The best computer – Introduction
Fri 5 Jun 2009Filed Under: Anti-virus software, Apple Computers, Computers, VMware Fusion, Windows Vista | Comments Off on The best computer – Introduction
It’s that time of the year in certain parts of the world that have a end of financial year of 30 June. From May onwards you’ll start to see retailers offering a variety of specials. Fortunately I have managed to synchronize all my hardware purchases and software licenses to expire at the start of the new financial and as a result can par take in annual ritual of updating or changing various pieces of software. Yes tend to buy any new computer hardware at this time of the year!
I current have two Apple Mac computers a Vista PC and a bits and pieces PC accumulated over the years which I regularly use. The bits and pieces PC is the main PC I use for trialling out new software like freebies and operating systems like Linux basically anything that comes on a magazine’s free DVD or something I found on the internet.
However if you’ve been keeping up with this section of the BLOG you’ll know that I now run VMWare Fusion on the Apple Mac’s to create virtual PCs running windows – or any other OS that I need. The setup has proven it’s self reliable and flexible. All the software I’ve installed on the virtual PCs work perfectly or specifically as well as they did on a standard box PC. So I’ve finally decided that the Vista PC, bits and pieces machine, the the very old Mac Mini will be decommissioned. That’s a job for Ebay…
The caveat is that games don’t run very well or not at all on the virtual PCs purely because my particular Macbook I have does not have a dedicated Graphics card. Of course this will be fixed when I get a new Mac with a dedicated graphics card.
So I’m in the market for a new Apple Mac of decent specification so I can run multiple virtual Windows PCs when required. I figure that a 5 year life span and using free and paid software including anti-virus software I can actually save money? Apple does not offer real discounts on their computers but retailers often have packages but often not compelling enough – nonetheless I shall see.
I’m a supporter of free software – afterall I make free stuff as well but I also support paying for legitimate software. Basically if you don’t pay for it the companies go broke and you won’t get new stuff. So I buy software if its better than free offerings. I always install the trail version first to make sure it will work so should you.
VMWare Fusion 2 January 2009 Update 2
Mon 19 Jan 2009Filed Under: Apple Computers, Computers, VMware Fusion | Comments Off on VMWare Fusion 2 January 2009 Update 2
Cleaning up the place in readiness for a new year of work I stumbled on neated packed away system installation CD for past computers.. They where Windows 95 and Windows 98! What treasure – to me anyway. I had the best memories of fighting and occassionally winning the blue screen of death.
Anyway since the computers have long since passed away and they where full version CDs I tried to install them on the Macbook via VMWare. So this post is all about running and installing Windows 95 and Windows 98 using VMWare Fusion2!
What do you know? VMWare installs and runs Windows 95 as well as it ever did on on PC hardware… Must find any patches if they still exist. Mainly to get Winsock etc.. for modem and networking!
Likewise I installed and successfully ran Windows 98 in VMWare2. The only problem I had with this install and that for Windows 95 was that VMware tools did not automatically install so I had to do it manually. I was fortunate that I have a bootable CD that loads MS-DOS – shock!
There is only one more computer I recall having CDs for and that is for a Windows ME machine which is in the shed.
I will then try and dig it out along with all the ‘ancient’ software and games I bought over the years and hopefully try them out on the Macbook…
VMWare Fusion 2 January 2009 Update
Mon 5 Jan 2009Filed Under: Apple Computers, Computers, VMware Fusion | Comments Off on VMWare Fusion 2 January 2009 Update
Lots have happend since the last update. I installed the latest Fusion 2 software update called 2.0.1-128865. After installation the XP virtual machines worked even better than the last! No more sluggish performance – everything thing was fine in my world again.
The latest Fusion 2 upgrade clearly made a noticeable difference in terms of usability I recommend it to anyone.
However there is still one major upgrade I need to perfrom and that is the Windows XP SP3 upgrade. As far as I know people seem to have had problems with running VMWare and XP SP3.
Sure I can try the upgrade in a copy of the Virtual machine but I haven’t got the time time just yet to dedicate myself to the upgrade should something go wrong.
Besides I need something to write about next month!