Thursday, February 15, 2007

Parallels for Mac OS X - Awesome!

What can I do that simply amazes me, using my iMac? I can run Windows XP, Dos, and OS/2 in separate windows under the Parallels program, all at the same time. Now for many of you this may not be a feat. But I can recall years ago being up late trying to get a Dial Up Bulletin Board of mine running in a multi-tasking environment. I would attempt to load, at that time, the new Windows 95. I loaded OS/2, which was a bear to get running (but not tonight). I also attempted to load the Desqview X Multi-tasking Dos.

Well on my iMac I just loaded my old copy of OS/2 just to see if it worked. And sure enough, it does and runs very fast! Faster by far than it ever ran natively on a PC. I also have Windows XP for those must have utilities that I had already invested money in, and that there are not yet Mac equivalents, and Dos is loaded for some old games from the closet. This is a huge amount of fun for an old techie from way back.

My point is, if you want to run multiple operating systems for testing applications (even Linux), or want a measure of flexibility that is unheard of in the computing world today, you HAVE TO GET the Parallels Virtual PC Software for your iMac or PC. Yes they have both versions available. No need to have a Mac to do what I am doing. You just need the Parallels software.