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iluvmymactoo · Oct 31, 2004, 05:58 PM

I only actually need VPC to test my web site designs on a pc platform. I was wondering if anyone had it installed on their iBook and how it performs?

Sophus · Oct 31, 2004, 08:44 PM

Originally posted by iluvmymactoo:
I only actually need VPC to test my web site designs on a pc platform. I was wondering if anyone had it installed on their iBook and how it performs?

It works okay on an iBook G4 800 with 640 RAM. For browsing, working in Office etc. Not a speed demon, but sufficient for everyday work that is not too heavily depending on CPU and disk access (R/W).

Abit667 · Oct 31, 2004, 10:32 PM

Runs pretty good on my G4 1Ghz with 768mb ram. I play TA all the time in it and its pretty smooth, I mainly have to use it for this chemistry program that I have to use every couple weeks for class..

Much more responsive then the other VPCs. I actually use WinXP on this and its pretty quick.

iluvmymactoo · Nov 1, 2004, 02:28 AM

Thanks

raviley · Nov 4, 2004, 06:33 PM

I was wondering what your specs were on your VPC xp systems. I own a 12" powerbook rev. B w/ 512mb of ram and my emulated intel processor is only 296 mHz. It's seems extremely slow for me. Is it the same for you guys, and any tips to speed it up? Thanks.

hldan · Nov 7, 2004, 08:31 PM

Originally posted by iluvmymactoo:
I only actually need VPC to test my web site designs on a pc platform. I was wondering if anyone had it installed on their iBook and how it performs?

Your best performance will be with Windows 2000 Professional. Win2000 does not hog system resources nearly as much as XP. It's mainly a 295Mhz PentiumII so XP is hardly usable.

iluvmymactoo · Nov 8, 2004, 04:42 AM

Originally posted by hldan:
Your best performance will be with Windows 2000 Professional. Win2000 does not hog system resources nearly as much as XP. It's mainly a 295Mhz PentiumII so XP is hardly usable.

Yea that's what I thought actually.

But will I be at any disadvantage not using xp over 2k professional?

Voch · Nov 8, 2004, 08:08 AM

Actually, Windows XP is as good as Windows 2000 in Virtual 7 if you shut off all the eye candy (see this "How to change visual effects" writeup on Microsoft's site). I tune my P4 2.8Ghz Windows XP box at work this way, too.

Voch

iluvmymactoo · Nov 8, 2004, 05:33 PM

Did anyone notice in the 10.3.6 update there was a mention of "better compatability with ntfs" ?

What do you think that would mean?

If when installing window$ into your virtual pc it is formatted as fat32 it can then be mounted onto the desktop so that NAV 9 can scan it for viruses, however as ntfs this cannot be done.

Has anyone actually formatted their installation as ntfs and since the 10.3.6 update tried to mount it to their desktop?

hldan · Nov 8, 2004, 06:54 PM

Originally posted by iluvmymactoo:
Yea that's what I thought actually.

But will I be at any disadvantage not using xp over 2k professional?

With the eye candy turned off XP it will run much better, however Windows 2000 Professional is compatible with more software than XP so turning off all the cool eye candy on XP essentially brings you back to Win2000. For now Microsoft seems to be shipping only the XP version when you buy VPC7.

TSans · Nov 16, 2004, 04:01 PM

I know that Microsoft doesn't officially support Windows 98 SE with Virtual PC 7, but has anybody tried using it? I'd rather use 98 vs. 2000 because I think it'll run better. Also, the windows programs I need to use are real estate programs that were designed for 95/98. This shouldn't be a problem, should it?

DennyA · Nov 16, 2004, 07:33 PM

Is Virtual PC 7 any faster than VPC6 on the iBook?

swichd · Nov 17, 2004, 10:00 PM

Originally posted by DennyA:
Is Virtual PC 7 any faster than VPC6 on the iBook?

