[active]

Hi,

For ages now, I've been waiting for the chance to ditch my PC and use a fast Mac for day to day work, emulating a PC under Virtual PC, where required.

On my 1GHz PowerBook, Virtual PC is ok, certainly fine for demo'ing stuff, but not fast enough for work.

I'm thinking that under the 2GHz G5, Virtual PC should fly? Certainly as quick as a fast P-III, perhaps around 700Mhz?

Anyone tried Virtual PC on a developer G5 machine?

Chris.

[BlackGriffen]

The biggest slowdown from VPC actually comes about because it emulates an ancient video card with the CPU alongside emulating a Pentium. RealPC is supposedly going to be an emulation solution that uses the hardware graphics card (seeing as how they're the same cards on both PCs and Macs) and that thus sees a speed up.

We'll see, though.

BlackGriffen

[tikki]

Originally posted by BlackGriffen:
The biggest slowdown from VPC actually comes about because it emulates an ancient video card with the CPU alongside emulating a Pentium. RealPC is supposedly going to be an emulation solution that uses the hardware graphics card (seeing as how they're the same cards on both PCs and Macs) and that thus sees a speed up.

We'll see, though.

BlackGriffen

vapourware! I wish it wasn't the case, but i fear it is.

[Severed Hand of Skywalker]

You guys even think Microsoft will update the app to let it run on a G5?

[l008com]

Originally posted by Severed Hand of Skywalker:
You guys even think Microsoft will update the app to let it run on a G5?

Of coarse, it will just be slow as hell.

[Ghoser777]

Actually, I think Microsoft would be happy if VPC 7.0 was blazing fast on a G5. Remember, they don't sell PCs, they sell software. So if you're using VPC, then you're (most likely) using Windows, Office, etc. I don't see any reason why they would want to sabatoge the project.

All I want to know is:
- Will VPC 7.0 be out soon?
- WIll it be optimized for the G5?
- Will Powerbooks with the G5 be out before late August so I can splurge on one?

Matt Fahrenbacher

[Art Vandelay]

Originally posted by Ghoser777:

- Will Powerbooks with the G5 be out before late August so I can splurge on one?

No. Apple has already stated that it will be a while before the G5 migrates to the PowerBooks.

[besson3c]

Why not just use RDC if you want to do real work?

A G5 is still not going to approach RDC speeds...

[DaedalusDX]

Originally posted by besson3c:
Why not just use RDC if you want to do real work?

A G5 is still not going to approach RDC speeds...

It doesn't approach RDC speeds, but at the same time it runs acceptably fast for a wide range of applications.

The RDC argument breaks apart for me because I'm using a Powerbook that may or not be near my home network. When I'm home, it becomes feasible to use the networked PC. When I'm away, it isn't plausible.

Virtual PC does have its place and its usefulness, and the latest versions definitely run acceptably even on the 1Ghz Powerbook.

[besson3c]

Do you have broadband at home?

Couldn't you just leave your PC left on, and port forwarding enabled if behind a router?

I suppose a WAN connection might start to approach Virtual PC as far as speeds... =)

[active]

True. Funny - I was in JohnLewis (www.johnlewis.com) yesterday and they sell quite a range of Apple products in their stores. However, a guy (who was a PC user) was asking if the 1Ghz iMac would be fast enough to emulate a PC....and the sales rep spent 5 minutes telling him that it would be so slow and unreliable blah blah. Until I advised otherwise.

I'm guessing that VPC 7 (or 6.5) should be out in the Fall, as Microsoft will want to rebrand and sell the product, away from the Connectix brand (which is still owned by Connectix). Would be great if they brought out a version that emulated a more modern graphics card and ran faster on a G5....that would suffice for me and would justify an upgrade.

Chris.

Originally posted by DaedalusDX:

Virtual PC does have its place and its usefulness, and the latest versions definitely run acceptably even on the 1Ghz Powerbook.

[DaedalusDX]

Originally posted by besson3c:
Do you have broadband at home?

Couldn't you just leave your PC left on, and port forwarding enabled if behind a router?

I suppose a WAN connection might start to approach Virtual PC as far as speeds... =)

No. That would be impractical...

Suppose you had a large file to open in some PC application... You'd have to FTP that file to the PC first.

Virtual PC has the advantage that the PC is not separated from the host computer by the ether that is the internet.

[Moose]

Originally posted by Art Vandelay:
No. Apple has already stated that it will be a while before the G5 migrates to the PowerBooks.

