Apple Approves First Retro PC Emulator for iPhone, iPad, and Vision Pro

[MacBH928]

XP was rubbish back then and it is even more rubbish today.

All Apple users laughed at XP back then, so now we going to say woW lOok hoW AmZinG???

Instead of chucking words on the internet use some logic. There's no reason to install really rubbish and really old software on a new device or computer.

Sure, it's a thousand times faster but without GPU support you have no OpenGL or Direct X no matter how fast you new CPU is.

The real question is. If Mac users thought XP was a pile of dung back then....why install that pile of dung today?

actually XP was way superior to win98 and much more stable. Yes I rather use OS X. The reason to run it is for fun, hobby, old apps and games.

Surely no one is running XP on iPad to do real work...I don't thinks so...

 

[MacBH928]

Windows 98 seems to run about as well as my first Celeron 400 PC.

that should fly , i remember when 200Mhz was out and I was thinking this is from the future.

 

[applezulu]

Before I put effort into trying to figure out how, I’d be curious if this use case is even possible. So if anybody knows and would care to answer:

I have some multi-track audio recordings made a thousand years ago in a now-mostly dead format in a “cakewalk” app on a pc. What I’d like to do is emulate windows XP, install cakewalk, open those old projects, and export each individual track as a separate .wav audio file. Those could then be uploaded into a modern recording studio app and tinkered with anew.

So would this emulator make that possible, if I could figure out how to install the app and upload/export files to and from that?

 

[dmr727]

Before I put effort into trying to figure out how, I’d be curious if this use case is even possible. So if anybody knows and would care to answer:

I have some multi-track audio recordings made a thousand years ago in a now-mostly dead format in a “cakewalk” app on a pc. What I’d like to do is emulate windows XP, install cakewalk, open those old projects, and export each individual track as a separate .wav audio file. Those could then be uploaded into a modern recording studio app and tinkered with anew.

So would this emulator make that possible, if I could figure out how to install the app and upload/export files to and from that?

Wow - it's been a long time since I thought about Cakewalk. I used to connect a 286 to a Roland D5 through a MIDI interface.

I'd give it a shot - emulation these days is pretty fantastic. Let us know how it goes!

 

[killaz05]

Before I put effort into trying to figure out how, I’d be curious if this use case is even possible. So if anybody knows and would care to answer:

I have some multi-track audio recordings made a thousand years ago in a now-mostly dead format in a “cakewalk” app on a pc. What I’d like to do is emulate windows XP, install cakewalk, open those old projects, and export each individual track as a separate .wav audio file. Those could then be uploaded into a modern recording studio app and tinkered with anew.

So would this emulator make that possible, if I could figure out how to install the app and upload/export files to and from that?

I would think so. I have a folder on my iPad in the files app that is shared with windows 7. I couldn't get the shared folder to work properly with windows XP though. I am using Windows 7 to run an old engineering program for bulkhead walls. I am able to bring in the input files, use the program and then export the result files pretty easily.

If your program can run in Windows 7, I would use that since the virtual machine drivers seem to work better with it.

Also, if you go to run Windows and it seems too zoomed in, just pinch the screen to a good size. I was worried when installing it till, I realized.

 

[gank41]

Before I put effort into trying to figure out how, I’d be curious if this use case is even possible. So if anybody knows and would care to answer:

I have some multi-track audio recordings made a thousand years ago in a now-mostly dead format in a “cakewalk” app on a pc. What I’d like to do is emulate windows XP, install cakewalk, open those old projects, and export each individual track as a separate .wav audio file. Those could then be uploaded into a modern recording studio app and tinkered with anew.

So would this emulator make that possible, if I could figure out how to install the app and upload/export files to and from that?

So, I don't use Cakewalk but I do have an old version of Cubase installed on my WinXP VM in UTM, and although WinXP "works" in that Cubase opens my old files, I'm not seeing the Shared Library working on my end where I'd save the files.
Basically you're doing what you're doing in Windows and saving the files, and then the iPad would be using them (presumably) in Logic for iPad? I'd assume that would 100% work as long as you can save the files to where the iPad can get at them. Don't think of this as "doing a thing on the device to do the thing", think of it as using two computers and sharing files between them.

