Virtual PC 7 performace issues?

[Lorn]

I just set up Virtual PC 7 on my PowerMac G5 and I think it's acting a bit eird. It was supposed to have support for the G5 processors but the whole thing seems really off. First, under system properties, it says that I have a 686 processor at 532 MHz (when I have 2 1.8 GHz G5 processors) and 512 MB of RAM (when I have 1.25 GB of RAM). Also it says my graphics adapter is shown as a S3 Trio32/64 (when I have a stock GeForceFX 5200). Any ideas about how to get VPC7 to realize what I really have or is this just how it works? The whole program is acting really sluggish because of it.

Thanks.

 

[3Memos]

I just set up Virtual PC 7 on my PowerMac G5 and I think it's acting a bit eird. It was supposed to have support for the G5 processors but the whole thing seems really off. First, under system properties, it says that I have a 686 processor at 532 MHz (when I have 2 1.8 GHz G5 processors) and 512 MB of RAM (when I have 1.25 GB of RAM). Also it says my graphics adapter is shown as a S3 Trio32/64 (when I have a stock GeForceFX 5200). Any ideas about how to get VPC7 to realize what I really have or is this just how it works? The whole program is acting really sluggish because of it.

Thanks.

That sounds about right.

 

[varmit]

I just set up Virtual PC 7 on my PowerMac G5 and I think it's acting a bit eird. It was supposed to have support for the G5 processors but the whole thing seems really off. First, under system properties, it says that I have a 686 processor at 532 MHz (when I have 2 1.8 GHz G5 processors) and 512 MB of RAM (when I have 1.25 GB of RAM). Also it says my graphics adapter is shown as a S3 Trio32/64 (when I have a stock GeForceFX 5200). Any ideas about how to get VPC7 to realize what I really have or is this just how it works? The whole program is acting really sluggish because of it.

Thanks.

Dude, its emulating a PC inside your Mac. That PC is a 532Mhz 686 (aka pentium) with 512 of RAM (because that is what you designated it to have in the VPC preferences, you can give it more) with a bum of a video card. There is nothing out of the ordinary here. Now as for it acting slow, thats normal, since it has to EMULATE the pentium chip and run it on the Mac. Also, did you get the update to VPC since you installed it?

VPC is a software running of the Pentium hardware.

And if you run Windows 2000 Pro, it runs a little faster than XP does.

 

[Lorn]

Dude, its emulating a PC inside your Mac. That PC is a 532Mhz 686 (aka pentium) with 512 of RAM (because that is what you designated it to have in the VPC preferences, you can give it more) with a bum of a video card. There is nothing out of the ordinary here. Now as for it acting slow, thats normal, since it has to EMULATE the pentium chip and run it on the Mac. Also, did you get the update to VPC since you installed it?

... you act as if I should have known all of this. Sorry, but if I was designing a program to emulate a PC on a MAC I think I might have given it a bit more oomph. Especially considering that it came with Windows XP Professional.

 

[mcarvin]

I just set up Virtual PC 7 on my PowerMac G5 and I think it's acting a bit eird. It was supposed to have support for the G5 processors but the whole thing seems really off. First, under system properties, it says that I have a 686 processor at 532 MHz (when I have 2 1.8 GHz G5 processors) and 512 MB of RAM (when I have 1.25 GB of RAM). Also it says my graphics adapter is shown as a S3 Trio32/64 (when I have a stock GeForceFX 5200). Any ideas about how to get VPC7 to realize what I really have or is this just how it works? The whole program is acting really sluggish because of it.

Thanks.

The other guys are right on. One important thing to remember is that VPC does not have video hardware support; it sees Radeon 9600s and X800s as that awful Trio card. Allegedly, hardware support was supposed to be in VPC 7, but it got removed somewhere along the line.

As far as the processor goes, VPC 6 emulated a P-II at 233Mhz. Believe me, VPC 7 is a speed boost compared to 6. Maybe one day Bochs will be usable...or even DarWINE.

