I'm thinking of running win7 in VMWare.
It will be on a 21.5" iMac with a 3 ghz C2D and 4 gbs of RAM.
What kind of performance will I see? How much RAM should I dedicate to the virtual machine?
Any advice from users already doing this would be appreciated.
Comments
I'm thinking of running win7 in VMWare.
It will be on a 21.5" iMac with a 3 ghz C2D and 4 gbs of RAM.
What kind of performance will I see? How much RAM should I dedicate to the virtual machine?
Any advice from users already doing this would be appreciated.
Since you got a max 4GB box, I say 2GB to Win7
If your looking for performance, games, 3D, heavy CPU, you should look into using Win7 in Bootcamp and then using that config in VM (will import your Win7 from Bootcamp as a VM file) for slower uses like Office etc along with OS X.
Soon as you got Win7 installed in VM and updated, take a "Snapshot" of this configuration as a master, label and date it. Then make a copy of the first configuration, install any applications and update those, save this configuration and label it.
Then make another copy of this second one to use online and use, it's likely to get hosed sometime in the future, so you transfer files to a USB key/disk, run a ClamXAV on the USB key (in OS X) delete the hosed configuration, copy the second one and import the files from the USB key.
Also it's good to do this when updates roll around, this way your updating a pristine copy, no bad stuff comes along for the ride. Remember anti-virus has to know what it's looking for to work using definitions of known code, so if your Win 7 gets pawned, it might be something not seen before or specific in your hacked Win7. So updating a pristine copy is the best way to go.
Bootcamp doesn't allow you to revert to earlier Snapshots like VMware does, so your screwed installing a fresh copy if it gets hosed. Penalty for needing performance. Keep the Bootcamp Win 7 off the internet expect for updates and it should be fine.
Also DO NOT give Win7 read/write access to your OS X side of the fence. In fact, if you haven't already done so, create a new Admin User, log into that and turn your first Admin User to General User and log into that from now on.
Doing that prevents a lot of bad sh*t from happening in case something has a flaw, as your not running as Admin, but as General User with limited privileges. The only hassle is you have to give your Admin name and password once in awhile if installing stuff or trying to move apps or change certain settings in System Preferences, it's worth the slight trouble for the added protection.
VMWare gives you the ability to turn on/off USB ports, drives, iSight, etc access to Win7, so it's really nice feature. There is also a integrated feature, where Win7 apps run in a window on OS X, so Win7 doesn't even need to appear. But you can choose to have the taskbar in OS X as well, weird.
Do learn how to clone your boot drive and BootCamp, to a external firewire 800/400 drive, it will save your bacon one day for sure. It's better than TimeMachine as you can boot from it as use it if your internal drive dies or gets totally screwed up. So you can get online, get help, download software etc to access the drive and recover files, erase the drive and even reverse clone!
I keep several clones time dated just in case we have been rooted for quite some time unawares. If you got a breached machine, c boot from the OS install disk and use Disk Utility to Erase and Zero the drive before hooking up any backup or clone.
Cloning Bootcamp is another process with another software, don't use Filevault if you plan to clone, it's not bootable far as I know, it's just a encrpyted image.
http://theappleblog.com/2010/01/12/h...-to-a-new-mac/
Also explore the other operating systems at VmWare, there is Ubuntu which operates nearly like OS X with a slightly different UI. You can also install Ubuntu via a ISO disk from Disk Utility, instructions at Ubuntu site.
There also is a Chrome OS VM file floating around, so one can run that in VMWare logging into Google with their account.
Enjoy your trip with alternate OS's.
VirtualBox is FREE.
I already have purchased VMWare, if not that would be a great idea.
I use Xp in VMWare and it works fine. I would like to add this to another machine. But getting XP is difficult and Win 7 is reportedly much better. This will be for a machine at my business so I don't care about gaming. I want stability and reasonable performance.
I already have purchased VMWare, if not that would be a great idea.
I use Xp in VMWare and it works fine. I would like to add this to another machine. But getting XP is difficult and Win 7 is reportedly much better. This will be for a machine at my business so I don't care about gaming. I want stability and reasonable performance.
Win7 in VM will do you fine then.