
for this to work, but in theory I can't see how this is true.

3. Will Vista most likely run in the parallels environment?

Just a few questions to start off with. Thanks in advance!

Rhoq · 01-05-2007, 04:07 PM

Ron - although I have yet to upgrade to an Intel based Mac (I'm still running my PPC PowerMac G4 1.25), I have seen Parallels in action on a co-worker's brand new MacBook Pro (Core 2 Duo) and Windows runs quite fast (the speed difference between running it in the virtual environment vs. natively under "Boot Camp" is negligible).

MS Office will run just fine on what ever version of Windows you decide to run under Parallels, including Vista. As long as you aren't going to use it for gaming, Parallels should be the only Windows solution you need on an x86 Mac (otherwise you'd want to boot directly into Windows via Boot Camp).

Paul_Sjordal · 01-05-2007, 04:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ronald Epstein

Okay....

I'm still considering buying a Macintosh desktop
despite the fact that my biggest fear about doing
so is the huge amount of Windows software that
I need to run on it without straying away from the
Mac OS environment.

Fortunately there is Windows Parallels, an $80 piece
of software that opens up a window inside your Mac
OS that allows you to run Windows inside of it.

So, I suppose this question is for those of you that
are actually using that program....

1. Does Windows run pretty fast in the parallel environment?

I've never run this particular product (Windows Parallels), but I have experience with Windows emulators from back before Apple moved the Macintosh to Intel architecture, and for most things it ran quite well. There was some performance-sucking overhead, but it was still speedy enough to play games ant whatnot. I imagine that now that the Macintosh is using hardware that is virtually identical to "Wintel" machines, the performance overhead will be even less.

Quote:

2. Can I install Microsoft Office in the Windows parallel
environment and run all my Office files? Someone had told
me that I would need to buy the Office for MAC in order
for this to work, but in theory I can't see how this is true.

What will it cost you to try? To be honest, you won't be disappointed with running the Mac version of Office without emulation. Microsoft does a great job with Mac Office and it works seamlessly with files generated by the Windows version of Office. It even runs the great majority of Office VB macros without a hitch. You'll only run into trouble if the person who wrote the macro used Office VB to make calls to Windows APIs.

Quote:

3. Will Vista most likely run in the parallels environment?

Just a few questions to start off with. Thanks in advance!

If the past is anything to go on, you should probably wait for an update from the publisher of Windows Parallel before attempting to mess around with Vista.

Michael_K_Sr · 01-05-2007, 06:10 PM

I run Parallels at the office and I notice no performance hit with 2GB of RAM onboard. Speeds are definitely better than my Dell laptop, which is admittedly almost three years old. The Windows version of Office will absolutely run within Parallels. The Mac version of Office is nice, but it still isn't running natively on the Intel processors (new version probably not until Q3) We're waiting on our copies of Vista, so I can't comment on the last question.

Ken Chan · 01-05-2007, 06:29 PM

Quote:

Will Vista most likely run in the parallels environment?

It already supports the RCs, and they earlier stated they intend to support Vista when it is generally available.

Quote:

Can I install Microsoft Office in the Windows parallel environment and run all my Office files? Someone had told me that I would need to buy the Office for MAC in order for this to work

Yes; and no, not true. But if you want to access Office documents on a Mac, Office for Mac will work, without Parallels.

Quote:

I have experience with Windows emulators from back before Apple moved the Macintosh to Intel architecture, and for most things it ran quite well

Virtualization, like Parallels, does not have the overhead that emulation did. Some tests here. Of interest, Office in particular ran only about 10% slower than native.

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SethH · 01-05-2007, 07:04 PM

You might consider running Office in Parallels and then downloading OpenOffice 2.0 to use in Mac. OpenOffice is completely free and will open all Microsoft Office documents. It's still a step behind MS Office, but in some functionality it is several steps ahead. It's a very solid setup.

TonyD · 03-19-2007, 04:59 PM

i tried to open the openoffice but it keeps saying no because i dont have osx installed.

Christ Reynolds · 03-22-2007, 12:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TonyD

i tried to open the openoffice but it keeps saying no because i dont have osx installed.

you mean it said you don't have X11 installed. you can install it from your mac OS X disk.

however, you should use neo office, which is the mac port of openoffice.org, no X11 needed.

CJ