 

[daveL]

Well, let's see ... This is *Virtual* PC, right? You are looking at the system properties of the *Virtual* PC, i.e. the *Virtual* parts of the *Virtual* PC. It has nothing, well very little, to do with your *Real* Apple hardware. The report you are reading is giving you info on the *emulated* bits and pieces of your *Virtual* PC. Keep in mind, of course, that Apple hardware can't run x86 (Intel) software directly, e.g. Windows, thus the need for a *Virtual* PC hardware emulation. Said emulated PC can't possibly run as fast as your native Apple machine.

 

[Lorn]

Well, let's see ... This is *Virtual* PC, right? You are looking at the system properties of the *Virtual* PC, i.e. the *Virtual* parts of the *Virtual* PC. It has nothing, well very little, to do with your *Real* Apple hardware. The report you are reading is giving you info on the *emulated* bits and pieces of your *Virtual* PC. Keep in mind, of course, that Apple hardware can't run x86 (Intel) software directly, e.g. Windows, thus the need for a *Virtual* PC hardware emulation. Said emulated PC can't possibly run as fast as your native Apple machine.

Thank you for your immensely invaluable and condescending reply. It's good to know that people are really willing to help...

Again... if I was designing something think this I think I would have found a way to give it a bit more power.

 

[Lord Blackadder]

Virtual PC BLOWS - You need a Mac that exceeds the performance of the emulated machine by a factor of 5 to get equivalent performance. Unfortunately, don't expect it to ever run at acceptable speeds on a Mac.

I have a Dell Precision 500MHz P3 from work that our lab was going to throw away, and it will run Windows faster than any G5 with VPC. It's THAT bad.

Worse still, the newest version of VPC after the Microsoft takeover is SLOWER than the last. Conspiracy theorists are in a frenzy...

 

[slipper]

Guys take it easy on him. Im sure he knows that it is an emulator. I would be shocked myself if i had a dual 1.8 G5, and virtual PC misinterpreted it as a 500mhz processor.

Lorn, please keep in mind that VP7 runs considerably quicker than the previous versions. With that in mind, you are also running two operating systems so it is just plain slow. I usually recommend getting a very very cheap PC instead of running VP, a $500 Dell will run a lot quicker than a $3000 G5 with VP.

 

[edesignuk]

Thank you for your immensely invaluable and condescending reply. It's good to know that people are really willing to help...

People *are* helping. They have told you that your experience is nothing uncommon and that there is not a problem. If you had done *any* research before buying VPC you'd have known this.

Again... if I was designing something think this I think I would have found a way to give it a bit more power.

You better get busy then.

 

[3Memos]

Thank you for your immensely invaluable and condescending reply. It's good to know that people are really willing to help...

Again... if I was designing something think this I think I would have found a way to give it a bit more power.

They took several minutes typing out a response. Probably not the most tactful, but still, if you get past the delivery, its useful information.

 

[Bye Bye Baby]

People *are* helping. They have told you that your experience is nothing uncommon and that there is not a problem. If you had done *any* research before buying VPC you'd have known this.
You better get busy then.

What a typical whinging pohmie reply. Could you at least try and be a little bit more diplomatic...

 

[Bear]

Thank you for your immensely invaluable and condescending reply. It's good to know that people are really willing to help...

Again... if I was designing something think this I think I would have found a way to give it a bit more power.

The only solution is really to run it on faster hardware.

Oh they can still clean up the Virtual PC software and do some other tricks, however, the power comes from the base machine it's being run on along with the memory allocated. Also remmeber what else the Mac may be running at the same time. And finally remember emulation is not free, so a 2 GHz G5 will emulate a somewhat slower Intel chip.

One piece of advice...turn off all the stupid eyecandy in windows. The less eyecandy that windows is throwing at you, the faster things will repsond.

 

[edesignuk]

What a typical whinging pohmie reply. Could you at least try and be a little bit more diplomatic...

