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Question of the Day: What is the ultimate French toast topping?
Windows on a Mac Pro vs Windows on Dell XPS
- Thread starter dd1313
- Start date
unskinnybob
Expert Member
What Windows apps do you want to run? Not a fan of bootcamp, which is essentially splitting your disk into 2 partitions and dual booting. If you don't run funny apps, go Mac. For gaming, don't.
I want to run MS project ,but basically is Windows on a mac similar in performance to windows on a Dell
InTheCube
Expert Member
If I recall correctly (I'm in no way any type of Apple/Max expert or layman), both platforms use Intel architecture underneath, so to compare performance should be easy - just compare hardware specs between the 2 machines. I reckon if the specs are similar, the performance should be similar.
The build quality and look and feel of the 2 machines however will be somewhat different, with Apple winning in the aesthetics and quality department. But this factors out in the price as well, by quite a bit.
You should probably Google this topic as well (i.e. comparison articles), as well as individual reviews of each machine. I personally use a Dell XPS 15z, and I'm very happy with it. Only thing that peeves me off is that the keyboard is missing a few critical keys, in order of importance:
- No dedicated Home, End, Page Up, Page Down keys - these require 2 button presses (Fn key + arrow key)
- No keyboard button to mimic the right-click of your mouse button (can't believe how much I miss this)
- No NumLock key, and hence numeric keypad (not a train-smash, unless you work in Finance/Accounts, which I don't)
Other than the above, I love my XPS 15z. Well worth the money.
The build quality and look and feel of the 2 machines however will be somewhat different, with Apple winning in the aesthetics and quality department. But this factors out in the price as well, by quite a bit.
You should probably Google this topic as well (i.e. comparison articles), as well as individual reviews of each machine. I personally use a Dell XPS 15z, and I'm very happy with it. Only thing that peeves me off is that the keyboard is missing a few critical keys, in order of importance:
- No dedicated Home, End, Page Up, Page Down keys - these require 2 button presses (Fn key + arrow key)
- No keyboard button to mimic the right-click of your mouse button (can't believe how much I miss this)
- No NumLock key, and hence numeric keypad (not a train-smash, unless you work in Finance/Accounts, which I don't)
Other than the above, I love my XPS 15z. Well worth the money.
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Depends on your Macbook Pro and how much speed you need. I generally just run Windows applications like that in a virtual machine because it's more than fast enough for the job and more convenient than rebooting or switching to my Windows laptop. Another factor is whether you need to carry these machines around. If you're running an application where every bit of processing power is important, then go with running natively on the Windows machine, unless your Macbook is a faster machine.
Yes, Macbook keyboard has similar annoying limitations.
Duan
Senior Member
I have a Macbook Pro 15" i7 with 8GB RAM.
In Bootcamp, it runs Windows 7 way better than any other laptop I have ever had, including a string of dells.
This was contrary to my expectations. The only logic I have to offer is that Apple has fewer models, with fewer options which means fewer drivers which needs to be developed, tuned and tested.
Try to multiply models by options to see how many unique dell iterations you finally end up with....
Their (Apple's) tweaked drivers (in my experience) are super stable and the build quality of the actual device is of course great.
Having said that, it takes some getting used to from keyboard layouts to the track pad etc...
I finally changed companies and dont need to run Windows any more. Nowadays I only boot into Windows if I really need an app like MS Project.
If you won't be playing games or doing CAD work, it may just be better to look at a virtual machine for your Windows fix.
In windows a mouse works better and in OSX the trackpad is best. Performance wise there is probably no difference between a Macbook and any other intel laptop other than price.
Hope that doesn't confuse the issue even more for you.
In Bootcamp, it runs Windows 7 way better than any other laptop I have ever had, including a string of dells.
This was contrary to my expectations. The only logic I have to offer is that Apple has fewer models, with fewer options which means fewer drivers which needs to be developed, tuned and tested.
Try to multiply models by options to see how many unique dell iterations you finally end up with....
Their (Apple's) tweaked drivers (in my experience) are super stable and the build quality of the actual device is of course great.
Having said that, it takes some getting used to from keyboard layouts to the track pad etc...
I finally changed companies and dont need to run Windows any more. Nowadays I only boot into Windows if I really need an app like MS Project.
If you won't be playing games or doing CAD work, it may just be better to look at a virtual machine for your Windows fix.
In windows a mouse works better and in OSX the trackpad is best. Performance wise there is probably no difference between a Macbook and any other intel laptop other than price.
Hope that doesn't confuse the issue even more for you.
Speedster
Honorary Master
I run Parallels Desktop on my MacBook Pro. Works like a dream!
MagicDude4Eva
Banned
If you just want to run MS Project have a look at OmniPlan - I used this about 3 years ago and I would be surprised if by now it can't also write MS Project files (unless of course you need that whole MS Project server integration stuff).