Low End Mac Reader Specials

TypeStyler For Mac OS X is Now Shipping! Download The Free Fully Functional 60 Day Tryout at www.typestyler.com

Poker Mac Don't install Parallels to play poker online! Poker Mac will show you how to download and install a native Mac poker application such as Full Tilt Poker Mac.

Laptop Hardware Provided by TechRestore - Overnight Mac & iPod Repairs.

Compare products like desktop computers, apple laptops, apple macs, and LCD Monitors side by side! All the information and reviews to make the best purchasing decision for new mobile phones, sat nav systems, or MP3 players. The Ciao online shopping community makes searching products easy for you.

Apple Archive

No Virtual PC for the G5? Try WinTel

A 'Best of Apple Archive' Article

- 2003.09.05

With the G5 shipping, we now have access to the new 64-bit machine that many have been hoping would come from Apple for quite some time. While I haven't had a chance to play around with one yet, I can be sure that OS X performance is greatly improved over even the G4.

This means that Photoshop will be faster, Word will open up faster, and Virtual PC will start feeling even more like a real PC, right?

Wrong.

Virtual PC doesn't even work on the G5, and now that Microsoft has bought it from Connectix, they have to deal with the users that will be complaining; saying they need it for their work. While I don't use it too often, preferring instead to use a real PC, I definitely would miss it if I couldn't use it.

While I don't have the latest version of Virtual PC, I would expect those just buying version 6 to be able to get an upgrade either for free (a free download, or something) or for a very minimal amount, as it would probably help sales for Virtual PC. Then again, most people buying it probably have G3 or G4 machines, and are planning to use it on them.

Thankfully, for those that have just purchased a new G5 and must run Windows applications - they aren't exactly in the dark. OpenOSX has just released WinTel 1.0.1, and it's completely compatible with the G5. It's basically a Mac OS X user interface for the bochs emulation software, which emulates a Pentium processor, and dual G4 processors can function as either one powerful Pentium or dual Pentiums.

In the same fashion as Virtual PC, files can be dragged from the PC desktop onto the Mac desktop. Wintel also carries a much lower price tag than Virtual PC - it's available on a CD for $30 including 10 open source operating systems (or just $25 as a download). Windows must be purchased separately (or you could always transfer a license from an old PC).

This provides a nice alternative to buying a new or used PC (Pentium II PCs typically sell for $50 or less). Having a software application on your Mac is much more elegant and less space consuming than having a whole separate computer on which to run a few applications, but a hardware PC still offers things that emulation can't, such as much better video performance and the ability to use PC-only PCI cards and other hardware.

Then again, much PC software has certain hardware requirements, and before long you'll be buying a Pentium 4 with 512 MB RAM and a 250 GB hard drive - right after you already spent $2,000 on a G5.

For what I use PC emulation for (mainly opening files that won't open on a Mac or visiting PC-only websites), I don't need to have a whole PC. The newly released WinTel emulator looks promising, but it seems that it's main selling point is that it runs on a G5 - for those who can't wait up to a year for Virtual PC to be updated.

Since Virtual PC runs fine on my PowerBook G4, I don't have any reason to get WinTel. I am curious, though, to see how well it sells. LEM

Recent Apple Archive articles

Links for the Day

Recent Content on Low End Mac

Recent Deals

About LEM | Support | Usage | Privacy | Contacts

Entire Low End Mac website copyright ©1997-2009 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc., unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. Advice presented in good faith, but what works for one may not work for all. Please report errors to .
  LINKS: We allow and encourage links to any public page as long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking it.
  Access our RSS news feed at http://lowendmac.com/feed.xml.
  Email may be published at our discretion; email addresses will not be published without permission, and we will encrypt them in hopes of avoiding spammers. If you prefer your message not be published, mark it "not for publication." Letters may be edited for length, context, and to match house style.
  PRIVACY: We don't collect personal information unless you explicitly provide it. For more details, see our Terms of Use.
  Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iBook, iMac, eMac, iPod, iPhone, PowerBook, MacBook, MagSafe, Mac Pro, Apple TV, and AirPort are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are hereby acknowledged.

Custom Search

Amazon.com

Navigation

Used Mac Dealers
Apple History
Video Cards
Email Lists

Favorite Sites

MacSurfer
MacMinute
MacInTouch
MyAppleMenu
InfoMac
Macs Only!
The Mac Observer
Accelerate Your Mac
RetroMacCast
PB Central
MacWindows
The Vintage Mac
   Museum
DealMac
DealsOnTheWeb
Mac2Sell
ramseeker
Mac Driver Museum
JAG's House
System 6 Heaven
System 7 Today
the pickle's Low-End
   Mac FAQ
Abandonware
   Petition
Mac vs. PC Info

Affiliates

The Apple Store
Mac Connection
B&H
MacMall
TechRestore
ExperCom
Crucial Memory
batteries.com

Advertise

All of our advertising is handled by BackBeat Media. For price quotes and advertising information, please contact at BackBeat Media (646-546-5194). This number is for advertising only.

Open Link

Problems viewing this page with Internet Explorer 5.5 or 6? It works fine in other browsers, including IE 7. We recommend Firefox for those using Windows, as it is standards based and more secure than IE 6 (and earlier). More LEM visitors use Firefox than any other browser.