CodeWeavers has recently announced the arrival of their newest product, CrossOver Mac. In case you aren't familiar with CrossOver, it is CodeWeavers' latest Windows-compatability product  intended for Intel Mac OS X machines. This one will allow Mac users to run their favorite Windows applications seamlessly on their Mac, without the need for a Windows OS license of any kind.

Pricing will be at $59.95 for single-user licenses, with volume and educational discounts available. CrossOver Mac will support a number of Windows applications to run natively within Mac OS X using Wine, enabling the user to run Windows applications without having a copy of Windows installed on their system. It will ship between July-August 2006.

Codeweaver's solution differs from solutions like Apple's Boot Camp and Parallels Desktop since it does not require a copy of Windows to run the Windows applications. Also, applications will be able to run side by side with their Mac OS X counterparts, whereas virtualization solutions must be contained within a "Windows window" or the machine must be rebooted in the case of Boot Camp. The bad part of the bargain is that only a limited number of applications will be supported, whereas dual booting can support any Windows application, and virtualization can support most non-3D intensive application.

Mac OS Hints writer drewthaler noticed that Parallels Desktop, as good as it is, has a glaring flaw: In his words, "It uses Mac OS X's default caching strategies for huge files such as the operating system images (hard disk [or HDD] files) and SAV files (session saves). Over time, almost all of your RAM will fill up with data from these files, leaving little room for your other applications. If you've ever converted a hard drive image with Image Tool while doing something else at the same time, you'll know exactly what I mean."

He contacted the Parallels team to tell them what was up, but they never responded. So he came up with PD Tweaker, a little plugin that runs on Unsanity's Application Enhancer and instructs OS X to either stick to the default plan and always save HDD files and SAV files, or not save them at all to improve computers' overall performance. drewthaler says to try and see how much faster your Macs feel after PD Tweaker is installed.

Just a note - you'll need to install Application Enhancer 2.0 first before you install PD Tweaker, if you don't already have it in your Mac. They're both freeware, though, so no problem.

Download: [PD Tweaker]
Download: [Application Enhancer 2.0]

You read that right. At least that's what CNET's Daniel Begun says. He ran a series of tests comparing the performance of Windows XP SP2 on an Intel Mac using Apple's Boot Camp Public Beta (which gives users a dual-boot system), Windows XP on Parallels Desktop for Mac (which allows users to run both OSs at the same time and seamlessly switch back and forth between them), and Mac OS X Version 10.4.6. All these were installed on a 17-inch MacBook Pro with a 2.16GHz Intel Core Duo processor, 2GB of DDR2 SDRAM and an ATI Radeon X1600 graphics chip.

The CNET labs ran a few of their own benchmarks on the MacBook Pro to see how the three compared in terms of how the applications ran on each. Their test comprised attempting to process images using Photoshop CS2, running Microsoft Office 2003, encoding iTunes, playing Quake 4, and just plain booting each of the systems up.

I'll spare you the gory details; suffice to say that XP-on-Parallels only beat the others in the boot time test. But as Begun says, "This also just goes to show the danger of drawing too many conclusions from this type of testing... If we spent more time tweaking Parallels, we probably could have beefed up its overall performance." Begun and the lab testers were won over by Parallels' overall stability, usability and the ease of switching between OSs it affords users - its performance shortcomings were negligible given its advantages. Sounds A-OK to me, what do you guys think?

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Now that we have the equation, let us give some equivalents to the variables.

Parallels Desktop = A desktop and server virtualization solutions provider. It allows one physical machine to run numerous operating systems simultaneously as completely isolated, independently functioning virtual computers. That means that you can use Windows programs at the same time as Mac applications.

Boot Camp = Lets you install Windows XP without moving your Mac data, though you will need to bring your own copy to the table, as Apple Computer does not sell or support Microsoft Windows. That means when you hold down the "alt" key you can choose between the Mac OS and Windows. Simply restart to come back to Mac.

Now that Apple on their Get A Mac campaign acknowledges the use of third-party software solutions such as Parallels Desktop for Mac, is the equation correct? Is it really greater than the Boot Camp?