 

[applezulu]

So, I don't use Cakewalk but I do have an old version of Cubase installed on my WinXP VM in UTM, and although WinXP "works" in that Cubase opens my old files, I'm not seeing the Shared Library working on my end where I'd save the files.
Basically you're doing what you're doing in Windows and saving the files, and then the iPad would be using them (presumably) in Logic for iPad? I'd assume that would 100% work as long as you can save the files to where the iPad can get at them. Don't think of this as "doing a thing on the device to do the thing", think of it as using two computers and sharing files between them.

That's the general idea, yes. I also see now that they have an app for Mac. Perhaps that might be the better way to do this. I definitely want something that's well sandboxed, so that I can set it up, generate the exported files and then get Windows the heck off my iPad/mac or whichever.

 

[Populus]

I have a question, just to evaluate wether to install it on my tight 128GB iPad or not: if you install Windows (XP, 7, 10, 11, whatever) or any Linux distribution, can you run software compiled for those systems? Can you run simple, non-CPU/GPU demanding Open Source software coded for x86? Or this is just for playing the integrated solitaire and minesweeper apps? This would be on an M2 iPad Pro.

If the answer to the question above is yes, then can you share a folder between the virtualized desktop and your iPad? From what I’m reading few comments above, it seems like it works at least for my beloved Windows 7…

Depending on your answer and experience with it, I will install it or not.

Thank you.

EDIT: if the answer to both questions are a big yes, then honestly I don’t understand why Apple doesn’t include a native macOS virtualization tool… maybe it would need too many resources for a base M4 iPad Pro which is still limited to 8GB of RAM, needed for both iPad OS and Apple Intelligence? The iPad Pro situation is weird at best.

 

[Populus]

actually XP was way superior to win98 and much more stable. Yes I rather use OS X. The reason to run it is for fun, hobby, old apps and games.

Surely no one is running XP on iPad to do real work...I don't thinks so...

I think the (rude) user you were replying to might be confusing the long-lived Windows XP with the infamous Windows Vista. I used XP for some years, actually I grew up with that Windows system, and I remember it quite stable simple and efficient, at least for Microsoft standards in those times.

 

[Kal Madda]

I have a question, just to evaluate wether to install it on my tight 128GB iPad or not: if you install Windows (XP, 7, 10, 11, whatever) or any Linux distribution, can you run software compiled for those systems? Can you run simple, non-CPU/GPU demanding Open Source software coded for x86? Or this is just for playing the integrated solitaire and minesweeper apps? This would be on an M2 iPad Pro.

If the answer to the question above is yes, then can you share a folder between the virtualized desktop and your iPad? From what I’m reading few comments above, it seems like it works at least for my beloved Windows 7…

Depending on your answer and experience with it, I will install it or not.

Thank you.

EDIT: if the answer to both questions are a big yes, then honestly I don’t understand why Apple doesn’t include a native macOS virtualization tool… maybe it would need too many resources for a base M4 iPad Pro which is still limited to 8GB of RAM, needed for both iPad OS and Apple Intelligence? The iPad Pro situation is weird at best.

Yes, you can install any software designed for the OS on a UTM SE VM, though some softwares will probably run better than others, really resource intensive software probably won’t run as smoothly as medium to light software. And there is also a way to create a shared folder between the two. I have not used a shared folder yet. I installed a Windows 7 VM in UTM SE on my 11” M1 iPad Pro with 8GB RAM and 128GB storage. So far it’s been running great! Very minimal lag. It runs just as well as an old desktop I used to use ran it. I will tell you though, it is a bit of a learning curve if you haven’t created or used VMs before. I tried UTM’s Windows 7 template for a while, but I struggled to get it to work. So I decided to create a new machine from scratch. I stuck with the default CPU, turned off “UEFI boot” (this is under “QEMU” in the settings for the VM. I also found for the install that it helped to allocate less RAM (I believe the UTM app must be using more RAM in the background for this part of the process), so I gave it 2GB of RAM for going through the install. I also configured the default CPU with 4 cores, and switched on the “Force Multicore” setting. After I got Windows 7 installed, I ejected the installer ISO disc, I turned off the VM (use the software shut down within Windows 7, not the power button on the app UI), and went into settings for the VM and upped the RAM to 4GB of RAM. And this is the Windows 7 ISO I used: https://archive.org/details/en_windows_7_ultimate_with_sp1_x64_dvd_u_677332_202006 It took me forever just to find an ISO, so hopefully this helps you out. 👍🏻

