[Nodnarb]

Hey guys,

I'm trying to set up my dads new MBP and install windows/fusion. I'm giving it a test run on my computer before his arrives, and i had a question:

I had a boot camp partition on my MBP, and installed the fusion trial and have been using unity mode and it's been great. Only negative is that "mirrored folders" don't work with using the boot camp partition.

Is there any disadvantage to installing XP Pro straight through fusion, and not installing it through boot camp? I could see the mirrored folders being great for him, but I still do like the ability to be able to natively boot into windows if he needs to.

What is the best route to go?

Thanks for the help.
Nodnarb

[RMXO]

I'm no expert in this subject but I have done lots of trial & error though.

I recently bought a new MBP and installed Vista x64 Ultimate under Fusion & Boot Camp and loving it. To answer your question, I never selected the "mirrored folder" option since I dont like it. I prefer the 1st option & checked the box under it. You can transfer files back & forth between OSX & Boot Camp OS via fusion. Just run the Boot Camp parition under Fusion and transfer your files that way. All I did was drag & drop.

I originally just had Vista x64 in Fusion but I wasn't able to play games properly doing that hence me installing Vista x64 under Boot Camp to fix that problem I had under Fusion. Normally if I had to use any non- gaming Windows software I would just use fusion but to play games I would use Boot Camp.

I'm not sure how your dad plans to use Windows but I would highly suggest having both options: using Windows via Fusion & booting into Windows via Boot Camp.

[Cold Warrior]

Fusion does not allow you to install Windows directly onto your Mac. It will always run inside Fusion.

Boot Camp is just a program that Apple makes for us to ease the process of installing Windows on our Macs. Boot Camp partitions your Mac's hard drive to make it easy for the Windows installation disc to see the new partition. Boot Camp also burns a drivers disc for you too so that Windows can work well with your Mac's hardware (things like the iSight camera, etc.).

I hope that clarifies some of what's incorrect in your first post. You will get better performance from Windows by booting it natively vice running it in Fusion (although Fusion generally runs quick enough for me). I use both ways personally: Fusion if I'm doing light work, but natively booting if moderate to heavy work in Windows.

[TheoCryst]

Originally Posted by Cold Warrior 

Fusion does not allow you to install Windows directly onto your Mac. It will always run inside Fusion.

Boot Camp is just a program that Apple makes for us to ease the process of installing Windows on our Macs. Boot Camp partitions your Mac's hard drive to make it easy for the Windows installation disc to see the new partition. Boot Camp also burns a drivers disc for you too so that Windows can work well with your Mac's hardware (things like the iSight camera, etc.).

I hope that clarifies some of what's incorrect in your first post. You will get better performance from Windows by booting it natively vice running it in Fusion (although Fusion generally runs quick enough for me). I use both ways personally: Fusion if I'm doing light work, but natively booting if moderate to heavy work in Windows.

The way I read it, he was considering doing a native Boot Camp install, and then having Fusion use the new partition. A best of both worlds solution, if you will. That's what I would do, all other things equal. Convenient if you just need to run Outlook/IE once in a while, but all the power of your native hardware if you need it.

[Nodnarb]

Thanks RMXO, that helps.

Originally Posted by TheoCryst 

The way I read it, he was considering doing a native Boot Camp install, and then having Fusion use the new partition. A best of both worlds solution, if you will. That's what I would do, all other things equal. Convenient if you just need to run Outlook/IE once in a while, but all the power of your native hardware if you need it.

Yeah, that's what I meant, sorry if I was unclear Cold Warrior.

My question really is on some underlying workings of Fusion that I don't fully understand (only started using the program 2 days ago, and can't find clear cut answers on their website).

The main reason I was thinking of using the mirrored folders (which means installing windows directly through fusion rather than boot camp). Is there an alternative way to sort of emulate the way mirrored folders works for a novice mac user?

the situation i'm thinking of is this: he is a first time mac user, so it's going to be a lot learning mac at the same time as fusion and office 07 (currently uses '03 but now needs '07). I think the mirrored folders would be extremely useful so he would pretty much have ONE documents folder (this is really the only one I care about, pictures and music matter much less) rather than a windows documents and a mac documents folder.

i'm planning on setting him up using Microsoft office 2007 via fusion so he'll be doing most document editing in windows Word, etc. but will also have iWork installed. He will also use Windows for outlook as you said, and to conncet to his Exchange server at work.

Is there an easier way to keep the documents transferrable but keep the boot camp intact in case it's ever needed? --- Or is direct booting into boot camp not really ever going to be needed (he's not going to be playing any Windows games or doing anything super graphics/CPU intensive in Windows)

Thanks a lot for your help everyone.

