Is 2GB enough for Fusion and XP? How 'bout Vista?

[CalMin]

Looking at the new MacBook Air to replace my 12" Powerbook. I like small laptops. It's a flaw, I know. Regardless, this thread is not about which laptop to choose. If I went with a MacBook Air, I am constrained to 2GB RAM. I currently run Fusion w. XP on my Alu iMac and it runs like a champ, but that beast is maxed out to 4GB.

Anyone running this setup with 2GB? What about Vista (I know it's a RAM hog, but I've only ever used it on a Dell with 2GB).

The kind of things I'd want to do are surfing IE-only websites and MS Office type tasks with custom work macros.

 

[clevin]

do you have to allocate certain amount of memory for fusion?

I suggest 512Mb RAM for XP. and 1G for vista.

 

[webgoat]

i've tried my mbp with 4gb of ram using fusion by allocating 3 gb to mac os x and 1 gb to vista ultimate and vista did not run very smooth but i guess it was bearable... i've since set it to 2 and 2 and both os run very smooth

 

[CalMin]

i've tried my mbp with 4gb of ram using fusion by allocating 3 gb to mac os x and 1 gb to vista ultimate and vista did not run very smooth but i guess it was bearable... i've since set it to 2 and 2 and both os run very smooth

Thanks for the replies.

So a MacBook Air which maxes out at 2GB total RAM, probably won't work all that well with a Vista Virtual PC then. I would not be able to afford allocating more than 1gb to Vista.

 

[posner]

boot camp as alternative?

I'm in the same boat. I have an '07 Mac Pro for working at home, and it runs Fusion beautifully with 5GB. Now I want to replace my 4yr old 12"PBG4 and I'm weighing MB vs MBP vs MBA. MBP seems like overkill given I'll work mostly on the MacPro, but it can handle plenty of RAM. MB can also take it up to 3GB and would probably be sufficiently powerful for road work, but now the MBA brings the temptation of a truly portable road machine. So I wonder if Fusion can run off .5GB in a pinch; and I suppose Boot Camp is always a backup option. Hmmmmm...

 

[webgoat]

don't the new macbooks support 4 gb of ram? and half a gig of ram will be fine if running xp... vista definately needs at least 1

 

[ClassicBean]

I run Fusion on my 2.0 Ghz iMac. It has 2 GB of RAM. I've allocated 512 to Windows XP. It runs smooth. Neither OS seems slow. I also run it on my MBP (2.16 Ghz, 2GB RAM). Runs great as well.

Wall I'm not sure how the processor would effect the performance, 2 GB of RAM should be great. Vista, however, is another story. That was terrible. Ran slow as rat feces.

What's more, I used to run parallels. I switched to Fusion when I got Leopard as Parallels wasn't working properly and their customer service is not very helpful. I found Fusion to be much faster, much simpler to install and use. It's also a lot faster booting up from a frozen state than Parallels was.

Simply put, I liken Parallels to using a PC and Fusion to using a Mac.