Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

amgff84

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Sep 22, 2019
379
301
Hey all, so I don't have a need for Windows anymore and sold my main Windows machine in the summer and then my Windows laptop in the fall. I still kept an old pristine Dell Latitude D630C with Windows 10 on it, just because... sometimes, you actually might need Windows for something. Well, that machine has the Nvidia Quadro NVS 135M GPU, and supposedly they were either known to fail, or had terrible driver support, but I believe the GPU on this machine is now dead as it is very slow, shows graphical anomalies, and the screen randomly flashes on and off and a crash report is created afterwards.

I have no desire to replace the motherboard with any of the 3 boards I have for this, I just don't care for it at this point... However, I still need a Windows machine.

Here's the kicker, I have access to a decently powered Windows machine via the Shadow app. The issue with this is some USB devices will not be recognized, probably due to the fact that Shadow is nothing more than a cloud streamed Windows 10 environment.

Soooooo... I installed El Cap on my late 2008 MacBook unibody. Grabbed my Windows 7 32bit disc, and went to town. After trying it out for the day, I have come to the conclusion, that on my specific machine, Windows 7 32bit with only 2.7 GB of RAM available. Yeah, so I lost out on access to all 8 GB of RAM due to the fact that Bootcamp requires a 32bit OS, then factor in VRAM. So here's my point though; Windows 7 32bit actually seems a little less laggy and runs cooler on this machine than it's native El Cap OS. So, heres the thing... Both operating systems are obsolete, and offer no further support. Granted, it's probably going to be okay for a while longer, and there are extra steps you can take to improve your safety such as a supported browser, antivirus (I'm looking at you Windows).

How is it possible that my Windows 7 runs cooler than the Mac OS installed? Another anomaly, Mac will freeze due to the heat, so I use a fan control app to adjust the curve to it won't exceed 78 degrees C.

I have heard nothing but bad reviews (mostly) on Windows with Bootcamp, and in previous attempts on other machines, also experienced worse performance.

What are your opinions? I know she's old, but she's damn good.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.