Yes, about 1.5x faster IMO (didn't run benchmarks

).

swichd · Nov 17, 2004, 10:01 PM

Originally posted by TSans:
I know that Microsoft doesn't officially support Windows 98 SE with Virtual PC 7, but has anybody tried using it? I'd rather use 98 vs. 2000 because I think it'll run better. Also, the windows programs I need to use are real estate programs that were designed for 95/98. This shouldn't be a problem, should it?

I use NT 4.0

and '98 is an option for setup so i think it would work.

discotronic · Nov 18, 2004, 12:51 AM

Originally posted by TSans:
I know that Microsoft doesn't officially support Windows 98 SE with Virtual PC 7, but has anybody tried using it? I'd rather use 98 vs. 2000 because I think it'll run better. Also, the windows programs I need to use are real estate programs that were designed for 95/98. This shouldn't be a problem, should it?

I use 98 and it works just fine.

RichieZ · Nov 20, 2004, 11:45 PM

OMG its so fuking slow! I'm running XP Pro on my 1.2g iBook w/ 768MB

its much worse than empulating redhat on a wintel machine. Also VPC is terrible compared to the other emulation software, VMware

swichd · Nov 21, 2004, 12:11 AM

Originally posted by RichieZ:
OMG its so fuking slow! I'm running XP Pro on my 1.2g iBook w/ 768MB

its much worse than empulating redhat on a wintel machine. Also VPC is terrible compared to the other emulation software, VMware

I've never empulated anything, but virtual pc and VMware workstation are two entirely different products. Right from VMware�s website (http://www.vmware.com/products/desktop/ws_features.html)

How Does VMware Workstation Work?
VMware Workstation works by enabling multiple operating systems and their applications to run concurrently on a single physical machine. These operating systems and applications are isolated in secure virtual machines that co-exist on a single piece of hardware. The VMware virtualization layer maps the physical hardware resources to the virtual machine's resources, so each virtual machine has its own CPU, memory, disks, I/O devices, etc. Virtual machines are the full equivalent of a standard x86 machine.

VMware will not work with Mac OS, since it doesn�t have the needed x86 processor. Virtual Pc is a true emulator. It emulates every aspect of computer system. No pun intended, but you�re comparing apples and oranges. What other choice do we have for Mac OS X? Bochs? If you think Virtual PC is slow, Bochs crawls at about 1/50 of the speed.

troymurray · Nov 21, 2004, 12:15 AM

Originally posted by RichieZ:
I'm running XP Pro on my 1.2g iBook w/ 768MB

its much worse than empulating redhat on a wintel machine. Also VPC is terrible compared to the other emulation software, VMware

Did you disable all of the visual stuff in XP?
Start --> Control Panel --> System --> Advanced --> Performance Settings --> Adjust for best performance --> OK --> OK

RichieZ · Nov 21, 2004, 02:57 AM

Originally posted by troymurray:
Did you disable all of the visual stuff in XP?
Start --> Control Panel --> System --> Advanced --> Performance Settings --> Adjust for best performance --> OK --> OK

yes i did

RichieZ · Nov 21, 2004, 02:58 AM

Originally posted by swichd:
I've never empulated anything, but virtual pc and VMware workstation are two entirely different products. Right from VMware�s website (http://www.vmware.com/products/desktop/ws_features.html)

VMware will not work with Mac OS, since it doesn�t have the needed x86 processor. Virtual Pc is a true emulator. It emulates every aspect of computer system. No pun intended, but you�re comparing apples and oranges. What other choice do we have for Mac OS X? Bochs? If you think Virtual PC is slow, Bochs crawls at about 1/50 of the speed.

iwas not aware VMware was not avaliable for OS X, i'm just sayint thate VPC is really slow on my ibook, and VPC is much slower than VMware on my x86 wintel PC

troymurray · Nov 21, 2004, 07:06 PM

Originally posted by RichieZ:
VPC is much slower than VMware on my x86 wintel PC

I agree with that statement.

PubGuy · Nov 21, 2004, 10:38 PM

I've had both VPC6 and VPC7 installed on a first-generation Titanium Powerbook G4-400 with 384 MB RAM...this is not exactly a speed demon.