So glad that I fit your apparent stero-type of a "pohmie".

 

[jsw]

It'll run a lot faster emulating Win2K than it will XP. It'll emulate the same PC, but Win2k is less demanding.

Note that Microsoft didn't decide to emulate a slow PC just to piss you off. VPC is telling you the PC equivalent, speed-wise, of what it's able to emulate. Were you to run it on an 800MHz G4, it wouldn't be emulating a PC that "fast".

Also, there are inherent difficulties translating all code to the Mac/G5 equivalent, so an emulator that goes between two radically different platforms (Intel vs G5) will always - always - be significantly slower. They can speed it up, maybe by a factor of two, but you simply can't expect an emulator to ever run as fast as the native code.

And no need to be defensive about the replies. People were a bit condescending, yes, but even a cursory glance at the manual or any review, whatsoever, of VPC would have answered your questions.

 

[jsw]

So glad that I fit your apparent stero-type of a "pohmie".

What's a "pohmie"? Am I one? How do I join?

 

[edesignuk]

What's a "pohmie"? Am I one? How do I join?

I *think* it's what the Aussies call the British, perhaps our enlightened Italian (????) friend Bye Bye Baby can explain

 

[3Memos]

What's a "pohmie"? Am I one? How do I join?

'Pommie' actually is derived from the acronym 'POHMIE' which dates back from when Australia was a penal colony. It was found on the back of convict's uniforms and stood for 'Prisoner Of His Majesty In Exile'.

 

[varmit]

Thank you for your immensely invaluable and condescending reply. It's good to know that people are really willing to help...

Again... if I was designing something think this I think I would have found a way to give it a bit more power.

I think they are working on it to give it more power. Microsoft had the Xbox2 guys working on the graphics for VPC for a little bit I believe. Because the new Xbox2 is going to use the G5 chips, so they need to learn how to emulate the old Xbox so the new Xbox2 can play the older Xbox games. Of course, they could also compile the NT kernel to work on PPC/G5 chip, so that it does go as fast as possible, but this takes the Virtual out of VPC.

 

[edesignuk]

'Pommie' actually is derived from the acronym 'POHMIE' which dates back from when Australia was a penal colony. It was found on the back of convict's uniforms and stood for 'Prisoner Of His Majesty In Exile'.

heh, cool, I never new that

 

[jsw]

'Pommie' actually is derived from the acronym 'POHMIE' which dates back from when Australia was a penal colony. It was found on the back of convict's uniforms and stood for 'Prisoner Of His Majesty In Exile'.

Damn, then. I never get to join the cool groups.

So, then, I'd need to become a British citizen, then get sent to prison, then exported? Sounds like too much work.

Perhaps I'll go for "Poster, Occasionally Helpful, Mostly Incredibly Extraneous"

 

[3Memos]

People Over Here Must Insult Everyone

 

[meta-ghost]

two things...

two things,
- the 512mb ram is the max you'll be able to set in VPC 7.0. (i had a discussion with the vpc folks at macworld last week about this.)
- definetely run win2000 and not xp. much, much faster.

 

[daveL]

two things,
- the 512mb ram is the max you'll be able to set in VPC 7.0. (i had a discussion with the vpc folks at macworld last week about this.)
- definetely run win2000 and not xp. much, much faster.

From the sounds of it, the original poster bought VPC7 with XP included, so I doubt running Win2K is an option, but what do I know, I'm just condescending. I agree with your advice, however. I use VPC with Win2K and it's usable for the few Windows apps I run.

 

[Bear]

two things,
- the 512mb ram is the max you'll be able to set in VPC 7.0. (i had a discussion with the vpc folks at macworld last week about this.)
- definetely run win2000 and not xp. much, much faster.

Actually some of the reasons Win2K is so much faster is all the stupid eye candy in the XP gui. Turn it off and it gets a bit more responsive. However, if you turn all the eyecandy off in Win2K, Win2K will be even faster than XP with all of it turned off.