Development on an Apple

[MartinLiss]

Does anyone here have experience running Microsoft programing software (particularly VB6) on an Apple using VMWare or Boot Camp?

[baja_yu]

I think I've seen someone say they develop on iMacs through Windows installed on VirtualBox. Since they now use standard Intel CPU's I don't think there is any difference to using Windows as a host OS compared to Mac OS X. I have that setup now (Windows guest on Windows host via VirtualBox) and it works fine (VB6 and VS 2008/2010).

In any case, if you're not in a hurry, I should be getting an iMac in a couple of weeks so I can post my first hand experience.

[MartinLiss]

...In any case, if you're not in a hurry, I should be getting an iMac in a couple of weeks so I can post my first hand experience.Thanks, I'd appreciate that.

[baja_yu]

No problem. I'll report as soon as I get it.

One suggestion I can give you right now is to get a Mac with at least 4GB of RAM (for laptops I think this is only MacBook Pro). If you are using VMWare or VirtualBox you'll pretty much be running two OS' at the same time. I don't know how much Mac OS X eats, but if you install Windows 7, it might get too tight with just 2GB. 4GB should give you the needed extra 'elbow room' so everything runs smoothly.

[FireXtol]

I've done it on OS X.5 and Parallels. Worked fine.

[MartinLiss]

I've done it on OS X.5 and Parallels. Worked fine.So does that mean that you used VB6?

[Nightwalker83]

I haven't tried it since I don't have a Mac but bootcamp should work fine running VB6.0. I spoke to friends of mine at school a couple of days ago and they said they use bootcamp on the macs there to run Windows software they use in the design course. The software they run from what I gather is pretty old too so Visual Basic 6.0 should run on boot camp just fine.

[baja_yu]

I think using VirtualBox or VMWare will be a much less painful option. I've never used Boot camp (or Macs before) but as I understand it, it resizes partitions and installs Windows as a separate OS, and then giving a dual boot option to user to boot either into Mac OS or Windows.

EDIT: Personally, after working with VirtualBox, using W7 as host OS and running XP as the guest in a virtual machine, I am NEVER installing a dual boot again. The only drawback of VMs that I can see is that you need more RAM since both OS' are running at the same time, but with RAM so cheap, and me not doing anything very demanding, 4GBs work like a charm.

[tr333]

Bootcamp allows you to "dualboot", so you can boot in to either OSX or Windows. If you dualboot, the OSX install DVD contains the windows drivers for the hardware.

VMWare Fusion and Parallels can either run standalone virtual machines, or use the bootcamp partition and load it as a virtual machine from inside OSX. If you need the speed boost from running native, you can just reboot back in to the bootcamp partition.

[03myersd]

I've seen it run on a friends machine using windows 7. VS2008 runs alright, bit slow in a virtual machine(depending on what else is running), but runs perfectly on bootcamp. VB6 is just as slow either way due to it being windows 7.

[dilettante]

VB6 is just as slow either way due to it being windows 7.
I can only imagine this means somebody doesn't know they're supposed to turn off desktop composition for the VB6 IDE under Win6.x and later.

[IanS]

I do it all the time - doing it right now.

I have an Intel iMac. I use Parallels.

I have a lot of VM's each running different versions of Windows with different apps installed, ie some straight after installation, some with MS Office and various other apps installed etc.

My 'Main' windows development VM is XP Pro. All the others are just for testing my finished apps so after a test/debug session they can be reset back to their original state ready for the next test session.

You can also install 64bit versions of Windows on Parallels. MacOS is 64 bit so can run 64 bit VMs.

Years ago I tried using Bootcamp but that's a bit pointless - MacOS with all the VM's is perfect.

[MartinLiss]

I do it all the time - doing it right now.

I have an Intel iMac. I use Parallels.

I have a lot of VM's each running different versions of Windows with different apps installed, ie some straight after installation, some with MS Office and various other apps installed etc.

My 'Main' windows development VM is XP Pro. All the others are just for testing my finished apps so after a test/debug session they can be reset back to their original state ready for the next test session.