I've found that Windows 2000 offered the best speed. I tried XP and turned-off all the eye-candy and some other extra services...Windows 2000 was still more responsive. I upgraded from VPC6 to VPC7. There was a marked improvement in speed, especially menu performance and browsing directories. Everything seemed to run faster using VPC7 (without making any other changes).

FYI : Miscrosoft states that you must have Windows 2000 with Service Pack 4 as a minimum in order to install the Additions for full functionality. THIS IS NOT TRUE. The Additions install fine, it just won't install the Virtual Printer. However, you CAN install the Virtual Printer manually and it is fully functional. Reason I mention this is that I've tried both the "raw" install and the SP4 upgrade. The SP4 upgrade seems slower. For my needs, I didn't need any of the features provided by the SP4 and wanted to keep it simple. YMMV.

Dr.Michael · 06:28 AM

Originally posted by iluvmymactoo:
I only actually need VPC to test my web site designs on a pc platform. I was wondering if anyone had it installed on their iBook and how it performs?

Powerbook g4 1000 here. Slow slow slow.

This is a question that is always asked with every new version of vpc.
The answer is always the same: It works as a testplatform. Not for every day work. 7 is faster than 6. But faster does not mean fast or even usable.

Better invest your money in a cheap Pentium 3. Then you can run linux and a couple of versions of Windows. This is a lot more pleasent experience. You can even access the computer with your iBook via vnc/ssh and thus you can live with every cheap monitor since you need it only for setup/install.

swichd · Nov 22, 2004, 06:05 PM

Originally posted by Dr.Michael:
Better invest your money in a cheap Pentium 3. Then you can run linux and a couple of versions of Windows. This is a lot more pleasent experience. You can even access the computer with your iBook via vnc/ssh and thus you can live with every cheap monitor since you need it only for setup/install.

That's the best idea so far. You can find them for less than VPC and it would be much faster. To tell you the truth, I got VPC for $10 and I only use it to play with when I've got nothing to do.

2004G4 · Nov 23, 2004, 02:17 PM

I don't think you can get a decent laptop for the price of VPC/XP (199 at amazon) unless you know something I don't

Also, kind of inconvienient carrying two laptops around.

I've heard of other people who had good results with VPC7. Personally, I am going to try it. I'm a PC user, and network admin so there are some apps I need to run on PC. As long as things are usable that's fine with me, it would also help to smooth the transition a bit. I just ordered an ibook and an extra 1gb ram...I'll let everyone know what my impression is good or bad.

Originally posted by swichd:

That's the best idea so far. You can find them for less than VPC and it would be much faster. To tell you the truth, I got VPC for $10 and I only use it to play with when I've got nothing to do.

troymurray · Nov 23, 2004, 02:25 PM

I wish M$ would provide a "Test Drive" of VPC7 in addition to their cash cow Office, so I could try VPC7 without spending the cash and being "stuck" if it's horrible.

Dr.Michael · Nov 23, 2004, 03:21 PM

Originally posted by 2004G4:
I don't think you can get a decent laptop for the price of VPC/XP (199 at amazon).

Well, no one was talking about a notebook or about carrying something around.
I use a tower Pentium 2/450 that I got for 30�, equipped with a 30 GB hd for 15�. This is my test environment and it works perfect since 2 years.

Thraxes · Nov 23, 2004, 08:32 PM

VPC on my iBook... well for one it is quite amusing seeing the irritated faces when I boot up the Windows2000 emulation. On the other hand it is not that quick as some here make it out to be. The Speed VPC posts is indeed almost 300MHz but my old 300MHz PII fileserver is much much quicker.

It is useable though, I need it to run Codewarrior for school projects on embedded CPUs. For Java and C I just use xCode but that is not an option when writing Assembler for the Motorola HC12 CPU.

Otherwise it is way better to look for native ways to do things. I found some opensource stuff that will let me write and simulate HC12 Assembler stuff using mostly Unix tools. Unfortunately I really need the Project data and code that I get from my school in Codewarrior format.