By the way, oddly, I was wondering if there's any way to set up a track pad on the Windows side of things to behave like an Apple track pad?? Anybody know of any way to do this???
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MP 7,1 Mac Pro 8.1 - WHAT IF...
- Thread starter maikerukun
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Windows drivers for Apple input devices - Magic Utilities
Native Windows drivers for Apple Magic Mouse, Magic Keyboard and Magic Trackpad. Brings scrolling, middle click and media keys to Apples input devices.
THANK YOU! I will order this nowWindows drivers for Apple input devices - Magic Utilities
Native Windows drivers for Apple Magic Mouse, Magic Keyboard and Magic Trackpad. Brings scrolling, middle click and media keys to Apples input devices.magicutilities.net
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Interesting! But that's exactly how I would do it. Stream the Puget TO the Mac Pro. I love that plan and thanks for suggesting it!
Parsec can also stream (multiple) virtual screens. So if you wanted, you could run the Puget headless and bring it up on the Mac like that.
What got me started down this road, rather than just connecting a PC to my screens, was wanting to be able to take screenshots of PC apps whilst putting together written tutorials on the Mac.
I had looked at something else called Synergy too. Also quite cool for sharing screens / keyboards, albeit in a different way.
So you can stream from a multiple-screen pc, to a multiple-screen mac, and get everything to line up?
Streaming with multiple screens requires the paid subscription, which I'm not using yet. I have experience with HP ZCentral Remote though, which is similar, and that definitely lets you fill all your screens, even with different resolutions, using virtual screens on the host PC.
Also - just checking the Parsec settings, you can actually stream from a host Mac. A few features are missing though compared to PC (e.g. no 4:4:4 colour - https://support.parsec.app/hc/en-us/articles/4407194154253).
Also - just checking the Parsec settings, you can actually stream from a host Mac. A few features are missing though compared to PC (e.g. no 4:4:4 colour - https://support.parsec.app/hc/en-us/articles/4407194154253).
That's EXACTLY what I was wondering considering they're both two screen setups.
Yep, I came here this morning to tell you that LOL. I went there and saw it was available now! But gonna have to play around with it to see what all I can do for me. What's crazy cool is that combined with the Apple keyboard and trackpad tools to let me control the PC as if it were a Mac also means I don't have to memorize new trackpad layouts or anything. I can just record both on my Studio Displays as if it were truly just 2 Macs running in the same dual displays
This is going to be an excellent setup once I have time to do it.
Yep, I came here this morning to tell you that LOL. I went there and saw it was available now! But gonna have to play around with it to see what all I can do for me. What's crazy cool is that combined with the Apple keyboard and trackpad tools to let me control the PC as if it were a Mac also means I don't have to memorize new trackpad layouts or anything. I can just record both on my Studio Displays as if it were truly just 2 Macs running in the same dual displays
This is going to be an excellent setup once I have time to do it.
You can swap the Cmd and Ctrl buttons too, so you don't constantly trigger the Start menu in Windows!
I just installed Parsec. I’ve been switching one of my Studio Displays between my Studio and my PC (and actually have the new Sabrent Thunderbolt KVM arriving tomorrow) but Parsec seems like a great option.
You've had it for a couple of days now. What's your current review on it? Any lag, does it ever freeze? Any bugs you've noticed? How smooth of an experience is it? Like, if someone were to come over and try to get something done on your computer would they even have a clue if one of them wasn't the actual computer running on the system? I'm gonna get it soon as I'm done with my current project. Don't wanna try anything in the middle of work though. Excited to hear your thoughts!
I’m not sure it’s for me yet. I’ve been using a KVM to switch between the Mac and a PC since around 2014 so that’s the workflow that I’m used to. I also just got the Sabrent Thunderbolt KVM this week and I’m liking that a lot. That said, the performance of Parsec is really good but it also refuses to do more than 4K so it’s not going to be more convenient for 5K fullscreen mode than just switching to the PC on the KVM. What it will let me do is have a 4K PC desktop in a window on my Mac that I can throw into the background while jumping between Mac windows or Zoom calls. Parsec is a free trial so you should try it out but you’ll need to use their Warp version for the stuff you want to do. It’s not that expensive so I’ll probably keep it past the trial but I suspect I’m going to primarily be using the KVM.
Trying to find a good triple display displayport KVM is one of my white whales, thats for sure, and I’m not even an expat yet.
Thanks for the detailed response! Is the primary benefit to using the KVM just that you're used to it?
Boy, that "yet" sure does suck. Hopefully they find a way to retain more of us lol.
Yes, pretty much just out of habit. I'm using the PC for AI/ML, certain legacy software development tools that aren't supported on Mac, and of course, games. AI/ML can be done headless already and games you'll always want to switch direct to the PC via the KVM, so it's that middle category of stuff that Parsec is best for and I'm still just use to switching. That said, I'm using a pair of Studio Displays and only one of them switches with the PC, so I do like the idea of being able to use Parsec to drag the PC display window to whichever of the two monitors is most comfortable. I think the way to think about it is if you’re looking for a Bootcamp replacement, use a KVM. If you’re looking for a VMWare or Parallels virtualization replacement, use Parsec.
