Can I Run Windows With Leopard?
Yes. Boot Camp, Apple's dual-boot software that has been available in beta to Mac OS X 10.4 owners free of charge, is built into Leopard. It lets users of Intel-based Macs boot into either Leopard or Windows, or quit one operating system and cold boot into the other. Unlike virtualization software such as SWsoftware Inc.'s Parallels Desktop or VMware Inc.'s Fusion, however, Boot Camp does not run both Windows and Leopard simultaneously.
Boot Camp installs and manages Windows XP Home SP2, XP Professional SP2, Vista Home Basic, Vista Home Premium, Vista Business and Vista Ultimate, so you'll need a retail copy of Windows: licenses tied to a PC aren't transferrable. A full version or a reseller edition, also called a "system builder" edition, are your only options. You can't install an XP or Vista upgrade stock-keeping unit.
Just a thought: With Vista's additional hardware demands and the knocks it has taken from users, Windows XP seems the consensus pick of Mac owners writing to various message forums, including Apple's. Although Microsoft Corp. recently extended the retail lifespan of XP another five months to June 30, 2008, it's never been tough to find the older operating system--even after Vista's release. Brick-and-mortar stores such as Best Buy Co. have it on the shelves, and there's still time to order a copy online before Leopard shows up on the 26th.
I'm already running Boot Camp, so will I have to reinstall Windows too? Nope. Boot Camp puts Windows XP or Vista on a separate partition, which remains undisturbed by the upgrade.
I'm running Windows using Parallels Desktop (or Fusion); will I have to do anything special? This isn't as clear-cut. SWsoftware, for example, said last week that Parallels Desktop works with Leopard. "You'll be able to safely upgrade to Leopard when it goes live without worrying that Parallels will work," said Benjamin Rudolph, director of corporate communications, on the company's blog.
VMware's Fusion, meanwhile, will also work with Leopard, according to a message posted to a support forum by Pat Lee, senior product manager. "VMware Fusion 1.1 is free for all paying 1.0 customers, and it will include support for Mac OS X Leopard," Lee said. However, Fusion 1.1 only recently entered beta testing, and VMware won't talk about a release schedule yet, so you might need to run an unfinished version under Leopard for awhile.
But exactly what users of either virtual machine (VM) will need to do, if anything, before or after a Tiger-to-Leopard upgrade is unknown. Anyone taking the Erase and Install route, of course, will have to reinstall, at a minimum, the VM and then Windows in the VM.
What New Hardware Helps Strut Leopard's Stuff?
A new hard drive. Time Machine, the new feature in Leopard, doesn't require an external drive to do its document-versioning magic, but adding one is the simplest way to back up and restore. (Time Machine will back up to any nonbooting drive or partition, including internal and networked volumes, although Apple is pushing the external drive route.) Time Machine supports both FireWire and USB external drives, so you have plenty of choices.
Second on the wish list, and related to Time Machine, is the AirPort Extreme wireless router. Plug an external drive into the AirPort's USB port, and any wireless-enabled Mac can back up files to the disk over the Wi-Fi network. But you'll have to do the backup the old-fashioned way, by dragging files and folders to the disk's icon. Time Machine doesn't work with wireless disks--at least, not yet. Apple's list price: $179.
If you plan on going wireless with the AirPort, remember that USB-only drives cost less than multiport models that offer, say, both USB and FireWire interfaces. LaCie Group SA, for instance, prices a 320GB USB-only drive at $105, but the same-size disk with both FireWire 400 and USB ports runs $140.
What Happens if I Want to Roll Back to Tiger?
Ah, the dirty secret of operating system upgrades. Not everyone will be happy with Leopard, no matter how much Apple amps up the Jobsian reality-distortion field. But reverting to Tiger, say, after updating from it to Leopard, is a lot like herding cats: possible perhaps, but not very pretty.
This isn't an Apple-only problem. Reversing an upgrade on almost any operating system is a major pain. Just ask anyone who has decided that Vista is valueless to them and hopes to downshift to XP.
Although some might hint that the Archive-and-Install option lets you roll back your operating system, that's a lie. You can't boot from the Previous System folder, nor can you rebless that folder ("bless" in Mac terminology means designating a folder as the boot folder) to force a return to Tiger. The only sure way to return to yesteryear is by planning ahead, which means backing up what you have before you upgrade. You can then wipe the drive and restore the backup--this is another pitch for bootable backups made by the likes of SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner--to your Mac's drive.
Before you do that, however, you'll want to back up any settings, documents, photos, music and data that you created and/or changed after the Leopard upgrade so they can be restored after the operating system has been.
Have a headache yet?
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