VirtualPC on Mac Mini- Easy & Fast!

[id-sign]

After reading how slow VirtualPC was to install and run, I was afraid of being very unhappy with it. (I have a Mini 1.5Ghz w/ 80 gig HD & Superdrive.)

However, I had the program along with the included Windows 2000 installed, configured and running in under 45 minutes with no problems at all! I then installed my one PC program that I need (that doesn't exsist on Mac) along with it's large database again with no problems, and in no more time than it took to install on the actual PC. The program is a very basic database w/ search and cross references, but runs just as fast as I was used to.

The included Windows programs(pinball, etc...) ran fine as well.

Don't fear VirtualPC if you need it- I got it off Ebay for $100 less than retail.

 

[strider42]

After reading how slow VirtualPC was to install and run, I was afraid of being very unhappy with it. (I have a Mini 1.5Ghz w/ 80 gig HD & Superdrive.)

However, I had the program along with the included Windows 2000 installed, configured and running in under 45 minutes with no problems at all! I then installed my one PC program that I need (that doesn't exsist on Mac) along with it's large database again with no problems, and in no more time than it took to install on the actual PC. The program is a very basic database w/ search and cross references, but runs just as fast as I was used to.

The included Windows programs(pinball, etc...) ran fine as well.

Don't fear VirtualPC if you need it- I got it off Ebay for $100 less than retail.

Its good for things like that. But anything that really is crunching the numbers or needs 3d graphics will suffer more. lots of ram helps too.

 

[yellow]

Well, there's no doubt that Win2k is MUCH faster under VPC than WinXP. Hell, a mouse in a running wheel is faster.. but I suspect you've not tried to update Windows yet in VPC?

 

[mduser63]

Virtual PC is simply not the slow-as-molasses, unusable beast that most people here make it out to be. I use it on my PowerBook occasionally to run PSpice, which is actually fairly number intensive at times (electrical circuit simulations), and it is perfectly usable. The interface is snappy, and while simulations take longer than on a real PC, they don't take so much longer as to be annoying. My brother uses Paint Shop Pro in VPC on my Power Mac, and he has commented about how fast it runs. I do run Windows 2000, not XP, and I've turned off unnecessary background services.

 

[dornoforpyros]

hmm I'm running Windows 98se and in my experience it is slow as mollasis in january

 

[Maxiseller]

I second that. Painful to run XP even with 1G Ram.

It will be interesting to see what effect the intel macs have...

 

[WehoMacUser]

Guest PC

I purchased GuestPC and think it is good. I use it to run Quicken 2005. I use Mac Quicken now but was using PC Quicken 2005 before I switched to mac in October.

 

[cubist]

VPC 6 and 7 are very good. Older versions are much slower. Also, you must have lots of RAM. For a W2K VPC, you should have 768MB or more of real RAM, and allocate 512MB to the VPC.

I have a W2K VPC which is set up for remote access to my office. I connect to the VPN within W2K and run Outlook, PVCS, C and Java compiles, file and database maintenance, everything works great. Plus, I have the machine burned to a DVD-R, so I can move the whole thing to another machine if I want. I love it - why work any other way?

As for XP, XP is a pig even on PCs. It's remarkable how sluggish even the most recent PCs feel running XP. It's constantly nattering at you about do you want to do this? do you want to do that? Those background activities chew up a lot of resources. You can turn off most of the automatic stuff (like indexing all your files, all the time) which will help. I don't recommend using XP with VPC.