You can also install 64bit versions of Windows on Parallels. MacOS is 64 bit so can run 64 bit VMs.

Years ago I tried using Bootcamp but that's a bit pointless - MacOS with all the VM's is perfect.Thanks.

[FireXtol]

So does that mean that you used VB6?

Yes, VB6 under Win XP under Parallels under Mac OS X.5.

Parallels is great. Windows runs better in Mac than Mac itself does.

[MartinLiss]

Yes, VB6 under Win XP under Parallels under Mac OS X.5.

Parallels is great. Windows runs better in Mac than Mac itself does.Thanks. It looks like I'm going to be spending some money at the Apple store:)

[baja_yu]

What will you be getting? I have my eye on the 21.5" iMac. The 27" model looks really nice with the big screen, but you don't get much more than that (more hard disk space and a better graphics card).

[MartinLiss]

Don't know yet.

[FireXtol]

I've also ran Windows 7 from a VM in Windows 2000 Server host. And then I ran VB6 inside 7. Works fine(can do things that crash the IDE under 2000).

Is there a particular concern you're interested in?

With VMs you're running the full blown OS. There's not much they can't do acceptably.

With boot camp it'd be running on the metal, so it's very efficient and fast like a 'normal'(not a mac; an Intel, most commonly) PC.

[IanS]

and moving from your old windows PC to a VM in MacOS is painless.

Parallels has a thing called 'Transporter'.

You sit at your Mac, point transporter across the network at your old WindowsPC and Transporter sucks everything from the old PC and creates a new VM containing the OS, all your apps and data etc. The really clever thing is that, during the transfer, it automatically strips out all the hardware specific stuff such as drivers and injects all the parallels drivers into the system and sets it all up so it boots no problems.

[MartinLiss]

and moving from your old windows PC to a VM in MacOS is painless.

Parallels has a thing called 'Transporter'.

You sit at your Mac, point transporter across the network at your old WindowsPC and Transporter sucks everything from the old PC and creates a new VM containing the OS, all your apps and data etc. The really clever thing is that, during the transfer, it automatically strips out all the hardware specific stuff such as drivers and injects all the parallels drivers into the system and sets it all up so it boots no problems.Wow as soon as the hordes of iPhone 4 buyers clear out I'm off to the Apple store.

[MartinLiss]

Any thoughts on an iMAC 27" versus a MAC Pro Quad Core?

[baja_yu]

Depends on what you plan to do with it. In my opinion, it's way over priced (Mac Pro), taking in mind that the base price doesn't include a monitor.

[MartinLiss]

Thanks, I thought they were about the same price but I didn't consider the monitor.

[baja_yu]

It's possible that you have more options than what I get. In my local store the cheapest Mac Pro (without a monitor) is $3.000, while the cheapest iMac 27" is $1.900. For standalone monitors I only have two options, 24" at $1.170 and 30" at $2.470.

[MartinLiss]

Well I'm now an iMAC owner. I bought a iMAC 27" Quad Core. Now all I need to do is to figure out how to use it,

[baja_yu]

Sweet! I saw it in the store, that thing is HUGE. I love working on big screens, so much space, especially since I don't like to break lines when coding :) I almost can't remember what it was like back in the day with 14" CRTs.

What do you plan to use it for?

[MartinLiss]

Sweet! I saw it in the store, that thing is HUGE. I love working on big screens, so much space, especially since I don't like to break lines when coding :) I almost can't remember what it was like back in the day with 14" CRTs.

What do you plan to use it for?Lots of PokerStars screens:)

[MartinLiss]

Maybe I should start a new thread for this question but on a PC I can just drag the side of a window to expand its width. How do I do that on the MAC?

[baja_yu]

I think by default it only allows resizing by the bottom right corner.

And I'm not sure why I said 'by default' because I think it can be changed.

[FireXtol]

I think you can buy a program to enable more Windows-like features for Mac. Yea... they cost money. Mac doesn't really have much freeware, compared to other OS(besides what's ported from Linux).