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Win PC with MacOS VM as Mac replacement?

rzme01

rzme01

can't re member
My MBP is getting a bit old and has been through the wars and I've been scoping out replacement costs - blimey: £3000-3700 to replace what I've got with a new one is nad-numbingly expensive.

I've got a lot of software licences tied to the Apple environment so is a windows laptop with a MacOS VM a realistic option to replace it with? Has anyone done it as their main computing resource?
 
It depends. I am running macOS 10.13 High Sierra in a VM on Windows 7 and it works fine. You lose the WiFi within the VM as the Internet connection is considered to be cabled even though your lappy is using its WiFi connection. This means that the maps app doesn't work properly as it can't determine your location. I believe that the only VM that can support OS X is VMware and then only versions 10 to 12. I am using version 12 and can have macOS, Windows 10 pro, Windows XP and Zorin 12 all up at the same time! I am using an i5 but to do the job properly I'd go for an i7 and at least 8 preferably 16GB memory or even more depending on what you want to do and a fast SSD to hold the virtual disk for a fast boot and performance.. I haven't tried any graphics editing yet but I've just put together a graphics workstation tower PC for a photographer friend. Once I get my mits on it we'll see what it can do. It would be interesting to see what happens using macOS to drive the Quadro graphics card.

I have put together a *.bat file that launches macOS. When I get around to it I hope to be able to boot into macOS at startup. I haven't tried it yet but I hear that Snow Leopard runs faster in a VM then on the original 2010 hardware. This release is important if you have any old Power PC applications as it contains Rosetta which is a Power PC emulator.


Cheers,

DV
 
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It’s never going to be plain sailing, but I’m with you on new Mac prices, they’re good machines but the entry price is insane... so I’d look at Apple certified refurbished machines. I’ve bought a couple now and they’ve been indistinguishable with the exception of the box which is a just plain white as opposed to the full retail packaging, you’ll get a 13” touch bar model with a 512gb SSD for under £1500 with a full warranty and they are also eligible for Apple care.
 
Virtualbox will happily run macOS on any platform. Direct hardware control of graphics or peripherals will be the weak point however. I discovered this the hard way running Windows10 in macOS and had to settle for Parallels in the end as the hardware support was just so much better. Virtualbox is free however and costs only your time to try it.

Re: the cost of MBPs - Jigsaw24 have secured the last of Apples previous generation stock and are selling them at a huge discount - this may be better than the refurb store. http://www.jigsaw24.com/macbook_deals/store/fcp-category/list

I bought a refurb 24" iMac back in 2010. It's still going strong and probably now represents the best value-for-money computer I ever bought.
 
I had a lot of issues with virtualbox, not being able to run an external display from a VM, connect to the web on VM or even see USB drives.

The jigsaw24 prices aren’t inclusive of VAT (the VAT price is small printed on each item though).
 
linnfomaniac83 said:
I had a lot of issues with virtualbox, not being able to run an external display from a VM, connect to the web on VM or even see USB drives.

The jigsaw24 prices aren’t inclusive of VAT (the VAT price is small printed on each item though).
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VMware seems very good and free for home use. I have had no problem with any of the machines macOS, Win 10, Win XP and Zorin (debian) with Internet access nor accessing USB (disks and sticks need to be FAT32 for macOS). As for external screens I'll see what happens when I get my hands on the new build graphics workstation. I was really surprised by XP VM. I had to keep an old Thinkpad that had an RS232 port and ran the old application under XP that is used to configure some hardware. However modern machines have USB in place of RS232 but I got the application to work configured for USB and thence via a USB/RS232 converter was able to configure the old hardware. I can now dump this old Thinkpad.

Cheers,

DV
 
Virtual machines are always going to be bit of a bother with OS X, I do use VirtualBox for booting Windows XP from Windows 10 (via Bootcamp on my Mac), which works great, but this is the 'easy way around'. If I wanted Mac OS X on PC hardware I'd go the Hackintosh route: https://hackintosh.com/
 
DV, glad you had more success with virtualbox than I did. I just run a MacBook Pro with a boot camp windows installation which does everything I want.

