Rumour roundup: Windows virtualization on OS X x86 January 26, 2006
Posted by James Webster in : apple, virtualization , trackbackUPDATE: Parallels to announce OS X support in their workstation product later this week?
My previous post about VMware and OS X seems to be getting a bit of traffic, so I thought I might also contribute a ‘State of the Union’ summary of the rumours/possibilities that have been floating about. Or at least the ones that I’ve come across…
- VMware: The solution that I am personally hoping for is that VMware will release a version of their Player and Workstation products for Mac OS X Intel. The product is already portable between x86 Windows and Linux. I consider it highly unlikely that they will release a PPC version, CPU translation is outside their current product scope. O’Grady’s PowerPage asked the VMware sales department about the availability of an OS X version :
their sales department replied saying that they “do not provide information in advance of an official press release.”
Make of that what you will.
- Microsoft Virtual PC: According to TUAW, Microsoft is “still discussing” Virtual PC for Intel Macs. I don’t think I will be holding my breath.
- Dual-booting OS X with XP/Vista: You can read plenty about people’s efforts to do this elsewhere, including a few people who have fried their Intel iMac in the process. The bottom line is that the Intel iMac’s use a new style of BIOS incompatible (superficially at least) with XP. However Vista supports this, so MSDN subscribers with access to the Vista CTP might get lucky. Frankly I think you must be out of your trolley to want to do this.
- Parallels: A smaller player in the virtualization market, Parallels, recently launched a virtualization product. In an interview with virtualization.info the marketing manager of Parallels said:
We are planning to support MacOS X as a primary and guest operating system in upcoming versions of Parallels Workstation. Unfortunately, I’m unable to discuss any technical or business relationships relating to this support.
I think it unlikely that they will be able to legally get around the “DRM” that prevents OS X x86 from being run on any other hardware, but hopefully they will be able to deliver on an OS X version of their product.
- Darwine: For those not in the know, Wine is an open-source implementation of the Win32 API for Linux, enabling execution of Windows apps without requiring a separate virtual machine. It has come a long way in recent years, thanks in part to commercial support from Codeweavers. Darwine is the OS X/Darwin version of Wine. Up until Apple’s shift to x86, running Darwine would also require running an x86 CPU emulator. Now that piece of the equation has been removed (well, for users of Intel Macs) the progress of updates to Darwine will likely accelerate. Indeed with the switch to x86, Codeweavers also announced they would build support for CrossOver Office on Intel OS X.
Any others that I should be aware of?
Comments»
[…] UPDATE: I have summarized some of the latest information and rumours about Windows and OS X x86 virtualization over here. […]
Dual-booting will make a lot of sense on the MacBook on account of power management issues and conservation. Also there will be a fair number of Windows folks buying MacBooks just to run Windows (and yes, those folks are off their trolley, but OTOH at least they have enough sense to buy the best computer even if they won’t use the best OS).
And thanks for the excellent and concise description of Darwine. So few folks get it.
[…] Power management. Jim White left a comment in my Windows virtualization rumour roundup to the effect that a dual-boot iMac or MacBook Pro in XP mode might be less power hungry than one running OS X and a virtual XP environment. […]