Macs & Boot Camp

[Harbo]

My PC died on me the other night and left me helpless!
I had being toying with the idea of buying a compact laptop for a while and after a quick visit to PC World and John Lewis I bought the small Macbook Pro.
I still need to get to grips with it but I am so impressed that I am tempted to replace the PC with a Mac?
However I have a lot of PC software which I would still like to use (like CoralDraw) and have been reading about Boot Camp which allows you to partition the HD and run windows on it.
Has anybody tried it and are there any pitfalls?

Rod

 

[Linny]

Boot Camps works perfectly.

No mac programs to use instead of Corel Draw?

 

[Harbo]

Thanks - it's just that I have a lot of templates and standard details done in CoralDraw that took many hours to draw up. I could not face having to redo them

Rod

 

[RogerS]

Just make sure that you still keep your anti-virus stuff etc up-to-date on the Windows partition. I'm afraid that the Mac 'halo of protection' doesn't extend over the partition boundary. :wink:

 

[Balbus]

I'm told VM ware is easier — though not free.

What software do you rely on though?

 

[Harbo]

I use most of the stuff in MS Office but my wife can get Office for Macs for about £20 so that should not be an issue?

I use Adobe Photoshop CS2 but can probably get a Mac version?
I do not want to buy a new version of CoralDraw as I do not use it that often but have a lot of templates I created for people I do Consultancy work for.
Spent a lot of time doing them in the past!
There's probably other stuff that I might need to use that might prove important? It would be nice just to have the option of Windows XP until fully migrated?

Rod

 

[Balbus]

I don't know if it helps, but according to Adobe, Illustrator can open native CorelDRAW 10 files directly. Illustrator is pretty much the standard vector graphics program in publishing, though it's far from trivial to learn . . .

Photoshop and all the Adobe "Creative Suite" programs are available for the Mac — which is where most of them originated. They're pretty scriptable too, which personally I love.

 

[kityuser]

I'm told VM ware is easier — though not free.

What software do you rely on though?

http://www.virtualbox.org/

check it out 100% free, works, end of..... I've used all three Vmware, parallels and virtualbox.

I would go the VM way........ it seems a hassel to re-boot into bootcamp

also VMs can be backedup pretty much by copying one file, thats it, the whole "drive" or machine. Its GENIUS!!!!


Steve

 

[woodshavings]

I use VM Ware running both Vista and XP on my Mac, it works a treat. (I have some programs that are not compatible with Vista, hence both XP and Vista)
It runs all my old PC programs, including ms office and you can swap data between the pc and Mac programs.
I have installed Open Office on the MAC, its freeware and is compatible with MS office.
John

 

[Harbo]

Is it VMWare Fusion you use?
I have also seen that Parallels is cheaper to buy but is it as good?

Looking at the Open Office site do they do a English (UK) version?

Anybody used MS Office for Macs - there seems to be some bad reviews about it?

Thanks for the advice

Rod

PS my new Macbook has a different keyboard layout/symbols to the ones shown in the help page which is a bit confusing? Also it did not come with Snow Leopard (I only bought it last Thursday from John Lewis) it seems that there is no free upgrade from Apple? Planning to give JL a ring next week!

 

[kityuser]

Contact apple , I was in the same position with pather/tiger and got a free upgrade

Steve

 

[woodshavings]

Harbo, yes, it's VM Fusion.
OpenOffice has UK english for spelling and grammar.
HTH John

 

[rex_wood]

Besides OpenOffice, you may try Neooffice.

But I will recommed you to keep using PC. Although it may work to open your CorelDraw files and templates in Adobe Illustrator, it is not gurantee that you can use it happily. At least that's my opinion.

I only tried VMware. I think the performance of virtual software is not good enough. Especially for vector drawing purposes.

But I guess native software such as Bootcamp might work much better as long as you can solve all the drivers issues and so on. So I will say go to a PC, or use the bootcamp unless you need to run 2 operation systems at once and switch between them frequently.

 

[gidon]

Rod
The bootcamp drivers on the unibody Macbook Pro aren't very good. The sound doesn't work properly and the mouse movement is a little jerky.
I use Parallels for Office 2007 and other Windows stuff - you can try both (Fusion and Parallels) for free and see what you prefer. They both do a similar job - and the good thing is you can use the bootcamp drive as your virtual drive - so you can boot into it when you really need to but for day to day stuff you can use it through Parallels. (-ve side on that is that it's not a virtual drive - changes you make are permanent and also you can't pause the virtual machine). But if you're on 2GB of RAM stick another 2Gb or RAM (which will mean buying 2x2GB RAM) - and give Vista 2GB - XP will run on much less.
Cheers
Gidon

 

[Harbo]

Thanks for the advice everybody - I went in the end to VMWare Fusion running XP. The bits of PC software I have migrated (including CorelDraw) all seem to be working well.
I have downloaded the Open Office Suite and that seems OK. It is said to be more compatible with the earlier versions of MS Office than 2008?

The annoying thing is that I got my PC up and running very simply - the Serial Sata connection had come adrift from the HD!!
The North Bridge Chipset fan is still making noises so may have to replace it with a solid type cooler? Abit, the motherboard manu. has gone bust.

The Mac has been a revelation and I am very impressed with it.

Rod

 

[wizer]

Wow ABIT has gone bust? I used their boards for years when I was into making my own machines. What a shame.