Yomanze, Hackintosh can work great if you know what you're doing and building a machine from scratch (because you can pick and choose compatible components). It's a little more challenging with a laptop because you're obviously fairly stuck with the hardware choices but it can be done. I've got a Dell D630 that I managed to get working well. I only did it as an experiment because I already had a more powerful MacBook Pro. If I had a need for a high performance work station I'd definitely be tempted down the Hackintosh route!
 
linnfomaniac83 said:
DV, glad you had more success with virtualbox than I did. I just run a MacBook Pro with a boot camp windows installation which does everything I want.

Yomanze, Hackintosh can work great if you know what you're doing and building a machine from scratch (because you can pick and choose compatible components). It's a little more challenging with a laptop because you're obviously fairly stuck with the hardware choices but it can be done. I've got a Dell D630 that I managed to get working well. I only did it as an experiment because I already had a more powerful MacBook Pro. If I had a need for a high performance work station I'd definitely be tempted down the Hackintosh route!
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The thing is with Hackintosh is that there is a limited set of hardware that is supported by OS X and it seems even less with macOS. Also in the future newer versions of macOS may not support your hardware. Its not too much of an issue if you have a home build tower or desktop but a bind and for someone who wants say a sleek, thin and light laptop similar to the Macs then VMware hides the hardware from macOS. In addition you can run several versions of OS X on the same machine simultaneously (with sufficient memory & CPU hyper threads). We have already seen that High Sierra has dropped support for some 32 bit apps and this will continue as iOS and OS X are gradually merged together. So if the OP has some 32 bit apps he will be able to run an earlier version say El Capitan in one VM and the latest macOS in another. It would be easy to work on the same data from both VM machines on a modern laptop equipped with USB 3.1 type C and an external SSD. You can even support old power pc applications if you run Snow Leopard in a VM so I'm told. Must try this one day.

Cheers,

DV
 
Interesting stuff chaps - thank you. I'll probably go down the refurb route as a vm doesn't look like the type of answer for a machine that'll be used for business as well as pleasure. The Apple ecosystem does everything I want and is as close to painless as I could reasonably expect but their hardware prices are at a point where the value of the convenience is being overridden by the cost of the hardware. Reminds me of EMC c2000.
 
rzme01 said:
Interesting stuff chaps - thank you. I'll probably go down the refurb route as a vm doesn't look like the type of answer for a machine that'll be used for business as well as pleasure. The Apple ecosystem does everything I want and is as close to painless as I could reasonably expect but their hardware prices are at a point where the value of the convenience is being overridden by the cost of the hardware. Reminds me of EMC c2000.
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I know what you mean, I priced up a MacBook Pro a few months back and the spec I wanted (16gb ram, minimum 512gb ssd) was insanely expensive, north of £2.5k... some people might not consider that expensive for a laptop but I do. I can get the same machine from the refurb store for £1480 which is much more reasonable, if it lasts me 4 years and I can get £600 back then I’m okay with that... but that being said, my current machine is still going strong so it can wait and I’ll buy a more up to date refurb machine when mine becomes too sluggish.
 
rzme01 said:
Interesting stuff chaps - thank you. I'll probably go down the refurb route as a vm doesn't look like the type of answer for a machine that'll be used for business as well as pleasure. The Apple ecosystem does everything I want and is as close to painless as I could reasonably expect but their hardware prices are at a point where the value of the convenience is being overridden by the cost of the hardware. Reminds me of EMC c2000.
Click to expand...

When it comes to the time for me to replace my 2012 i7 Mac Mini (maxed to it's gills) it'll be a refurb iMac from Apple, wouldn't buy one at their full prices!

All I'd ask for is 16GB RAM minimum and a 2TB FusionDrive; these seem to crop up regularly

However, my Mini is doing very well, running a 256GB SSD/1TB FusionDrive and 16GB RAM and running OS High Sierra Beta currently without a glitch ;) Long may it last!!!
 
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