Good summary. A couple tidbits to go along.
Fusion defaults to 60GB for Win7 disk allocation and 1GB RAM. These
might be minimums but probably work well for most situations. It also
defaults to the 2GB allocations as separate files. Not sure the
advantage other than for backing up maybe. If you do something you might
only have a few 2GB files that have been changed. I know a couple people
who share their user folders (Documents, Music, Photos) from the Mac
side to Fusion so there is no user generated content in the virtual
machine. So if the VM blows up nothing is lost and they only need to
backup the Mac side. Another trick is to use the Snapshots feature. If
all your documents are outside the virtual machine you can create a
snapshot at a known good point. If anything goes wonky you can just
restore to the snapshot state. I've even heard of people using the
snapshot to run Jaws in 40-minute mode and then jump back again when
time was up. At least for developers who just run Jaws for testing that
might be a good solution.
On 6/5/12 5:17 AM, Sean Murphy wrote:
Hello to all.
I wish to clear up some possible misunderstandings that people have with the
virtualisation route.
Depending on available resources on your Mac will determine how to configure
the VMWare. If you have a Mac with 8gb of physical memory. VMWare states only
to use a maximum of 50% of the physical memory for the guess OS. This is more
then enough memory for a 64 bit OS which would be 4gb for the guess. If you are
planning to use a 32 bit OS, then I wouldn't allocate more then 3 gb of
physical memory for a 8 gb PC. If you have 4gb physical RAM, then I would use
the rule of thumb of no more then 50% and allocate accordingly.
In relation to the virtual hard drive that you set up for the guess OS. This is
really up to you how much you allocate. The rule of thumb I use is around 40
to 50 gb. I generally find this is more then enough. I also configure the
VMWare to share the documents, desktop, music, etc between Windows and the Mac.
Again, I am reducing the amount of disk spaced used by the Guess windows OS by
doing this. So the virtual disk is allocated for programs and those files
needed by the app. The other tip is that I set up my Mac user directory as a
VMWare shared drive under windows. So it is really easy to copy between both
environments. Also you can launch your window app from within the Mac
environment. For example, I can open the word document within windows by
opening it from the Mac. This is the true power and flexibility of having
windows in a virtual environment.
If you are having performance issues. It is a good starting point to find out
how much memory is being shared between the Mac and guess OS. How many cores
are being used. I find a max of 50% of the cores available is a good guideline.
EG: a duel core I would only allocate one. On my Mac Book Pro, I have 4 cores,
so I allocate 2. When allocating the virtual disks, I have read somewhere that
the 2gb files allocation reduces performance. When you do allocate virtual
disks, they will grow as you use it to the maximum allocated.
In relation to authorisation of Jaws. This is a known problem with virtual
environments. It is one of those bugs that sit with the company who FS uses to
set up the authentication and VMWare. It isn't a FS issues per say, rather it
is their vendors problem who they use for the authentication. The pro's and
cons of having FS authentication is not a discussion for this list.
I haven't had any problems with the authentication of Jaws. I even back up the
whole virtual directory on a periodic bases. So if the virtual guess breaks, I
can replace it with a known working version.
The other issues you have to be aware of is keyboard conflicts with Windows and
the Mac. Voice Over is very aggressive and doesn't like anyone else using the
Capslock key, control option together and any arrow key with the function key.
. The Mac does not have any Insert key. So under windows, you have to remap a
Mac keyboard key to an insert. This is done by an program called sharp keys.
Another thing I am currently playing with is remapping the Mac keys. I am
planning to remap the right option key to a right control key. Under windows,
I am going to remap the right control key to a insert or caps lock. This will
give me more flexibility with using Jaws commands. This is a real pain and
Apple needs to address the keyboard conflict issue. Since if you use VMWare
under windows. Once the control is passed to the guess OS. Windows doesn't
interfere with the keys at all.
One final point, if you turn off Voice Over, the cap lock issue doesn't occur.
Sean
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