Hey Guys, I'm in process of purchasing a laptop. I looked in to all the laptop discussions in this forum.
I have few more questions. If I purchase a Macbook Pro.... I think I want to install windows 7 on it on a bootcamp. What I am wondering is what kind of price range I am looking at for additional add on(i.e. mac version of microsoft office, mac version of windows 7, etc...)....

Do I actually need to purchase mac version of windows 7 ????

I heard that you can install windows 7 - in bootcamp and when you are in mac os you can just install vmware and select from the windows 7 from bootcamp. So you dont have to restart your computer to switch between os. Is this true?..

Let me know your opinion.

Thanks

There is no "Mac version of Windows 7". There is just Windows 7. You buy the disk, and you install it. BootCamp is simply the name of the software on OS X that guides you through that installation process. You can get Windows 7 from the Titles Bookstore for around $99.

I'm not sure why you want to install Windows 7, but if you feel like you need to get it for school, don't. (If that's the case, why are you buying a Mac anyway?) Just buy your Mac, and go to school. I see that you're in Information Techonology. Profs will let you know if any software you need if Windows-only, or if it is cross-platform compatible (a lot of times, they are). Only if the software is Windows-only, then buy Windows 7. Otherwise, save your money.

Of course, if you want to buy Windows 7 for whatever reason, go ahead. I'm just giving you a suggestion. Based on you post, it sounds like you think you need to buy it immediately, which you don't (and shouldn't).

As for Microsoft Office, there is a Mac version of Microsoft Office 2011, sold at Titles Bookstore for $95. Seeing as you are getting a MacBook Pro, I would suggest getting the Mac version of Office over the Windows version, as OS X will be your main, permanent partition.

There's also iWork (Apple's version of Office), which is much less buggy, much faster, and much easier to use. Pages and Keynote (the iWork version of Word and Powerpoint) are generally considered to be better than their Office counterparts. The third part of the suite, Numbers, is quite a bit more dumbed-down compared to Excel. iWork is also cheaper than Office – $60 for all 3 (you buy them separately via the Mac App Store). The only problem is that there are compatibility issues between Office (which the majority of people use), and iWork.

EDIT: I left out the VMware Fusion portion of the question because, while I do know about it and how it works, my opinion is that it's a waste of money (for my usage). I only use my Windows partition for gaming, so I'm not going to need to frequently use any "essential" Windows software while in OS X. Of course, by the sound of it, you aren't sure what you're going to be using Windows for. And based on that, it sounds like you aren't going to be using Windows a whole lot. And based on that, I don't think VMware is for you. It'll be a waste of $50 bucks.

If you don't want to go purchasing the mac version of all the software you need, and would rather use the Windows version - I would highly recommend VMWare Fusion. It has a mode where it can integrate its programs installed on its Windows 7 partition with your Mac desktop (only visually mind you), and make it look like you're actually running Windows programs on your mac.

The only downside is that your battery life will suffer a bit, because as you can imagine, running two operating systems simultaneously isn't easy.

you can always torrent windows 7, but I would buy PC because it's cheaper, more supported and I hate apple.

try this http://www.macinsiders.com/showthrea...ity-63074.html