When transitioning to Mac from Windows how do you handle it?

Nick · 07-03-2008, 03:20 PM

Well I went out and bought a MacBook Pro yesterday so I can start educating myself on Apple and what Altiris can do with them.

Let me say, WOW! Running a Windows OS virtually on OS X flies! Now I'm still learning on this but I would love to hear what others that have been through this, going through this or planning on going through this and your experiences.

Please comment in this thread and take a second to take the pole attached.

itsmillertime4u · 07-03-2008, 03:50 PM

I use VMware Fusion at home, and have been for about a year now after switching to Mac as my primary machine/OS at home. I am really happy with Fusion, although I do wish that it had more VMware Workstation features (multiple snapshots, record video, etc.). I've never used Parallels, however I do hear that the nonperformance on Fusion is better.

Nick · 07-03-2008, 03:56 PM

Same setup for me. I'm using Fusion currently and like how it feels but wish it had the multiple snapshot ability.

I've also played with VirtualBox and found it is a great alternative especially if you want a great FREE OS virtualization tool.

I haven't done any comparisons of the speed of virtualized OS's on Fusion and VirtualBox when run on OS X, but when I compare it VirtualBox on Ubuntu with VMWare on Windows Server 2003.... the Ubuntu/VirtualBox speed is visibly faster.

LordofthePatch · 07-03-2008, 04:26 PM

MacBook Pro here as well with two virtual Windows machines on Fusion. First machine is XP SP3 and is mostly used for Email (not a big fan of Entourage). This will probably go away with the release of OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) next year when Mail, iCal, and Address Book are all Exchange 2007 compatible.

My other virtualized machine is an NS running Windows 2003 and SQL 2005. Even with all this running OS X is still very useable.

Oh, and one other thing...I hardly ever reboot my Mac - just suspend the VM's and put 'er to sleep for the night...good Leopard!!

itsmillertime4u · 07-03-2008, 05:45 PM

I'm also looking at running VMware ESX within my Fusion pretty soon so I can start learn how to use it some more, although before I do this I think I will have to max out the memory on my iMac to 4GB (I currently have 3GB).

itsmillertime4u · 07-03-2008, 08:32 PM

One other thing I've been wanting to try is running Thinstall/thinApp within WINE. I've never used Thinstall/ThinApp before so I'm not sure what the learning curve would be, but ever since this article caught my interest I've been wanting to try it.

texdr · 07-07-2008, 01:09 PM

Thought I would throw my two cents in. I too have just switched from Windows to Mac. Like Nick, I am also using a Macbook Pro. I tend to run Mac and Windows at the same time, using Parallels and haven't had any problems. We have (we think) about 1500 Macs in our environment so there is a big push for me to get them under management using Altiris..if nothing else for the hardware and software inventory.

CPatsch · 07-07-2008, 01:55 PM

My household has recently converted to Mac OS X as well. In October of 07 I purchased a MacBookPro for my wife (17”, 4GB, 7200RPM drive), her old HP/Compaq laptop finally died. Granted she has a perfectly good desktop, she preferred to use a laptop for the portability. I purchased VMWare Fusion for her MacBook Pro and setup a Windows XP VM which she uses to run any legacy Windows apps, her desktop now stays powered off.

In April of this year I received a new 2.8Ghtz Mac Pro for my birthday. I was given permission to upgrade the base model (within reason), so in went an additional 8GB of RAM from Crucial, & a pair of 750GB 7,200 RPM WD generic drives for storage. I pulled an WD 150GB Raptor (10,000 RPM) drive out of my Vista machine and have dedicated that drive to Virtual Machines running on Fusion 2 Beta (some nice new features in Beta 2). Last month I finally shut down my Windows Vista machine and have all of my apps running in OS X. I run Windows XP, VISTA, Server 2003, Ubuntu, and shortly Server 2008 all in VMWare sessions (testing, work development, informational/educational purposes).

I can’t get over how user friendly Mac OS X is, I should have made the switch long ago…

Nick · 07-07-2008, 03:42 PM

Yeah, I have to agree with you on how user friendly OS X is.

itsmillertime4u · 07-08-2008, 07:40 PM

I really like it that their help system is really intuitive, like when it shows exactly in a menu to find something like this:

bgreen · 07-14-2008, 04:45 PM

I've got a Mac Pro dual booted at home, primarily for gaming, but I made the mistake of loading Vista again. I'll probably rebuild to XP as soon as I can find an SP3 VL CD.

