Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Virtualization on rMBP 13

J

jcmpdo

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Dec 1, 2013
13
0
Hi, I want to buy a new rMBP 13 but I come from a PC so I have some doubts regarding the hardware.
I want to run a virtual machine, mainly Linux for work, but sometimes Windows.

My doubt is whether the rMBP 13 supports virtualization VT-x and VT-d.

In terms of configuration I also have two doubts:
- RAM: 8 vs 16: in normal conditions 8 GB is enough for me, but when running one VM I was thinking that 16GB can be useful.
- CPU: i5 2,6 GHz vs i7 2,8 GHZ: do you think that the i7 processor has a great advantage over the i5 when running a VM?

What do you think?
 
In principle, yes for VT-X and probably the same for VT-D.

If you want to make sure, get your processor model and check intel's site. Google will usually get you there directly. For example:

http://ark.intel.com/products/75991

To get your processor model, go to everymac.
 
Thank you.
I have checked intel website and both the i5 and i7 support vt-x and vt-d.

What about the configuration options? What do you recommend?
 
What about the CPU?
Do you think is necessary the i7? Or the i5 2.6GHz is enough?
 
The I5 should be sufficient for general tasks, unless you are doing something CPU intensive. I noticed when I am running 2 VM's in VMware 6, my fans tend to kick in and the overall temp increases where my palm rests are warm. This is when I may be running a couple of MS apps and some ssh sessions to a solaris/unix server.

I have the I7 and 8GB of ram on my Air 6,1 and it runs up to 2 VM's without any issues. It's when I try to launch a third that I get periodic Page Outs and a bit of stuttering/click delay. This is in addition to running around 15 Mac apps at the same time.

Once my rMBP 13" arrives, it should provide slightly better performance than what I am getting now, since I went with the 16GB option.
 
At this very moment, I am running 3 VM's, dual core i7 (16GB Ram) that is about 60% idle. If that gives you any idea.

VM1: WindowsXP VPN'd to client
VM2: Oracle database
VM3: Glassfish server
 
willgreene99 said:
Once my rMBP 13" arrives, it should provide slightly better performance than what I am getting now, since I went with the 16GB option.
Click to expand...

Is it an i5 or i7?
So you would choose a i5/16GB configuration over a i7/8GB?
 
Ram first for running vm's, the 2.6/16GB setup should serve you wel.
 
jcmpdo said:
Is it an i5 or i7?
So you would choose a i5/16GB configuration over a i7/8GB?
Click to expand...

I5 for me as I did not feel the difference in speed was a big enough factor to sway me.

I am estimating that I should get fairly the same performance but with less power (which should represent a boost in battery run time) and lower temperatures (which should keep my palm rests cooler).

I5/16GB is the way to go, but that is my opinion.
 
Yesterday I bought a 13 inch MBPr with an i7 chip, 8GB of RAM, and 512GB of flash storage. It handles a VMware Fusion virtual machine in which I run Windows and a few apps, mostly Quicken for Windows, with no problems whatever. Less than 20 seconds are required to load Windows and Quicken comes up and displays the password prompt in 5. If anything this rig is overkill for a VM. Others may have more demanding needs than mine but so far I am more than pleased with how the MBPr handles Windows and its apps.
 
gwsat said:
Yesterday I bought a 13 inch MBPr with an i7 chip, 8GB of RAM, and 512GB of flash storage. It handles a VMware Fusion virtual machine in which I run Windows and a few apps, mostly Quicken for Windows, with no problems whatever. Less than 20 seconds are required to load Windows and Quicken comes up and displays the password prompt in 5. If anything this rig is overkill for a VM. Others may have more demanding needs than mine but so far I am more than pleased with how the MBPr handles Windows and its apps.
Click to expand...

I agree. I have the 8gb 256gig MBPr and it works great for a virtual machine. I mainly use quickbooks and some tax programs and it is running great (Windows 8).
 
taythecoug said:
I agree. I have the 8gb 256gig MBPr and it works great for a virtual machine. I mainly use quickbooks and some tax programs and it is running great (Windows 8).
Click to expand...

Same hear. I am running a 2010 Macbook pro 13 and 8GB and a single parallels VM. I do seem to have plenty of free memory even when running big Windows programs like Visual Studio.
 
jerrykur said:
Same hear. I am running a 2010 Macbook pro 13 and 8GB and a single parallels VM. I do seem to have plenty of free memory even when running big Windows programs like Visual Studio.
Click to expand...

i5 por i7 CPU?
 
