Running L4 on a Mac using Fusion

David Hilty
David Hilty Member Posts: 79 ✭✭
edited November 2024 in English Forum

I've already downloaded L4Mac, but I was thinking about installing VM Fusion and running L4 on XP on my Mac.  Will the Logos resources that are on my Mac be accessible by L4 on the Windows side, or will I have to duplicate that?  As you can probably tell, I;m completely new to the idea of running a VM.

Any and all help would be appreciated.

Comments

  • Terry Poperszky
    Terry Poperszky Member Posts: 1,576 ✭✭✭

    Will the Logos resources that are on my Mac be accessible by L4 on the Windows side, or will I have to duplicate that?  As you can probably tell, I;m completely new to the idea of running a VM.

    While you can trick it into using the Mac resources, I would suggest that you duplicate them until the Mac version is finished. BTW, L4, windows 7 and Fusion 3.01 work beautifully on my system.

     

     

  • David Hilty
    David Hilty Member Posts: 79 ✭✭

    Thanks.  Do you know how I can figure out how much space my Logos library takes up?

  • Terry Poperszky
    Terry Poperszky Member Posts: 1,576 ✭✭✭

    Thanks.  Do you know how I can figure out how much space my Logos library takes up?

    I am sure there are some charts around, I have an enhanced Scholars and it is taking up about 7 GB, or you could check the following directory on your Mac and see how much it is using.

    du -hc "/Users/<user name>/Library/Application Support/Logos4"

     

     

     

  • Tim
    Tim Member Posts: 256 ✭✭

    I too have fusion 3.0.1, windows 7, and L4, and while I will say that they all function well, I cannot share the aforementioned rousing endorsement. Frankly it is so slow that it hurts. The refresh is so bad that typing in notes is almost impossible, and scrolling in books isn't much better. I am running a 2009 MBP with 2.93, 4GB, and running on high performance setting. 

    If anybody has suggestions on how to improve the performance I would love to hear about it, but as things are I would not recommend this as a truly viable option. 

  • Jack Caviness
    Jack Caviness MVP Posts: 13,592

    I too have fusion 3.0.1, windows 7, and L4, and while I will say that they all function well, I cannot share the aforementioned rousing endorsement. Frankly it is so slow that it hurts. The refresh is so bad that typing in notes is almost impossible, and scrolling in books isn't much better. I am running a 2009 MBP with 2.93, 4GB, and running on high performance setting. 

    If anybody has suggestions on how to improve the performance I would love to hear about it, but as things are I would not recommend this as a truly viable option. 

    Tim

    Since several others have reported good performance with the same basic setup, something must be different in yours. I used Fusion 2.0.6 with XP before I upgrades to Parallels 5, and I had better performance than you describe here. Have you disabled 3D acceleration in the Fusion configuration settings? That seems to make the biggest single performance boost using either Fusion or Parallels. 

  • Terry Poperszky
    Terry Poperszky Member Posts: 1,576 ✭✭✭

    Have you disabled 3D acceleration in the Fusion configuration settings?

    Tim, mine is a late 2008, 2.8 Mhz and I would second Jack's comment. If yours is so slow it hurts, either something is set up wrong, or your expectations are too high. That is not a slam, but several people are running Fusion 3.01 with systems that are slower than ours with acceptable results.

     

    BTW, how much memory and how many cores do you have allotted to the VM, and did you build the XP instance after the 3X upgrade or before? I have seen some chatter that said to get the full speed increase from the upgrade the VM has to be built afterwards.

     

     

  • Jack Caviness
    Jack Caviness MVP Posts: 13,592

    BTW, how much memory and how many cores do you have allotted to the VM, and did you build the XP instance after the 3X upgrade or before? I have seen some chatter that said to get the full speed increase from the upgrade the VM has to be built afterwards.

    There seems to be a lot of truth in this. I upgraded from Fusion 2.0.6 to Parallels 5 (I know that is not Fusion 3!). I created a new VM with a fresh install of XP and L4. On another VM I let Parallels convert since it was only for TurboTax and contained 6 years of tax returns. The Logos setup is faster in every way that the TurboTax one. From that experience, I would say that creating a new VM is the best way to go for either Fusion or Parallels.

  • Terry Poperszky
    Terry Poperszky Member Posts: 1,576 ✭✭✭

    I would say that creating a new VM is the best way to go for either Fusion or Parallels.


    Yea, I agree but I haven't experienced it for my self because I chose that time to move over to Win 7 (64 bit) as well. So, I have to take other people's word for it, and my pastor can tell you, that doesn't sit well with me [;)] Just call me Thomas.

     

     

  • Thinking
    Thinking Member Posts: 368 ✭✭

    How do you "trick it into using the Mac resources"?

    I tried to do this several times without success and finally called tech support and was told it was not possible.

    Phil



  • Terry Poperszky
    Terry Poperszky Member Posts: 1,576 ✭✭✭

    How do you "trick it into using the Mac resources"?

    I tried to do this several times without success and finally called tech support and was told it was not possible.

    There is not possible and then there is not advisable. One way is to enable folder sharing in Fusion, and then to share the resource folder on your Mac, under Windows. I have not done, it. Nor will I. Unless you are really hurting for disk space, the dangers out way the benefits. I don't even share resources between my stable release and my beta release in case a change in format cause a problem.

     

     

  • Tim
    Tim Member Posts: 256 ✭✭

    Jack, & Terry,  thank you for the suggestions. I did have the default RAM allotted. I had forgotten about that when I deleted my XP boot camp partition and rebuilt it with Windows 7 and then redid the VM. Between increasing the ram to 2 GB and turning off the 3D acceleration things seem to be working much better now. I had been using VM for 3.0 so I think my expectations aren't too unreasonable. 

    All that aside, I really am looking forward to having the native version. I am trying to be patient since I have been involved with a couple different software development projects, but I do find myself compulsively checking for updates on a daily basis. :-)

  • Terry Poperszky
    Terry Poperszky Member Posts: 1,576 ✭✭✭

    All that aside, I really am looking forward to having the native version.

     

    You, me and a lot of other people. [;)] The thing that gives me hope is the common code base for the actual engine means the UI can move more quickly than in a normal development project. That the the time I am putting in on the L4Win version, is not wasted.