Mode of installation of Windows in Vmware

[Abdulhaq]

I would like to know which is a better Mode of installation of Windows in Vmware Fusion. The two methods available are either by using the Windows already available in Bootcamp (I already have Windows 10 installed in Bootcamp in my mid 2010 Mac mini which is equipped with 16GB ram) or by making a fresh installation in VmWare by way of a Windows disc image via a CD or USB.

I would also like to know that if install the Bootcamp version whether I can continue to use the Bootcamp version by booting into Bootcamp. I would like to know the advantages and disadvantages of either method and which is the preferable mode.

 

[keysofanxiety]

Advantages of BootCamp:

1) Option to boot into Windows only. This will ensure better driver support & hardware performance, as it's not emulated/virtualised.
2) The BootCamp partition can also be accessible and used within OS X, through Parallels Desktop/VMware Fusion. Therefore if you just want to quickly open/access an app or a file, you won't always have to restart and boot into Windows. Best of both worlds.

Disadvantages of BootCamp:

1) You'll already be sacrificing a lot of hard-drive space just to put Windows on. If you've installed it as a virtual machine only, you can easily resize at your discretion.
2) If you don't assign enough hard-drive space to BootCamp, or assign too much, you can't resize the partitions as you would in OS X without corrupting the boot sector. As such, you're pretty much stuck with what you first allocated, unless you're willing to reinstall Windows.

Overall:

If hard-drive space isn't a concern, I'd always say use BootCamp & access the BC partition through PD/VMWare. This is because you have the option to fully boot into Windows if you need the hardware grunt, or can just quickly flick into Windows while in OS X if you need to quickly do something.

 

[Abdulhaq]

Advantages of BootCamp:

1) Option to boot into Windows only. This will ensure better driver support & hardware performance, as it's not emulated/virtualised.
2) The BootCamp partition can also be accessible and used within OS X, through Parallels Desktop/VMware Fusion. Therefore if you just want to quickly open/access an app or a file, you won't always have to restart and boot into Windows. Best of both worlds.

Disadvantages of BootCamp:

1) You'll already be sacrificing a lot of hard-drive space just to put Windows on. If you've installed it as a virtual machine only, you can easily resize at your discretion.
2) If you don't assign enough hard-drive space to BootCamp, or assign too much, you can't resize the partitions as you would in OS X without corrupting the boot sector. As such, you're pretty much stuck with what you first allocated, unless you're willing to reinstall Windows.

Overall:

If hard-drive space isn't a concern, I'd always say use BootCamp & access the BC partition through PD/VMWare. This is because you have the option to fully boot into Windows if you need the hardware grunt, or can just quickly flick into Windows while in OS X if you need to quickly do something.

[doublepost=1472831917][/doublepost]Thanks.

 

[maflynn]

I would also like to know that if install the Bootcamp version whether I can continue to use the Bootcamp version by booting into Bootcamp

Yes, you can use either Vmware or bootcamp. That is if you create a bootcamp partition, and then install/use Vmware, it will see the windows on the bootcamp installation and use that.

I would like to know the advantages and disadvantages of either method and which is the preferable mode.

Advantages of Vmware is that you don't have leave OS X to use windows.
Disadvantages of Vmware is that the Windows OS, is not getting direct access to the hardware, there's a fair amount of overhead and performance in both the guest and host OS will not be the best.

Advantages/disadvantages of bootcamp are the inverse of above, direct access to the hardware, it uses all of the ram, and CPUs, so performance will be better then over Vmware, but you have to leave OS X and reboot the computer.