[Macpartners] MacBookPro / Windows Vista

[Albert Willis]

On May 13, 2007, at 8:42 PM, Marion Leeds Carroll wrote:

> Hi -
>
> I find that even if I purchase a Mac for personal use, it's subject  
> to an educational discount from Apple because I work here - cool!   
> So I'm looking into replacing my very old and misbehaving PC with a  
> MacBookPro plus the available Windows interface:  Parallels Desktop  
> for Mac plus Windows Vista Business Edition.
>
> - Has anyone on this list tried this interface? Is it good?
> - how/where did you purchase the software to make the Windows  
> interface work? - is it available via MIT?
> - has anyone tried the transfer of files from PC to MacBook?  Is it  
> hard? (I don't want to lose a lot of things I have on my old PC, so  
> it seems to me if I can bring a PC interface in the transition  
> would be simpler -- and also I need to be able to view web pages on  
> a PC, for editing purposes)
>
> - Marion

Marion,

Parallels Desktop is available from GovConnection at an education  
discount.

Parallels Desktop has become quite popular on campus; most people  
like being able to run Windows and Mac OS X at the same time without  
rebooting. Parallels has a Coherence mode, which hides Windows while  
letting you interact with a Windows program. You can use Internet  
Explorer or Outlook without fussing with the rest of Windows if you  
like. You can see a demo at http://www.parallels.com/products/ 
coherence/.

I haven't used it, but Parallels comes with Transporter for moving a  
Windows environment from a PC to virtual machine on your Mac.

Keep in mind that there's no IS&T support for Parallels at this time;  
though you may be able to get help from various email lists.

   -- Al


______________________________
Albert Willis
Macintosh Platform Coordinator - Software Release Team
Client Support Services
Information Services and Technology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
awillis at mit.edu