windows development on a mac?

whiteboard

Hey all,

Find myself liking apple kit more and more but and I am looking at some new kit atm. Just wondering what options I have in terms of being able to do windows development on a mac? Current work is mostly java based but there is a possibility of some windows/web work using visual studio & SQL server coming up soon.

Just want to make sure that any spanky new kit doesnt become a doorstop over night.

Any advise/pointers/opinioins appreciated.

Whitey

fasty

The most common option is a virtual machine running Windows. Parallels and VMWare do paid products but there's a free offering called VirtualBox too.

I've used VMWare for years do to my Windows work. For a long time I didn't even have a proper Windows PC. If I didn't want to play games, I wouldn't have bothered. That's how good VMs are these days.

The other options are using the Bootcamp Utility to install Windows onto your Mac and boot into Windows when you need to dev for Windows, but who likes to reboot? Only do this if you need to do graphically intensive dev, but Web and Windows? I don't think you do.

If the work is C#.Net based, one option is Mono, a port of the .Net framework which is okay enough from what I've done with it, but the library is incomplete and tools ****e.

conor.hogan.2

Ye you can run a virtual machine (virtualbox for example) or dual boot if you want.

Freddio

you can remote destop from a mac into windows machines with this http://www.microsoft.com/mac/remote-desktop-client

whiteboard

Thanks for all the replies. Cant see any reason now not to guy buy one.....

mazzy maz

I'm running Windows XP via VMWare Fusion on my macbook for the sole purpose of learning C# using Visual Studio Express. Thought it would be a struggle to get up and running, but it was a piece of cake. Savage cabbage.

Some_randomer

@Whiteboard did you get the Mac in the end? I'm in the same boat - getting tired of the lags and constant fan on my reasonably new i7 16GB Win 10 laptop so looking at a Mac now. Also need to do VS and .NET work.

Buford T Justice

Some_randomer wrote: »

@Whiteboard did you get the Mac in the end? I'm in the same boat - getting tired of the lags and constant fan on my reasonably new i7 16GB Win 10 laptop so looking at a Mac now. Also need to do VS and .NET work.

Have you a solid state drive? 16 gig of ram?

EdgeCase

Some_randomer wrote: »

@Whiteboard did you get the Mac in the end? I'm in the same boat - getting tired of the lags and constant fan on my reasonably new i7 16GB Win 10 laptop so looking at a Mac now. Also need to do VS and .NET work.

The post you’re responding to is from 7 years ago!

Royale with Cheese

I'm a .net developer and went with a mac about 18 months ago. Aside from the astronomical price, it's been a great decision.

I went with the 512gb solid state, 16gb ram and then installed Windows 10 through bootcamp, giving it about 200gb. I've a full .Net dev environment up and running although I do most of my actual dev work by remoting into my work machine, so I haven't done a huge amount with the environment I setup thus far. I know the latest offerings like .Net core are designed to run on any architecture, but why would you bother when running a second OS on your Mac is this easy.

As an aside, the news that Apple are planning on replacing intel with their own chips in the next two years would probably affect my decision to buy another Mac. I need it to run both operating systems and I'd have my doubts about how well Windows would run on those CPUs.

EdgeCase

It depends on what they use. Windows 10 for ARM is available too. Considering they actively support Boot Camp, I think they're likely to have a solution.

Royale with Cheese

We'll see. After they changed the file system in MacOS, Windows can no longer recognise the MacOS partition and you need to manually enter a boot menu after a restart in order to boot it back into MacOS. So they left it up to Microsoft there to solve that one, who thus far haven't bothered.

Windows 10 will run on arm (which I'm guessing Apple will go with) with limitations. I would say Apple will leave it up to Microsoft to improve their arm support.

Anyway, if this is the route they go down I'd probably get myself one of the final Intel models and then keep it for a good few years, while Microsoft hopefully catch up.

Buford T Justice

Royale with Cheese wrote: »

As an aside, the news that Apple are planning on replacing intel with their own chips in the next two years would probably affect my decision to buy another Mac. I need it to run both operating systems and I'd have my doubts about how well Windows would run on those CPUs.

Is that for the 2019 generation macbook?

Royale with Cheese

I think they're aiming for 2020, but I've also read they might end up sticking with Intel on their high end models for now. Nothing is certain yet.

14ned

Royale with Cheese wrote: »

I'm a .net developer and went with a mac about 18 months ago. Aside from the astronomical price, it's been a great decision.

I went with the 512gb solid state, 16gb ram and then installed Windows 10 through bootcamp, giving it about 200gb. I've a full .Net dev environment up and running although I do most of my actual dev work by remoting into my work machine, so I haven't done a huge amount with the environment I setup thus far. I know the latest offerings like .Net core are designed to run on any architecture, but why would you bother when running a second OS on your Mac is this easy.

Exactly the same config as my Macbook Pro 13 2016, on which I exclusively run Windows.

For the price, it's terrible value. Dell XPS 13 much better in every way. But I'll grant that if you don't mind the hideous cost, it's a not half bad Windows laptop, compiles complex C++ reasonably quickly. My biggest gripe is the keyboard, the keys get jammed very, very easily and cleaning them is nerve wracking and highly likely to eventually result in snapping off the wee plastic lugs, thus leaving me with no key. At which point I'll hate on Apple just a bit more for such a lousy keyboard design, because I can guarantee they'll charge me something completely ridiculous to fix it.

Niall

Some_randomer

Buford T Justice wrote: »

Some_randomer wrote: »

@Whiteboard did you get the Mac in the end? I'm in the same boat - getting tired of the lags and constant fan on my reasonably new i7 16GB Win 10 laptop so looking at a Mac now. Also need to do VS and .NET work.

Have you a solid state drive? 16 gig of ram?

Yep only 256 though and 16 gig RAM. After the last Win 10 update (1709) there's a serious lag now and again when I have a couple of different browsers and programmes running. My CPU and disk use are really low and RAM usage is usually under 50% but it still happens, so getting flipped off with it now.

EdgeCase

Buford T Justice wrote: »

Is that for the 2019 generation macbook?

It's only speculation at this stage. Apple haven't announced anything and if anything thing could be just trying to put pressure on Intel.

MillField

You can use Visual Studio on Mac, and as others have mentioned here you could always connect to a VM if you come across any issues. I use a Mac at home and have had no issues with any dev stuff.