 

[Populus]

Yes, you can install any software designed for the OS on a UTM SE VM, though some softwares will probably run better than others, really resource intensive software probably won’t run as smoothly as medium to light software. And there is also a way to create a shared folder between the two. I have not used a shared folder yet. I installed a Windows 7 VM in UTM SE on my 11” M1 iPad Pro with 8GB RAM and 128GB storage. So far it’s been running great! Very minimal lag. It runs just as well as an old desktop I used to use ran it. I will tell you though, it is a bit of a learning curve if you haven’t created or used VMs before. I tried UTM’s Windows 7 template for a while, but I struggled to get it to work. So I decided to create a new machine from scratch. I stuck with the default CPU, turned off “UEFI boot” (this is under “QEMU” in the settings for the VM. I also found for the install that it helped to allocate less RAM (I believe the UTM app must be using more RAM in the background for this part of the process), so I gave it 2GB of RAM for going through the install. I also configured the default CPU with 4 cores, and switched on the “Force Multicore” setting. After I got Windows 7 installed, I ejected the installer ISO disc, I turned off the VM (use the software shut down within Windows 7, not the power button on the app UI), and went into settings for the VM and upped the RAM to 4GB of RAM. And this is the Windows 7 ISO I used: https://archive.org/details/en_windows_7_ultimate_with_sp1_x64_dvd_u_677332_202006 It took me forever just to find an ISO, so hopefully this helps you out. 👍🏻

Good! Although I think I will start with a Linux distro if it comes with one by default. For what I need, I don’t care about the operating system and with Windows you have the hassle of getting a key and activating it.

 

[Kal Madda]

Good! Although I think I will start with a Linux distro if it comes with one by default. For what I need, I don’t care about the operating system and with Windows you have the hassle of getting a key and activating it.

Yeah, I think many linux distributions should run pretty well, and should be pretty simple to setup as well. UTM doesn’t come with any OSes “preinstalled” per se, but UTM does provide several “templates” on their site, and I believe several of the Linux templates include ISOs. I did also discover that there’s an option to skip the activation key for Windows in the installer. I’m currently experimenting with a Windows 10 VM in UTM SE. 👍🏻

 

[MacBH928]

Yes, you can install any software designed for the OS on a UTM SE VM, though some softwares will probably run better than others, really resource intensive software probably won’t run as smoothly as medium to light software. And there is also a way to create a shared folder between the two. I have not used a shared folder yet. I installed a Windows 7 VM in UTM SE on my 11” M1 iPad Pro with 8GB RAM and 128GB storage. So far it’s been running great! Very minimal lag. It runs just as well as an old desktop I used to use ran it. I will tell you though, it is a bit of a learning curve if you haven’t created or used VMs before. I tried UTM’s Windows 7 template for a while, but I struggled to get it to work. So I decided to create a new machine from scratch. I stuck with the default CPU, turned off “UEFI boot” (this is under “QEMU” in the settings for the VM. I also found for the install that it helped to allocate less RAM (I believe the UTM app must be using more RAM in the background for this part of the process), so I gave it 2GB of RAM for going through the install. I also configured the default CPU with 4 cores, and switched on the “Force Multicore” setting. After I got Windows 7 installed, I ejected the installer ISO disc, I turned off the VM (use the software shut down within Windows 7, not the power button on the app UI), and went into settings for the VM and upped the RAM to 4GB of RAM. And this is the Windows 7 ISO I used: https://archive.org/details/en_windows_7_ultimate_with_sp1_x64_dvd_u_677332_202006 It took me forever just to find an ISO, so hopefully this helps you out. 👍🏻

🤯

It can run Win7? I thought it can do retro OS for fun but Win7 is pretty recent and very capable. I mean, it should run 3D games like Diablo III and Crysis

 

[Kal Madda]

🤯

It can run Win7? I thought it can do retro OS for fun but Win7 is pretty recent and very capable. I mean, it should run 3D games like Diablo III and Crysis

Yeah, and so far it’s been running great. I haven’t tried any 3D games on it yet, but I intend to sometime. With how it’s performing for everything else, I don’t think it would have issues with older 3D games. 👍🏻 I shared in another comment here in this thread the steps I took to set up the configuration I’m using. 👍🏻