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Laptop help for 1st year engineering

 
Old 07-25-2011 at 09:29 AM   #1
mel369
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Laptop help for 1st year engineering
I'm in first year engineering and I just got a macbook pro. I'll need to run windows for some of the programming courses and i know i can do that with either using bootcamp or running a virtual windows desktop. Would it be worth it to run a virtual windows desktop? Because if i only need it for a few assignments than i should be fine with bootcamp right? Also in upper years would it be useful to have? I realize it'll depend on which type of engineering i go into but at the moment i dont know...
Old 07-25-2011 at 10:08 AM   #2
anonanon987
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According to some people on this website, people in first year Engineering can survive on Desktops which are at McMaster University. So, just running bootcamp should be fine but as for your upper year courses I think it depends on what you specialize in.
Old 07-25-2011 at 10:23 AM   #3
TheBrickWall
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You're best off with boot camp, but a lot of my friends use Parallels too. It's sort of like a Virtual Machine that lets you run Windows 7 / XP directly from your desktop, without having to shut down and re-boot it. Don't bother buying it, torrent it instead

http://www.parallels.com/ca/
Old 07-25-2011 at 10:25 AM   #4
jp1390
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I'm running a MacBook Pro with VMWare Windows XP and it works just fine. Most of the programs I use are designed for Windows, but some are offered for Macs as well. It's really not that big of a deal.
Old 07-25-2011 at 12:06 PM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mel369 View Post
I'm in first year engineering and I just got a macbook pro. I'll need to run windows for some of the programming courses and i know i can do that with either using bootcamp or running a virtual windows desktop. Would it be worth it to run a virtual windows desktop? Because if i only need it for a few assignments than i should be fine with bootcamp right? Also in upper years would it be useful to have? I realize it'll depend on which type of engineering i go into but at the moment i dont know...
You can also download a program called VirtualBox and create a small virtual machine within ur macbook pro. It is virtually the same thing. Just make sure you have a windows operating system disc or iso that is on ur computer, so you can install it. If you have more questions please contact me.

Crusade
Old 07-26-2011 at 09:24 AM   #6
mel369
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With VMWare Fusion do you have to partition your hard drive?
Old 07-26-2011 at 09:59 AM   #7
blackdragon
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My roommate had a macbook he bough from titles in first year, he had hell for c03 and d04, lol.
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Old 07-26-2011 at 10:17 AM   #8
Ownaginatios
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I believe the newer versions of VMWare will allow you to run your boot-camp partition as your virtual machine while you're booted into OS X.

One of my professors in second year did that.
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Old 07-26-2011 at 11:49 AM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ownaginatios View Post
I believe the newer versions of VMWare will allow you to run your boot-camp partition as your virtual machine while you're booted into OS X.

One of my professors in second year did that.
Yeah, I'm using VMWare Fusion and I have it open alongside with OS X. Pretty neat how I can drag and drop files between the two windows.
Old 07-26-2011 at 01:04 PM   #10
Leeoku
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cant u just reformat and install a partition with windows?
Old 07-26-2011 at 01:11 PM   #11
kldv
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mel369 View Post
I'm in first year engineering and I just got a macbook pro. I'll need to run windows for some of the programming courses and i know i can do that with either using bootcamp or running a virtual windows desktop. Would it be worth it to run a virtual windows desktop? Because if i only need it for a few assignments than i should be fine with bootcamp right? Also in upper years would it be useful to have? I realize it'll depend on which type of engineering i go into but at the moment i dont know...
Hi Mel,

For your first year courses, your best bet is to use bootcamp.
Some of the software tends to be resource intensive (especially graphics), and can find parallels and vmware somewhat underwhelming.
In terms of buying parallels or vmware, like you said, it really does depend on upper years? Last I checked, vmware was doing better, but parallels can be a bit more straight forward to use.
If you are tech savvy, it is possible to get wine running on a mac, and that nullifies any real reason for having vmware or parallels.


As for partitioning... Yes, bootcamp requires you to create a partition, no it does not erase everything on your computer while doing it. No, vmware and parallels do not require you to make partitions. Both are capable of using the bootcamp partition. Generally, you're best to reserve a minimum 20 GB of space for Windows.

tl;dr Bootcamp will be just fine for you.
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Old 07-29-2011 at 06:44 PM   #12
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are the mac iterations of the software difficult? why do people have trouble with macbooks?? for engineering.
Old 07-29-2011 at 06:52 PM   #13
anonanon987
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Quote:
Originally Posted by dide101 View Post
are the mac iterations of the software difficult? why do people have trouble with macbooks?? for engineering.
Some programs aren't compatible with the operating system which runs on Macs
Old 07-29-2011 at 06:58 PM   #14
Commie8507
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Quote:
Originally Posted by dide101 View Post
are the mac iterations of the software difficult? why do people have trouble with macbooks?? for engineering.
Software incompatibility has been eliminated ever since Apple switched over to Intel Architecture. If you buy a mac, get 8gb of ram they go for around 45-50, unscrew the bottom slide in the new ram download vmware/Parallels and you now can run any windows based software. The only mac i would not recommend you getting if you plan on running windows is the 15 inch. The drivers do not include automatic switch and you will be stuck with the dedicated graphics card, which will reduce your battery and generate a lot of heat.

dide101 says thanks to Commie8507 for this post.

dide101 likes this.
Old 07-29-2011 at 07:11 PM   #15
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Ahhh there we go 13" it is!



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