Tag: leopard

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File Sharing with Leopard and Vista

Update: guide now available.

I am in the process of writing my file sharing guide for Leopard and Vista and though similar to Tiger and XP, there are some quite fundamental differences which means it is taking longer to write the guide then I first thought.

I have recommended using the same username and password on home networks for sharing files as it makes it easier to share files.

Now with Leopard you can share individual folders much more easily, which means I may write two separate guides rather than one long one.

We’ll see how it goes, expect it soon.

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Windows on a Mac

If you want to run Windows on an Intel Mac there are basically four choices.

Boot Camp

http://www.apple.com/bootcamp

This is an either or situation, which means you are running Windows or OS X, therefore if you want to change applications you need to reboot.

Has the advantage that you are when running Windows for all intents purposes your mac is a Windows PC. This means that you get the full power of your Mac for running Windows.

You need a licensed copy of Windows XP *SP2* or Windows Vista

Comes as part of Leopard, so if you have Tiger you will need to upgrade.

Parallels and VMFusion

http://www.parallels.com/en/products/desktop/
http://www.vmware.com/products/fusion/

These applications create virtual Windows PCs, which allow you to run Windows (and Windows applications) at the same time as OS X and therefore you can switch between them withoout needing to reboot. There is a slight performance hit when running Windows in this way but for most people this is negligible. Also you will need a lot of RAM to run these, at leat 1GB and preferably 2GB of RAM.

Coherence mode on Parallels allows you to run Windows applications seamlessly alongside Mac applications.

Both require a Windows licence, but doesn’t need to be SP2, with Parallels you can even install and run Windows 3.1! Parallels XP support is excellent, however support for Vista is less good, so you can’t use things like Aero for example.

Crossover

http://www.codeweavers.com/products/cxmac/

Allows you to run Windows applications (some but not all) within OS X and you don’t need a Windows licence as you don’t install Windows.

Downside is that it doesn’t work with all applications.

MacBook

Summary

Therefore there are four choices when it comes to running Windows on a Mac. Which is best? Well that depends much more on your needs when it comes to running Windows.

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Just installed Leopard

Well better late than never I guess…

I have installed Leopard on my iMac (using an external Firewire drive rather than my main drive).

It installed fine, though I find it amusing that Apple’s “about one minute”  can be longer than any other minute, maybe a Time Machine thing?

I have had a quick look and I am quite impressed. I am quite pleased with the performance on my iMac which seems much faster, certainly don’t get the lag I have been getting when changing the volume for example.

Safari 3 is much better and I might just install 10.4.11 on my other Macs to get Safari 3, like the fact I can move tabs.

File sharing looks relatively simple, but quite different to Tiger therefore new guides are essential.

Overall impressed so far.

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Arrived

Well my package from Amazon arrived today and as well as some other stuff, it contains Leopard and Windows Vista Home Premium.

Should help me write some new guides for my website as I have a fair few to write…

Typical Microsoft, though I have a PC running Windows Vista, it is Vista Business Edition, which is (allegedly) easier to network, so I also need to test Vista Home as well.

Having said that, networking with the Vista Business laptop was very simple and I was quite pleased about how much easier it was than using XP.

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Dimmed Icons

So there I was updating my Mac mini (which to be honest has been gathering dust on my desk for a while now, well no screen, no keyboard and mouse, it’s difficult to use…. certainly not easy to switch on and do stuff.

Mac mini

So how do I configure it , well I am currently using VNC/Apple Remote Desktop combination to control it.

On the Mac mini I have configured it through Apple Remote Desktop to allow others to access it.

System Preferences > Sharing

Check the Apple Remote Desktop checkbox and add a password by clicking Access Privileges…

System Preferences

On my other Mac, I don’t have the full version of Apple Remote Desktop, so I am using Chicken of the VNC which is VNC software (you can tell that from the name), and as Apple Remote Desktop is VNC compatible, means I can control my Mac mini from another Mac on my network, and the Mac mini doesn’t need a monitor or a keyboard or even a mouse!

So once I started it, I set about installing updates, it was running 10.4.6, so I upgraded to 10.4.11 (and will probably install Leopard on it, when it arrives this week (oh yes I have finally got round to ordering Leopard, family pack will upgrade the Mac mini first, but will wait on my other Macs until I am happy that all my peripherals and applications are Leopard friendly)).

However I noticed that all my OS X icons in Finder were dimmed or faded and couldn’t understand why, well more importantly I must have done something to it and couldn’t remember what!

Well a quick search on Google found this Apple Discussions thread.

I like to be able to view the normally hidden files and folders. However when this is enabled, the majority of icons show as faded.

Ah well, I must have done something in Terminal to change Finder to view hidden files, but couldn’t remember how I did this, or where I found out to do this.

So back to Google and this revealing MacWorld article.

Using a simple Terminal command, you can work with all the files on your machine from the Finder. Open Terminal, type this command, and press Enter:

defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles YES

Well this is going to show hidden files, so as you might guess…

defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles NO

..will hide hidden files again.

So started Terminal, typed the command and then rebooted the computer to restart Finder and now all my icons can be seen in all their multitechnicolour glory.

So why have I been messing about with upgrading my Mac mini, well I am going to put it under my TV and use it as a media centre.

I have ordered a 15m cat5e cable so I can also place my new 802.11n Airport Extreme under the TV as well, so not only will the Mac mini be connected (by gigabit ethernet on the Airport Extreme and alas 100Mb ethernet on the Mac mini. It should be faster than 802.11g though.

I will also be able to connect my EyeHome to the Airport Extreme by ethernet as well.

Pity it’s an old G4 PPC model, so not only just 100Mb ethernet also no remote!

Well if it works out as I hope and it works well, I will upgrade to a new Intel Mac mini which comes with the Apple remote…

Or get an Apple TV!

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Sharing Files

On my main tech website I have a what others have called “useful” guide to sharing files between Mac OS X and Windows XP.

Sharing files between an XP PC and a Mac running OS 10.4

Of course one of the key issues for me now is that Microsoft have released Vista and Apple have just released Leopard (10.5) which means that my guide is out of date by two operating systems.

I do now have a Vista PC, but it is running Vista Business Edition which is “tweaked” for networking by Microsoft, whereas the Vista Ultimate Home Edition is not, therefore I think I am going to have to write two guides, one for Business and one for Home.

However I don’t yet have Leopard, partly as there isn’t a huge amount there for me to upgrade, but also I am not sure if all my peripherals and applications will work under Leopard. I remember having issues and problems when I upgraded my old G5 PowerMac from Panther (10.3) to Tiger (10.4) and some applications stopped working properly.

So eventually I will be upgrading my guides once I have bought the new operating systems.

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Leopard is out, but I’m waiting…

Today sees the release of the next version of Apple’s OS X.

10.5 or Leopard brings many new features that are currently been covered all over the web so I am not going to cover them again here.

Personally I am going to wait. There’s a few things which pique my interest, but nothing that says “buy me now”.

I have also heard that 10.5.1 is going to be one BIG update. around 500MB, so that means that there are still quite a few bugs in 10.5 and I don’t want to install it on my production machine.