On Tue, 2008-10-28 at 12:58 -0400, Phil M Perry wrote: > Well, most of Codeweaver's site has been knocked for a loop by the demand, > so I can't get a list of features and stuff. I gather that this is a > version of WINE, > allowing me to run Windoze software directly under Linux?
Yes. > OK, right now I'm > dual boot, and thinking about VMware (lately I have to reboot a lot to > go back > and forth, due to a Linux-only project). I'm currently running Ubuntu 7.10. > Which "Crossover" do I want to get (Pro?) and why? I depends on what windows applications you need to run on Linux, but probably Pro, as the other one available is for games. You can download both, though. > Is it more stable and > usable than VMware, or less? VMware runs windows applications at a more stable level than Crossover on the average. But that is because with VMware you are running the whole of Windows within Linux. However, there are a lot of windows applications that run great on Crossover without any difference in stability (and faster and less memory consuming). I for one prefer trying my windows applications on Crossover/wine first, before considering the alternative of having to run the Windows OS within my Linux desktop. > The big problem (that requires me to dual boot) > is that all my email, Firefox configuration and stuff, etc. are still on > the Win > side, on an NTFS partition. Is the NTFS support in 7.10 good enough to > confidently mount that partition (my Win C: drive) R/W and let Crossover > take care of everything? You don't have to mount it R/W. If you are using Firefox (and friends, e.g. Thunderbird) for you web and email, you can just mount and copy your configuration stuff over. I'm sure you can find information on the Internet on what to copy and how. Of course, I assume you are considering switching to Linux for good. In case you are not, mounting NTFS R/W can be done. There are NTFS drivers you can install for this (if they don't come with the Linux kernel yet). Then you can probably just run Firefox/Thunderbird natively in Linux and point them to the right profile dir on the NTFS drive. But all that can be tricky and risky. Safest is to switch to Linux. > Or should I go with VMware or something like that? If you have the greens, both. For your windows apps that don't run under wine/crossover, you can run them under VMware. This eliminates the need to dual boot for a lot of people. You could also try http://www.virtualbox.org/, which is free. Pretty similar to VMware. > Does Win XP think it's running natively when it's actually under VMware, > or is there some emulation going on? Both. > As long as I still have things that run > only under Windows, I'm a bit nervous about possibly wrecking it with > either WINE or VMware. Yea, making these changes can be anxiety producing. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it". So I'd say, play around with VMware and crossover if you have time. Don't migrate data or anything yet, just test the waters and see if the applications you use on windows can run under crossover or VMware ok. No hurry. > And yes, I realize that they're different animals, > but the end result is that I have Windows and Linux programs running at > the same time -- safely, I hope! Bliss. > > How much money am I saving if I take this free software, instead of > buying it at retail? Will the free version have any less support from CW? > Not sure. I would also like to know. Something to figure out at their website, once its up again. I expect they have forums you can ask your questions on, and that you can use for unofficial support, too. --Renier _______________________________________________ Mid-Hudson Valley Linux Users Group http://mhvlug.org http://mhvlug.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mhvlug Upcoming Meetings (6pm - 8pm) MHVLS Auditorium Sep 3 - Porkchop - The Areas of My Expertise Oct 1 - Ubikeys Oct 4 - Linux Fest Nov 5 - Releasing Open Source Software Dec 3 - TBD
