Best Windows for Parallels 8???

[Mr.MacJr]

I'm pretty new to Macs. I currently have a MBPr 2.3ghz i7 512SSD 8gb RAM... need to run windows for some programs I'll need for my new job.

Pretty sure I'm going with Windows 7, but am open to other suggestions. I'm curious though, will the 32-bit, 64-bit versions matter and if so, which one should I go with?

Also, any advice from people that have used Parallels before would be greatly appreciated.

 

[ScoobyMcDoo]

It seems to me the system requirements of the software you want to run under windows should be the driver of which version of windows you run rather than how any of us feel about it.

Regarding 64 vs 32-bit windows7 version - either will probably work fine, but might as well load the 64-bit version, but again check the requirements of your application software.

 

[skoldpadda]

It seems to me the system requirements of the software you want to run under windows should be the driver of which version of windows you run rather than how any of us feel about it.

^This

In regards to 64bit vs 32bit it really does depend on the software requirements. As well as this remember that 32Bit has a limit of 4GB (more like 3.5GB) RAM that it can access due to it's structure, but seen as you only have 8GB's all together i doubt you'll ever push past 4GB's. I'm all for moving forward and would recommend you to go for the 64bit.