what is parallel vs. bootcamp

Parallels is a purchased software that functions much like BootCamp. Being a commercial product it does have some other functionality and is not limited to only running Windows. You can see the details on it by going to the App Store, and see if you need/want those things over what BootCamp provides.

Parallels is a virtualization application that lets you run Microsoft Windows (or any other OS) on a Mac. Parallels allows you to have a Microsoft Windows or any other OS environment running in a window on your Mac Desktop as if it were an App on Osx.

Bootcamp allows you to have a Microsoft Windows installation running on Apple hardware, completely independent of the Mac OS that is running on it also.

With Parallels , Windows shares the resources with the Osx at the same time, so some general performance may be lost.

With Bootcamp, both Operating Systems are independent, and use all the hardware resources available on the computer as their own. When one Os runs, the other does not. And Rebooting the computer is necessary to switch between Operating systems.

virtual box from oracle is free and does most of what parallels does

I am very confused,do I have to purchase Parallel,s or is it part of Apple,s Boot Camp assistance.I also wonder after seeing all the problems people are having running Parallel if there is not a fundamental problem with running it on OS X. Might I be better off just to purchase a separate PC.I have a late 2012 Mac Mini with two 240GB SSD

HD,S and 16GB Ram,I hope to run Parallel,s virtualization ,dedicating one HD to each OS and splitting 8GB Ram to each.I do not want to reboot to switch back and forth or sacrifice any speed in operation or booty time.

Any input would be appreciated greatly THANX

Parallels is a separate commercial non-Apple product. Apple's Bootcamp Assistant is part of OS X. You can also use VirtualBox and VMware Fusion which are third-party non-Apple products.

You can use BC Assistant to install Windows, and then use any Virtualization engine to create a VM based on Bootcamp/Windows installation.

If you can afford a separate PC, that is the best solution.

Parallels is an independent 3rd party software. It is not part of Bootcamp as explained above. It is not included on your Mac and needs to be purchased separately.

You can assign the 8GB RAM to the Windows installation on Parallels, but you cannot assign a physical hard drive directly. You set the size of the virtual Hard drive Windows is going to use, and you can specify where the virtual hdd file is going to reside, i;e you could save the file on the other hard drive.

BearArgyros7 wrote:

I do not want to reboot to switch back and forth or sacrifice any speed in operation or booty time.

Unfortunately, you won't be able to have it both ways. If you don't want to reboot to switch O.S then Virtualization is the only option. But then you will be sharing system resources so some sacrifice will be made to have both things running at the same time. Its just the nature of Virtualization.

You could get a Windows computer, but then you would be switching back and forth between computers. Not sure that is any more efficient than sacrificing a tiny bit of speed which may or may not be at all noticeable.

If you choose Bootcamp, then you would need to reboot, but no performance sacrifice would be made, in operation or boot time. Each OS would be independent and be using the full resources of your Mac.

I don't personally have much experience with Parallels, but I do use Virtual Box, and have had no issues with it, or any performance decrease on my 2011 Mac Mini.

Other than that, I find it quite handy to have a Windows machine ready to be used on my Dock whenever I need it, and not have to run to my Windows Laptop to do something simple on Windows.