My work computer is a MacBook Pro, and I run Parallels to virtualize Ubuntu, XP, and my development Altiris Server (2k3, SQL 2005, VS 2005). I tried Fusion out for a while; performance was comparable, but I just can't live without the snapshot manager.

I'm hoping that I'll be able to get rid of my XP virtual pretty soon - just need to replace a few more core applications with OS X equivalents. Application-wise, here's what I'm using so far, with what each app replaced in parentheses:

Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac (Office)
Coda (Dreamweaver)
TextMate (PrimalScript)
Remote Desktop Client for Mac (RDP)
Parallels (VMWare Workstation)
MindManager for Mac (MindManager)

Here's what I still need to replace to be able to get rid of my XP Virtual Client, with what I'm evaluating as a replacement in Parentheses:

Microsoft Visio (OmniGraffle)
Microsoft Project (???)
Sonicwall VPN (VPN Tracker or NetExtender)

I made the switch about 18 months ago now, and have been very pleased with how it went. I've found it surprisingly easy to do a significant portion of my job (Altiris Consultant) from OS X, only leveraging windows for project plans, visio diagrams, and development/testing.

itsmillertime4u · 07-15-2008, 10:47 AM

I don't know about Visio or Project, but I use CoRD vice Microsoft RDP (I switched around the time that the MS RDP Client Beta ended and never went back even though MS RDP was updated). For VPN, for company wants us to use Cisco VPN, and they provide us the Windows software which of course I didn't like. I look around and ran into Shimo, which is working great. I had to use some website to crack the weak Cisco network key (found in my company's Cisco VPN configuration file), and bam I got in.

jpellet2 · 07-20-2008, 08:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bgreen

Here's what I still need to replace to be able to get rid of my XP Virtual Client, with what I'm evaluating as a replacement in Parentheses:

Microsoft Visio (OmniGraffle)
Microsoft Project (???)
Sonicwall VPN (VPN Tracker or NetExtender)

As far as I'm aware there is no Project equivalent on OS X that will let you open Office Project files but if you use it for your personal projects only then take a look at Project X. I use it and love it!

Jason

jpellet2 · 07-20-2008, 08:42 PM

I've been using OS X at work for about 5 years now. I work as the Computer Lab Manager on campus and I need to work with Windows and OS X. I use Fusion on my Mac Pro and Mac Book Pro and seamlessly switch back and forth between both OSes as many of you. I also build all of my Windows images in Fusion VMs so I have no real need for a physical machine for creation just for testing to ensure that drivers will load like they should.

Our entire Help Desk staff has actually switched to OS X across the board and use Fusion to do all of their Windows work such as Remote Assistance and Altiris Help Desk of course.

Jason

jpellet2 · 07-20-2008, 08:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by itsmillertime4u

For VPN, for company wants us to use Cisco VPN, and they provide us the Windows software which of course I didn't like.

Cisco VPN is available for OS X and works great on Leopard. You could also use the built-in VPN if you need to as that does work in most environments. On a wild side-note, the iPhone Sofware 2.0 uses Cisco VPN compliant software to connect too but we could do an entirely different thread on what we can do with the iPhone!

Nick · 07-22-2008, 12:55 PM

Third year in a row for Mac to dramatically increase share in the computer market. They're up 41% in sales of their computers/laptops from last year. This DOESN'T include iPod or iPhone sales.

Mac sales up 41%

LordofthePatch · 07-22-2008, 02:41 PM

Fastest growing PC-maker in the US right now!!

Funny how their stock is tumbling right now...

MikeMalsed · 07-31-2008, 01:40 PM

It assumes I'm transitioning to Mac from Windows - where's the option for "Not Transitioning?"

Nick · 07-31-2008, 03:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MikeMalsed

It assumes I'm transitioning to Mac from Windows - where's the option for "Not Transitioning?"

Just added the option. Though the question the poll asks is "When transitioning to Mac from Windows how do you handle it?" If an organization is not transitioning then the poll would be irrelevant.

estebs1978 · 08-11-2008, 02:58 PM

I wish I could get a MAC. They are awesome! You can virtualize Windows XP so you can still test and use that OS but the MAC OS is certainly idiot proof. It is very user friendly and it comes with a ton of free stuff to use (almost like Ubuntu).
MAC is the best out there.