DeltaMac said:
A 2010 MBPro 13-inch would still be a Core 2 Duo !
Click to expand...

It shouldn't make any difference. VMware Fusion with Windows 7 running in it performed serviceably for me although I only had a 2010 13 inch MBA with a 2.13 core duo chip and 4GB of memory. But the MBA had flash storage, which went a long way to disguise deficiencies that could have been disastrous with a mechanical hard drive. Of course, my MBPr with an i7 chip, 8GB of memory, and 512GB of flash storage is dramatically faster. Nevertheless, Fusion and Windows still performed satisfactorily on the MBA. Any modern MBP will be dramatically more capable that my old MBA.
 
Just installed Windows 8.1 and Office 2013 on my 13" rMBP 8/256 sitting on top of VMWare Fusion 6 tonight.

Went well and seems to be running fine. I did have a freeze during one of the MS updates. Not sure what caused it but had to force quit VMWare.

I'll play with it a bit more tomorrow. My product key for windows was rejected so I'll have to sort that out over the next couple of days too. Looks like a fun call to Msft.
 
I've been running virtual machines on the dual core Macbook 13" for about a year. The 13", crmbp and rmbp have two real cores, which translates into four virtual threads for the host OS. What does that really mean? Ideally you want each of your guest OSes to have access to one real processor. If you put heavy load on your virtual machine a real machine with only two real cores can really only run ONE virtual machine, or you'll start to have lockup issues. If you run moderate loads, you might be able to get away with two, with the virtualization solution (hopefully) distributing the load on all available threads and cores. I've run up to three virtual machines on the 13" rmbp, but in my case I was only using them for website testing with Internet Explorer, so this would be considered a very light load. Even under this light load I would experience the occasional hickup as I had many apps running on the host os at the same time. As for processor support:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macbook_pro#Technical_specifications_3
http://ark.intel.com/products/75990/

If you're serious about heavy work loads and virtualization, you should at least get 16GB of ram. You'll need it. If you want more than three virtual machines under heavy loads, you should probably get the 15".
 
gtmac said:
Just installed Windows 8.1 and Office 2013 on my 13" rMBP 8/256 sitting on top of VMWare Fusion 6 tonight.

Went well and seems to be running fine. I did have a freeze during one of the MS updates. Not sure what caused it but had to force quit VMWare.

I'll play with it a bit more tomorrow. My product key for windows was rejected so I'll have to sort that out over the next couple of days too. Looks like a fun call to Msft.
Click to expand...

After I bought a 13 inch MBPr with an i7 chip and 8GB of RAM earlier this week, I considered upgrading to Fusion Version 6 and Windows 8. After mature reflection, though, I was so happy with how well Fusion Version 4 and Windows 7 were performing on my MBPr, I decided I would stick with them. My virtual machine and Windows are used 95 percent of the time to allow me to run Quicken for Windows. This setup worked well enough when I was running them on a 2010 MBA, which had only a Core Duo chip and 4GB of memory. As noted in my earlier post, my MBPr with its i7 chip and 8GB of RAM run everything exponentially faster.

In 2009 I got a copy of Windows 7 from a software firm that had a bunch of licenses. I was a consultant for them. It was originally installed on a desktop Windows machine. In 2010, I needed to reinstall Windows in my MBA's virtual machine but it wasn't easy. I finally got MS to swallow my license info but not before having to call and work through a series of prompts. What a mess!
 
It did take quite a bit of effort but I finally got Microsoft to accept the license information. The helpdesk was awesome they did a great job.

Fusion has thrown a couple of hiccups my way but considering the total cash outlay on office and fusion which was pretty minimal I am very happy. I got a sweet deal on fusion and office was only $9.99 through my work.
 
gtmac said:
It did take quite a bit of effort but I finally got Microsoft to accept the license information. The helpdesk was awesome they did a great job.

Fusion has thrown a couple of hiccups my way but considering the total cash outlay on office and fusion which was pretty minimal I am very happy. I got a sweet deal on fusion and office was only $9.99 through my work.
Click to expand...

You got a great deal on Fusion!

I had a crash late this afternoon, the first one in the two days I have been running the MBPr, and suspect that Fusion/Windows may have been the culprit. I closed the lid on the machine when it was operating properly but when I opened it again. it was as dead as a doornail. Once I rebooted, everything came back up but the first thing I saw after the reboot was a glimpse of the Windows desktop. It disappeared immediately, which was followed by the big white Fusion arrow in the middle of a black screen. Anyway, once I rebooted everything worked perfectly again including Fusion and Windows. Time will tell I guess.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back