Best way to run Windows 7

[fins1up]

I'm coming back into the light and have a new iMac on the way. Question is, Which is the best way to run Windows 7? Bootcamp install, dual boot, VMware?
Ideally, I would like to have both environments available at the same time and just switch back and forth. I should have enough processor to do both, however don't want to impact reliability. Any suggestions or real life experience would be appreciated. Thanks!

 

[spinnerlys]

Booting Windows on the Mac

VMWare Fusion, Parallels Desktop and Virtual Box will be able to run Windows inside Mac OS X (side by side), the performance depends on the resources you assign to the VM and the applications you run in Mac OS X and Windows at the same time.

 

[maflynn]

There is no "best" way but rather which way fits your needs the best.

bootcamp has advantages in that windows has direct access to the hardware giving you the best performance. The downside is you need to reboot out of OSX and into windows

vmware's fusion, offers great stability but its performance is not as great. The advantage of vmware is that it runs under OSX and no need to reboot the machine to start up windows.

Parallels is another option providing better performance then vmware but is more unstable and buggy.

 

[scienide09]

Really, it all depends on what you're doing. I use BootCamp mostly, but also have a Parallels install that will allow me to access my BootCamp partition without having to reboot.

Basically, use Bootcamp for gaming or anything that's going to stress key system components (RAM, GPU, etc.).

Virtualization works for less intensive tasks, such as testing your website for cross-browser compatibility, browsing, email, etc.

Both Parallels and VMware will allow you to virtualize your BootCamp partition. Last time I checked, Virtualbox (a free virtualization program) doesn't yet have this feature up and running.

 

[wirelessness]

If you are going to install windows it makes good sense to use Boot Camp for the initial install. Then when you use one of the VM apps you can easily import the Boot Camp install in to the VM. This gives you the most flexibility for your efforts of installing Windoze 7. Again it does depend on what you need to do with it but this way you only have to perform ONE install and you get both environment options.

 

[fins1up]

Update

I appreciate the info. I used Boot Camp and installed Windows 7 Home Premium. Then I installed Parralles ver 5. (yep, I know ver 6 is on the
way). Everything works like a champ! A couple of little tweeks here and
there were required but over all everything was a snap to install. I've been a long time Quicken user (currently Home & Business 2010) which is one reason I wanted Windows. Apparently the new Mac version of Quicken is lacking many features, but Windows version runs great via Parralles access to the Boot Camp install.
Thanks again for the assistance.

 

[scienide09]

Glad to hear you're up and running. Sounds like you maybe hit a few small bumps along the way, but good for you for troubleshooting past it and making it work.