Where has Apple stated that?

[Severed Hand of Skywalker]

Originally posted by Moose:
Where has Apple stated that?

True they did say that they are sticking with G4's and the G5's are going to a long WHILE before they hit a powerbook.

[Art Vandelay]

Originally posted by Moose:
Where has Apple stated that?

In this article at MacCentral.

[driven]

Originally posted by besson3c:
Why not just use RDC if you want to do real work?

A G5 is still not going to approach RDC speeds...

This is hard to do on a laptop when travelling, or worse ... on an airplane.

[chrisutley]

I use RDC now, but I'd love to get that old smelly PC the hell out of my office. Of course a G5 won't approach RDC speeds (assuming you have a decent PC on the other end), that's not exactly news.

However, for many of us the G5 boost may finally make VPC just fast enough to use for everyday work. Of course there are lots of variables involved, depends on what software you are running, etc..

I found VPC to be acceptable for standard office apps on a dual 1.25GHz MDD, so I'm thinking I will be in heaven with the G5.

Originally posted by besson3c:
Why not just use RDC if you want to do real work?

A G5 is still not going to approach RDC speeds...

[thefamousmred]

<rant>

Originally posted by besson3c and a zillion other people:
Why not just use RDC if you want to do real work?

Can we please stop asking this question, and the related one (why not just get a real PC)?

There are many cases where a physical PC is not an option. For example, someone pointed out laptops on an airplane. Carrying 2 laptops around sucks (I've done it), so something being able to use VPC is a big help.

There's also the case where you need to test something on (say) Win 98, WinME, Win2k, WinXP Home, WinXP Pro, etc. Do you want to purchase and maintain separate PCs for each of those test environments? Of course not. VPC is a much more flexible solution.

VPC also has nice features like undoable drives and simple backup (copy a file...) that aren't available on real PCs. These features are important if you're (say) testing an installer, where you need to revert the computer to a known state after each test.

So....how about we cool it with the "just use a real PC" posts, eh? That's not always an option, and presumably the people asking about VPC are intelligent enough to figure out that they could indeed use a real PC if that suited their needs.

</rant>


I too am interested in VPC's performance on the G5. To reiterate the original question, has anyone tried it on a developer machine?

[active]

Absolutely. I lack space and don't want two computers - with all the cables that go with them - on one desk. I tend to use a Mac more than I would a PC, so if I could emulate a PC on my Mac...ideal.

To be honest, I don't really *need* a Mac. I do most 'everyday' tasks (email, web) on my Mac and more serious multimedia work (ever used Dreamweaver MX on a Mac?) on my PC. However, I prefer to use a Mac, which is why I'd like a fast Mac to emulate a reasonable PC.

Chris.

Originally posted by thefamousmred:
<rant>

Can we please stop asking this question, and the related one (why not just get a real PC)?

[yaro]

So are we to believe that nobody has ventured to install VPC on a G5? How about Apple?

[workerbee]

Originally posted by active:
(ever used Dreamweaver MX on a Mac?)

Unfortunately, yes.

[PowerTower Fan]

Originally posted by yaro:
So are we to believe that nobody has ventured to install VPC on a G5? How about Apple?

The G5 computers don't ship until August, so we won't know real world tests of VPC on it till then.

[Beerman]

I keep checking (using 6.1 now) but the websites always say something like "shipping this month" or "shipping soon."

I have a technology guarantee from buying Offfice v.X Professional that I get the update free, but I am hoping the Pro version arrives before I am old and gray.

[unimaxium]

Originally posted by Beerman:
I keep checking (using 6.1 now) but the websites always say something like "shipping this month" or "shipping soon."

I have a technology guarantee from buying Offfice v.X Professional that I get the update free, but I am hoping the Pro version arrives before I am old and gray.

They say it will be out in October so that they can make it support the new Windows XP Service Pack 2. I don't know why it takes 2 months to support the update that came out like 2 weeks ago, but hey it's microsoft (what can you expect )

[driven]

Every single thing in Microsoft's pipeline is woefully way behind schedule at the moment.

I wouldn't be a bit surprised to see Longhorn delayed until mid-2007.

I seriously wonder what the problem is up in Redmond these days.
(Is everyone too busy playing with their new Macs?)

[unimaxium]

Originally posted by driven:
(Is everyone too busy playing with their new Macs?)

LOL. Actually I think the problem is that everyone at Microsoft is devoting all their time and energy into trying to find an outfit that Bill Gates actually looks good in.

