Rather than buying Parallels or VMWare Fusion, I've decided to try a FREE emulator I found on the Web. It will run XP or Vista.<br><br>My question is, which is better to get at this stage? I've heard that MS is going to start making life miserable for people still running XP. I'm only going to use it for Web-related stuff, so I don't really care about "future-proofing" any applications.<br><br>I'm leaning toward Vista, simply because it's the latest, and has better security features by default.<br><br>Of course, I also don't know which of the 327 versions of Vista to get. I **think** Vista Home Ultimate is what I want/need.<br><br>Anyone have any experience on this?<br><br>

I run an OEM copy ($90) of XP Home using Bootcamp on my MacBook Pro with no problems. But all I mainly do is run tax software and some occasional browsing. I used the FAT32 formatting so I can copy files from the Mac side. <br><br>What free emulator are you going to try?<br><br>

I use Parallels and run OS X and Windows XP Home Edition on split screens on both of my iMacs<br>Files can be dragged and dropped from one OS to the other with Parallels .<br>As for Vista perhaps Alec will give his opinion.<br><br><br>

"Drooped?" <br><br>

<blockquote><font size=1>In reply to:</font><hr><p>What free emulator are you going to try?<p><hr></blockquote><p><br>VirtualBox is the virtual machine. I've read several reviews, and they all say it's just as good as the two big-boys.<br><br>So what do the "Home" versions of XP and Vista lack that is included in the "Ultimate" versions?<br><br>

Ultimate includes the kitchen sink, a lot of IIS stuff you likely won't need.<br><br>Home won't log into domains, which might be the only consideration depending on how you're going to use it.<br><br>Not sure to tell you if you should get 32 or 64 bit. 64bit is by far the choice if you're running it as your main OS as you can utilize ram past 8GB and stuff just runs so much smoother.<br><br>Actually I think if you get the retail box of Vista it has both 32 and 64 bit versions included. If however you get a system builders disk (which is 1/2 the price), it's either or.<br><br><br>Hey I'm an F'n Jerk!®

I downloaded Virtual Machine to give it a try I could not get XP/Win 2000/Win 98 or Win 95 to install all disks are licensed Mircosoft install disks.<br> Purchase Parallels or CrossOver or VMware.<br>Virtual Machine is buggy<br><br>

I say go with XP. Vista sucks up a LOT of resources and XP is still the most compatible out there. Don't worry about Viruses, etc. with a virtual setup. Just make sure once you do a clean install of the OS to back up the disk image it's stored in. If something fails all you have to do is start with the nice clean slate.<br><br>Virtualbox is pretty sweet. It's nowhere near as refined as VMWare or Parallels, but it's not hard to figure out how to get it up and running. I had an old version running about a year ago (before SUN took them over) ...and it worked just fine. Only reason I don't use it now is because I got VMWare as a Christmas gift. <br><br>XP<br><br>zweisoft<br>

"As for Vista perhaps Alec will give his opinion."<br><br>From the few diehard PC users I know, Vista sucks. From the Parallels users I know, Vista sucks. From entries on the Parallels forums, Vista sucks. From reports around the net regarding other virtual environments, Vista sucks.<br><br>I'm pretty sure you'll find Vista sucks.<br><br>Hope that helps! <br><br>- alec -

Oh, but M$ says Vista good! It's just a stereotype. <br><br>