smellslike$tome

Is anyone using a Mac besides me?

If anyone is, are you also using Virtual PC vers. 7.0 (or any other version)?

Is anyone using Microsoft Office:Mac Professional (which also contains Virtual PC 7.0)?

If anyone is using at least Virtual PC, how well is it working? What sort of PC based software are you running through it? How about Quickbooks?

I have a set of business related disks that I desperately want to use but they won't run on my Mac nor is there a Mac version. I was on the verge of purchasing a laptop just so I could access these disks when I found out about this software. It would be great if it will work well but the last thing I want to do is spend $400 for software that isn't worth a flip and won't do what I want it to, only to end up purchasing the lap top anyway.

Teetorbilt

Not much help here, basically a bump because I'm interested. My first online computer was a Tandy 1000, second was an Apple GS II. Remember Applespeak?

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MattCoops

remember that black and green screen

Ed the Roofer

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Ben76

I use a Powerbook G4. I use 2004 Office for Mac, but don't have Virtual PC.

DerrickVWS

What version of Mac OS are you running? And how old is your Mac?

I know the new Mac computers can now run Windows XP as well. My friend just got a Mac Laptop and it came with Windows XP installed as well. I was surprised! He just has to hold down a key during bootup to choose whether he boots into the Mac OS or Windows XP. He has a Mac Powerbook Pro. Now that is one beautiful laptop.

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DerrickVWS

One more thing, Apple makes a product called "bootcamp" that allows you to install Windows XP on your Mac. However, they require that you are using "Mac OS X Tiger v10.4.6 or later."

You can learn more here:
apple.com/macosx/bootcamp

(copy paste link above into your browser)

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smellslike$tome

I have a Power Mac G4 w/dual Power PC G4 processors at 450 mhz. Because I have Power PC processors, it is my understanding that neither "boot camp" nor "parallels" can be used by me (Intel based chips only). Anyone with a Power PC processor must resort to either an emulator such as Virtual PC or something called Darwine which is still under development and completely beyond my comprehension.

The problem I'm afraid of concerning the emulator is that it is reportedly very slow. I don't know exactly what that means since "very slow" is a somewhat relative statement. If it is slower than my patience will tolerate then I don't want to buy the software ($400) however if it is simply just slow enough to annoy me on a grumpy day (not that I ever have those ) then it may be worth it as long as it does what I want it to do.

DerrickVWS

It looks like Virtual PC 7 is only $195 with a Windows XP Home license included.

http://www.amazon.com/Microsoft-Virt.../dp/B0002NT5HO

Not bad.

Also, look at some of the reviews on Amazon. One person mentioned upgrading from 256meg RAM to 768megs made a HUGE difference.

"I have to admit that when I first installed Virtual PC on my G4 PowerBook, it was achingly slow. So slow that it was practically useless, seriously. However, I found that when I beefed up my memory to 768MB from the preinstalled 256MB, the software came alive."

Here's another interesting site with visitor feedback about their experiences:
http://www.macwindows.com/VPC7.html


If I were you... I'd just get an older used or cheap new Dell laptop and use that instead. I'm 99% sure you'd bypass several large headaches.

The Dell D600 sells for about $400 on Ebay. (But there is always potention for a headache when you buy a used laptop...)

Good luck!

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smellslike$tome

Yeah, I definately misquoted the price for VPC7. What I was thinking of was Office:Mac Professional which comes with XP, Office, and VPC7 which if I can get a good enough feeling about is what I would purchase rather than just VPC7.

My memory currently is 384 SDRAM. Maybe a little lite.

As for buying someone's cast off, I have enough trouble handling one of these beasts right out of the box, there's no way I'm paying for something that I don't know where it's been, who it's been with, or what it's been doing !

Let me ask you this since apparantly you are using VPC7. Have you had any difficulty running any non-microsoft titles? The disks I want to use are rated for Windows XP so I guess I should be ok?

DerrickVWS

Well, you can't hold me to this, but I think it will work for you.

But, you need to:

• upgrade your RAM to 1gig
• ensure you have about 50 gigs of free disk space
• When you run your specific application in Virtual PC, make sure it is the only software running. Don't run more than one in XP if you can help it.
• Good luck!

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