[driven]

Maybe Bill needs to find Steve Jobs wardrobe designer. :-)

[bradoesch]

Originally posted by unimaxium:
LOL. Actually I think the problem is that everyone at Microsoft is devoting all their time and energy into trying to find an outfit that Bill Gates actually looks good in.

I think suit and pie fits him quite good:

[fiesta cat]

Originally posted by driven:
Every single thing in Microsoft's pipeline is woefully way behind schedule at the moment.

I wouldn't be a bit surprised to see Longhorn delayed until mid-2007.

I seriously wonder what the problem is up in Redmond these days.
(Is everyone too busy playing with their new Macs?)

XP SP2 is what's up, they made it the priority (and rightfully so) and because of the changes in it, held up VPC/Mac as well as some other products.

It broke a helluva lot of applications and I'm sure MS has been busy working with many of those vendors (MS, for better or for worse, has always been good about backwards/compatability, even at a cost of speed/performance or product development elsewhere).

Behind the scenes, XP SP2 was bigger than many people realize.

I have no doubt they are aching to get VPC 7 out the door - anything to sell more copies of Windows or bring in more revenue for them is a good thing.

[sbc]

VPC looks like it will hit vendors towards the end of Sept and begin shipping in October. I guess possibly by the third week of Oct, maybe?!?!

[bradoesch]

Originally posted by fiesta cat:
XP SP2 is what's up, they made it the priority (and rightfully so) and because of the changes in it, held up VPC/Mac as well as some other products.

I wouldn't think the MacBU has been too busy on SP2 to slow down VPC for Mac.

[driven]

Originally posted by fiesta cat:
XP SP2 is what's up, they made it the priority (and rightfully so) and because of the changes in it, held up VPC/Mac as well as some other products.

It broke a helluva lot of applications and I'm sure MS has been busy working with many of those vendors (MS, for better or for worse, has always been good about backwards/compatability, even at a cost of speed/performance or product development elsewhere).

Behind the scenes, XP SP2 was bigger than many people realize.

I have no doubt they are aching to get VPC 7 out the door - anything to sell more copies of Windows or bring in more revenue for them is a good thing.

So you think all the delayed applications in the pipeline will start pouring out the door in the next few months?

BTW: There are 30some Microsoft applications that are broken or will "behave differently" under SP2 until they fix those.
(Also: FWIW: SP2 totally hosed 15 machines at my workplace out of 40 that were being tested ... we are holding off on the deployment.)

[fiesta cat]

Originally posted by bradoesch:
I wouldn't think the MacBU has been too busy on SP2 to slow down VPC for Mac.

Here's my take (somebody please prove me wrong). I'm thinking using Windows XP under VPC7 will require SP2. The reason why is thus :

If you released VPC before SP2, and then SP2 is finalized after VPC has been out, you have three main categories of bugs :

VPC7 bugs (bugs with VPC7 independent of OS)
SP2 bugs (bugs contained within WinXP SP2)
VPC7+SP2 bugs. (combination of the two above)

By waiting until XP SP2 is shipped and , and perhaps requiring SP2 if running XP under VPC, then you are back to these main bugs :

VPC bugs (bugs with VPC7 independent of OS)
SP2 bugs (bugs contained within WinXP SP2)

With the additional time/checking/testing that VPC7/Mac went through, you have severly restricted the number of bugs that may occur when VPC7 and WinXP SP2 are combined.

I'm probably wrong, I just think that if they released VPC7 up front and then SP2, etc., it seems like it would be harder to pinpoint many bugs later on.

[fiesta cat]

Originally posted by driven:
So you think all the delayed applications in the pipeline will start pouring out the door in the next few months?

BTW: There are 30some Microsoft applications that are broken or will "behave differently" under SP2 until they fix those.
(Also: FWIW: SP2 totally hosed 15 machines at my workplace out of 40 that were being tested ... we are holding off on the deployment.)

Wouldn't surprise me if a lot of applications start pouring out.

I was reading on Neowin or one of the other sites that some companies held off internally on SP2 and internally released partial SP2 fixes that went into the registry and corrected some problems/incompatabilities with SP2. I'm hoping those registry tweaks make their way out into the mainstream. Actually, I probably should start reading the MS newsgroups and documentation, since my company subscribes to all of the MSDN stuff. I'm sure a lot of the registry fixes are listed somewhere in there or in the newsgroups.