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Parsec is specifically designed for low-latency screen sharing for gaming. On a wired local network you should only get about 10ms of lag in total (5ms encode / decode).
VMs are not comparable; they have major performance issues (at least without GPU passthrough).
Obviously Parsec is no good for situations where Windows isn’t running e.g. accessing the BIOS and so on.
VMs are not comparable; they have major performance issues (at least without GPU passthrough).
Obviously Parsec is no good for situations where Windows isn’t running e.g. accessing the BIOS and so on.
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I bought it. Didn't realize how cheap it was, so just straight up bought it. it has a 2 week trial which I forgot you mentioned then It's like $100/year, which is fantastic for what it does. Anyway, this is nuts LOL. The only thing I'll say, is that it's a little bit fuzzy, and that's probably due to running 4k on a pair of 5k displays...the lag is very minimal though, and I'm loving this so far. Also, it would appear I can access BOTH my Mac Pro AND my Puget VIA my MacBook Pro! Which means my work on the road just got a serious boost!
It's not perfect "the fuzziness of the image bothers me just a little bit" but it's definitely WAY better than nothing. 99% perfect so far in fact
I bought it. Didn't realize how cheap it was, so just straight up bought it. it has a 2 week trial which I forgot you mentioned then It's like $100/year, which is fantastic for what it does. Anyway, this is nuts LOL. The only thing I'll say, is that it's a little bit fuzzy, and that's probably due to running 4k on a pair of 5k displays...the lag is very minimal though, and I'm loving this so far. Also, it would appear I can access BOTH my Mac Pro AND my Puget VIA my MacBook Pro! Which means my work on the road just got a serious boost!
It's not perfect "the fuzziness of the image bothers me just a little bit" but it's definitely WAY better than nothing. 99% perfect so far in fact
Presumably you’re using 4:4:4 mode?
It's not perfect "the fuzziness of the image bothers me just a little bit" but it's definitely WAY better than nothing. 99% perfect so far in fact
If you create a virtual display in Parsec on the Windows host and set that to a fixed size and then make the Mac client use that size in Windowed mode, it won't be fuzzy, but it also wont be fullscreen if you're using 5K monitors. I definitely would prefere a full-screen 5K mode but part of the reason I use Apple 5K monitors is that I don't like the fuzzy rescaling that Mac OS does on 4K displays. Hopefully Parsec fixes it to stream full 5K rather than the 4K limit it currently has.
I just wish apple would read these kind of threads and understand that they yet again pushes away the most advanced users and die hard fans. It is really sad. I never thought they would actually be content with releasing a mac pro that is worse for 3d than their old one.
So annoying that the m2ultra is such a nice cpu/gpu combo for an imac level computer but there was nothing higher end coming. Knowing this, I wonder if there ever will be a high end mac again. Let’s imagine an m3ultra late 2024 with 50% faster performance across the board. Still not on par with pc gpus. Heck, not even at 100% gpu performance increase it would be close to pc. Just read about a guy on the redshift forum that is returning a maxed out m2ultra studio after evaluation in his workflow where he hoped to use it as a front end/designer workstation. But since IPR perf on heavy scenes is not on par with pc he would be in a disadvantageous situation compared to his competitors. I’m sure that for some people the ultra would still be enough. Still on the fence personally but more and more leaning on skipping this iteration. Probably getting a maxed out m3 mbp16 when that comes around and keep using PC for the heavier 3d stuff.
So annoying that the m2ultra is such a nice cpu/gpu combo for an imac level computer but there was nothing higher end coming. Knowing this, I wonder if there ever will be a high end mac again. Let’s imagine an m3ultra late 2024 with 50% faster performance across the board. Still not on par with pc gpus. Heck, not even at 100% gpu performance increase it would be close to pc. Just read about a guy on the redshift forum that is returning a maxed out m2ultra studio after evaluation in his workflow where he hoped to use it as a front end/designer workstation. But since IPR perf on heavy scenes is not on par with pc he would be in a disadvantageous situation compared to his competitors. I’m sure that for some people the ultra would still be enough. Still on the fence personally but more and more leaning on skipping this iteration. Probably getting a maxed out m3 mbp16 when that comes around and keep using PC for the heavier 3d stuff.
Lol I appreciate the optimism but youd get better results yelling into the void.
The mac pro is a super teeny tiny fraction of apples overall revenue/profits and has been run by MBA people for the last decade. They couldn't give two ***** about the product let alone the actual users. The sole purpose of throwing the M2 ultra chip in this computer was so tim cook and/or the cfo can say "we completed the apple silicon transition" on their next earnings call. We've been a long way out from "i'd rather be a pirate than join the navy"