How to Run Microsoft Windows On A Mac

Microsoft Windows is probably the most commonly used computer operating system in the world. Apple's OS X is probably a distant second.

Apple has in the recent past, switched to Intel chips, thus allowing it to run Windows. Here are a few ways to do just that

Instructions

1. Step 1

   Make sure your Mac has an Intel chip and not the older Power PC chip. You can find this information by clicking the Apple icon on the upper left of your screen and then selecting "About This Mac."
   
   If you have the OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard operating system, you will be using an Intel chip Mac.

2. Step 2

   Figure out what version of Windows you want to install. Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7 all have different requirements in terms of memory and hard disk space needed.

3. Step 3

   Figure out if you want to use a virtualizer or not. A virtualizer runs Windows inside your Mac OS X desktop. It is essentially like running another program on your computer, except that program is Windows. This has the advantage of being able to run Windows and Mac programs together on the same desktop. However, performance and speed may not be as fast as the Bootcamp method (see step 4). You will also need a good amount of RAM memory to adequately run it. The absolute bare minimum is 1GB for XP and 2GB for Vista and Windows 7. However, I would recommend doubling (at least) the RAM to 2GB or 4GB respectively for better performance.
   
   The two main virtualizers are Parallels Desktop and VMWare. Additionally, VirtualBox (www.virtualbox.org) is a free alternative from Sun Microsystems.

4. Step 4

   If you do not want to run a virtualizer, then Apple's Bootcamp is the only other choice. Instead of being able to run Mac OS X and Windows simultaneously, you will need to boot up one or the other. This alternative gives up the integration convenience and instead replaces it with better Windows performance.