[bradoesch]

Originally posted by fiesta cat:
Here's my take (somebody please prove me wrong). I'm thinking using Windows XP under VPC7 will require SP2. The reason why is thus :

If you released VPC before SP2, and then SP2 is finalized after VPC has been out, you have three main categories of bugs :

VPC7 bugs (bugs with VPC7 independent of OS)
SP2 bugs (bugs contained within WinXP SP2)
VPC7+SP2 bugs. (combination of the two above)

By waiting until XP SP2 is shipped and , and perhaps requiring SP2 if running XP under VPC, then you are back to these main bugs :

VPC bugs (bugs with VPC7 independent of OS)
SP2 bugs (bugs contained within WinXP SP2)

With the additional time/checking/testing that VPC7/Mac went through, you have severly restricted the number of bugs that may occur when VPC7 and WinXP SP2 are combined.

I'm probably wrong, I just think that if they released VPC7 up front and then SP2, etc., it seems like it would be harder to pinpoint many bugs later on.

Good thinking. I never thought about this.

[driven]

Originally posted by fiesta cat:
Wouldn't surprise me if a lot of applications start pouring out.

I was reading on Neowin or one of the other sites that some companies held off internally on SP2 and internally released partial SP2 fixes that went into the registry and corrected some problems/incompatabilities with SP2. I'm hoping those registry tweaks make their way out into the mainstream. Actually, I probably should start reading the MS newsgroups and documentation, since my company subscribes to all of the MSDN stuff. I'm sure a lot of the registry fixes are listed somewhere in there or in the newsgroups.

I'm aware of some of the twaeks that you are talking about. The problem with them is that they essentially disable some of the security enhancements that are in SP2 anyway. So ... they aren't a good idea.

As for many apps pouring out ... I hope you are correct. I'm not nearly as optimistic.

[Turnpike]

Originally posted by fiesta cat:
Here's my take (somebody please prove me wrong). I'm thinking using Windows XP under VPC7 will require SP2. The reason why is thus :

If you released VPC before SP2, and then SP2 is finalized after VPC has been out, you have three main categories of bugs :

VPC7 bugs (bugs with VPC7 independent of OS)
SP2 bugs (bugs contained within WinXP SP2)
VPC7+SP2 bugs. (combination of the two above)

By waiting until XP SP2 is shipped and , and perhaps requiring SP2 if running XP under VPC, then you are back to these main bugs :

VPC bugs (bugs with VPC7 independent of OS)
SP2 bugs (bugs contained within WinXP SP2)

With the additional time/checking/testing that VPC7/Mac went through, you have severly restricted the number of bugs that may occur when VPC7 and WinXP SP2 are combined.

I'm probably wrong, I just think that if they released VPC7 up front and then SP2, etc., it seems like it would be harder to pinpoint many bugs later on.

not quite. if they don't require SP2, they'll have 5 categories of bugs; the three you listed and
SP1 bugs
VPC7+SP1 bugs

either way, SP2 + VPC7 will still create its own bugs, requiring it won't eliminate those.

Assuming the main bug fix for SP1 is upgrading to SP2, you are left with the option to either tell people the MUST upgrade to SP2 to fix their bug or the option to work on separate SP1 fixes. Since they'd not do the latter, they might as well get the former out of the way and require it to start with. Save on tech support calls and actually save on customers' nerves... people are happy enough to upgrade to get something to work before they buy it, but they don't like to upgrade just to make something they already bought usable.

[driven]

Originally posted by fiesta cat:
XP SP2 is what's up, they made it the priority (and rightfully so) and because of the changes in it, held up VPC/Mac as well as some other products.

It broke a helluva lot of applications and I'm sure MS has been busy working with many of those vendors (MS, for better or for worse, has always been good about backwards/compatability, even at a cost of speed/performance or product development elsewhere).

Behind the scenes, XP SP2 was bigger than many people realize.

I have no doubt they are aching to get VPC 7 out the door - anything to sell more copies of Windows or bring in more revenue for them is a good thing.

XP2 it turns out was a great big part of Longhorn.

As it turns out Longhorn is going to be about as much as XP SP3. It's XP + SP2 security fixes + new video subsystem + new communication subsystem. The rest has been gutted.

5 years of development for 2 subsystems + security patches? Wow.

Apple's doing something right on the OS front.

There has been some speculation that Longhorn has been vaporware to hold off Linux. I can't wait to see how long it takes to get the WinFS product out the door. (And I'm still hoping that Yukon and Widbey make it for 2005).