Nodnarb

[Nodnarb]

Follow up question:

How does Time Machine work with all of this? Am I correct in assuming that, if I have my drive partitioned for boot camp, Time Machine will only backup the Mac side? How would I backup windows doing this, or would I need a separate drive and software?

And if I didn't do boot camp, would Time Machine back up the Virtual Machine created by Fusion just as if it were another file? How does this work?

The answer to this, and the mirrored documents question, are all I am waiting on to decide which way to install Windows on his new machine.

Thanks again for everyones help.

[JKT]

If you install Windows as a VM on the Mac, it is something that you will actively want to exclude from your TM back ups - because the VM is installed as a disk image of several GBs, TM will recognise any changes to even a small file under Windows as a change to the entire disk image. In other words, it will back up the whole disk image's worth of several GBs each time*. Unless you are happy for your backups to take forever, it isn't recommended and you will need an alternative strategy for backing up your Windows VM (e.g. manually, once or twice per week).

As for a Boot Camp partition - I don't think TM sees the partition, so it won't back it up. However, I'm not 100% sure. If it does see the partition, I suspect it would have the same issue as it would have the Windows disk format and not the Mac's HFS+ disk format. Therefore, it wouldn't be able to interpret which individual files have changed and would have to back up the whole lot again. Having wrote that, I really don't think TM will see the partition at all.

With respect to your original question, if your dad is only going to be using Office in the VM, I would not bother with Boot Camp. It'll prove to be more hassle than it is worth in the long run.

* This isn't strictly accurate - some disk images are 'segmented' into smaller chunks (e.g. sparse disk images) and TM will only back up any of the segments that are changed. However, this can still be hundreds of MB to GB worth of data and will still be very slow.

[JKT]

Btw, the performance hit in Office is going to be minimal when running under a VM compared to natively, so I honestly would not bother with Boot Camp if the only concern you have is speed.

With regards to sharing files between the two OSs, I'm not sure how Fusion works (I have Parallels and VirtualBox), but I suspect it will offer you the ability to either block access to the Mac OS entirely, other than through the typical network share features of each OS, or permit you to create a shared folder for depositing files into that both OSs can see, or to allow you to see the entire Mac Home folder in Windows, so you can share seamlessly between the two. I know Parallels lets you do this, so I would be surprised if Fusion didn't.

There are advantages and disadvantages to each mechanism - the first is most secure by far, but awkward to use, the latter is easiest to use but means that your Mac Home directory is vulnerable to Windows malware (if it can wipe or access your Windows files, then giving the VM full access to your Mac Home directory means it can wipe or access them there too). Personally, I would stick to the middle ground of a shared folder between the two, so that the only files that could get affected by any Windows malware would be the ones in that folder alone (in addition to the ones in your Windows file system of course).

[JKT]

Originally Posted by JKT 

Unless you are happy for your backups to take forever, it isn't recommended and you will need an alternative strategy for backing up your Windows VM (e.g. manually, once or twice per week).

Btw, this isn't difficult as you only have to drag and drop your Fusion folders containing the VM from one drive to the other. It'll take a long time to copy, but it is just a drag and drop operation.

[Nodnarb]

Originally Posted by JKT 

There are advantages and disadvantages to each mechanism - the first is most secure by far, but awkward to use, the latter is easiest to use but means that your Mac Home directory is vulnerable to Windows malware (if it can wipe or access your Windows files, then giving the VM full access to your Mac Home directory means it can wipe or access them there too). Personally, I would stick to the middle ground of a shared folder between the two, so that the only files that could get affected by any Windows malware would be the ones in that folder alone (in addition to the ones in your Windows file system of course).

JKT, thanks so much for all your help.

I think I'm going to do it the way you advised, which is installing XP directly through Fusion rather than Boot Camp (this way it still leaves the option open for mirrored folders later if we choose too... I'm not sure which way would work best for him since it's also his first mac)

My one last concern is, running through Fusion is essentially 100% like boot camp besides a little speed hit, correct? --- I ask this because I know he's going to need to connect to different servers and stuff at work, and I was leaning towards boot camp just incase there is a hiccup in the setup process we could always just boot into 100% Windows and then it'd just be a normal PC for them to work with.

However, from what you're saying and the reading I've done, it seems that shouldn't be an issue - anything bootcamp can do (without regard to speed) can be done through the virtual machine in Fusion, correct?

I think this is my last main question before making the plunge of setting everything up (computer is still on the way, it left Alaska 3 days ago and UPS doesn't have an update!)

Thanks again for your help.

Nodnarb