After releasing several public betas this summer, VMware yesterday shipped Fusion 2.0, a major new version of the virtualization software for Mac OS X on Intel Macs. The new version includes over 100 new features, including tighter integration of Windows and Linux with Mac OS X, better 3D graphics support, and on-the-fly resizing of virtual disks. And a combination of new features gives Fusion 2.0 functionality similar to Leopard's Time Machine, enabling a user to restore Windows to one of many previously saved state. VMware Fusion 2.0 a free upgrade for current Fusion owners...

Ian Orchard in New Zealand reports that Sun's free VirtualBox virtualization software isn't as easy to use as other virtualization packages might be. He describes his successes and failures:

I've installed Win XP on VirtualBox and Leopard on my MacBook, twice. Both times with only a few stumbles and fiddles. It's not something I'd expect Granny to undertake, or 95 percent of the population in general. It is working well although I haven't figured out how to share files between XP and OS X. I've created documents in XP and saved them to all the likely locations, but neither Spotlight or EasyFind have been able to trace them. I've also been unable to connect to a printer, in spite of installing Bonjour for Windows. To be fair, it's asking a bit much to track down an AppleTalking HP Laserjet 2200 on the network or a shared Canon 750 that is connected to an elderly iMac, both via Airport Extreme. I'll try connecting directly via USB.

VirtualBox had no problems at all finding the WiFi connection, that part was spooky. I downloaded and installed Firefox, Avast antivirus, Service Pack 3 and Adobe Reader without any particular problems, but OMG, XP is a dog of an OS?

If you've tried the latest version of VirtualBox

Jonas Lanz in Zürich Switzerland found a solution to making Spotlight search SMB shares. He writes:

I have a similar problem.

What works:

1. Use OS X 10.4
2. Run "Go/Connect to server..."
3. Enter smb://<sharedvolume> and klick "Connect"
4. The Volume gets mounted and it is visible in spotlight and on the desktop (depending on your settings).
5. The mounted volume can be sarched (unindexed, might take several hours))
6. Run mdutil -i on "/Volumes/<sharedvolume>" as root
7. The mounted Volume gets indexed and a status bar appears by clicking the spotlight icon which indicates the progress (might also take several hours).
8. The mounted volume again can be searched by spotlight (now indexed, which is way faster).

With OS X 10.5 you have to run the "mdimport" command [in Terminal] first.

As soon as you run the mdutil command it says that the mounted volume gets indexed but nothing happens at all. Even the unindexed search does no longer work.

Other effect: Spotlight always jumps to the location "Computer" even if you start searching in a mounted volume.

If you've used tried this approach

Patrick Rose found that a fix we reported last week worked for another problem.

The .tbd file deletion trick mentioned on September 10 worked for me in a related problem. I have 2 OSX 10.4 servers. Both serve to Windows and Mac clients. One server when you try to connect in Windows would ask for userID and password and then open the share--it would be blank!

The odd thing is that this happened only in Win XP, and some machines would work as above (blank share), and some worked fine. After deleting the .tbd files, all is well.

If you've seen this

Equinux has released VPN Tracker 5.3, a new version of the IPSec virtual private network client for Mac OS X that works with over 300 VPN gateway devices. VPN Tracker 5.3 adds support for using Mode Config for Netgear VPN gateways to simplify the administration of VPN connections. Mode Config permits VPN Tracker to automatically obtain its IP address from the VPN gateway.

VPN Tracker 5.3 also improves device profiles for popular VPN gateways and provides a new device profile for SonicWALL NSA 2400 devices.

The new version also features an updated user interface that makes VPN configuration easier, according to equinux. Connections can be more easily started and stopped in the new connection list that has a user interface similar to that of Apple's iChat.

Version 5.3 also enhances compatibility with PPPoE-connections and with the application of RSA secure ID tokens.

If you've VPN Tracker

Alin Pilkington has seen the problem with the Boot Camp 2.1 update failing to install. The solution he found was to uninstall any Windows video adapter drivers that Boot Camp did not install:

I had this same problem and found the answer at this blog, which was to uninstall added video drivers in Windows. How hard would it have been for Apple to have displayed the source of the error and then quit instead of just aborting the 2.1 install without any clue as to why?

If you've tried this suggestion

Amar Chaker verified the problem where external drives connected to a Mac can keep Windows/Boot Camp from starting up:

I experienced the same problem: I have Windows XP Pro with SP3 installed with Boot Camp 2.1 on a MacBook Pro purchased in March 2008. On the Mac side, I use Time Machine with a Western Digital MyBook Studio 500GB external drive formatted for Mac and connected through the FireWire 800 port. I must physically disconnect the external drive for Windows to boot successfully.

If you've seen this issue

Terry Hunt has tried Sun's free xVM VirtualBox virtualization software for Mac and other host platforms. He sent a report:

I have found VirtualBox to be both easy on system resources and relatively easy to use. The shared folders not found in VMware server is also a plus. I look forward to a "VMotion" type feature in the future which should drive down the cost ESX server which my company also utilizes. I use it on Ferdora 9 and have Solaris, and Windows XP running in virtual machines.

Xinerama support for multiple desktops in seemless mode and automatic bridge networking will also be a welcome relief of some minor though greatly annoying tasks.

Time will tell if Virtual Box will be stable enough for mission critical CPU and Memory intensive applications though it seems well on it's way.

For more, see our VirtualBox Reports page.

A Macworld article from earlier in the year describes using Apple's Bonjour for Windows to enable printing from Windows in Boot Camp or in a virtual machine such as Parallels Desktop or VMware Fusion.

Ken Cluff reports success running the old Connectix Virtual PC 5 on Leopard (on a PowerPC Mac). Virtual PC 5, released in December 2001, was the first version of the PC emulator to be compatible with Mac OS X. Cluff reports:

I'll cut to the chase here: Virtual PC 5 runs on Leopard!

Here are the details:

• Dual 500 MHz PowerPC G4
• RAM 1.25 GB
• After market CoreImage capable video card
• Leopard 10.5.4

Virtual PC 5.0.4 is running Windows 98 as the guest OS. As you might guess from the host CPU, it's rather slow, but it runs. It's too slow to develop on, but for making sure the software I write runs on Windows, it's enough.

No version of Virtual PC runs on Intel Macs.

For more on this old emulator, see our Virtual PC 5 Reports page.

Bruce Hobbs asks:

I just upgraded my PowerBook G4 from 1 GB to 2 GB so that I could bump the memory used for Virtual PC 7 from 512 MB to 1 GB in order to improve speed.

I found to my disappointment that the maximum memory that I can assign to a Virtual PC is 512 Mbyte. I will still get better performance with my 2 Gbytes, since I typically run Mac applications along with my Virtual PC applications, but I'm still disappointed.

A: Virtual PC could never assign more the 512 MB RAM to a single virtual machine. You can have multiple virtual machines, each with 512 MB. There is no way around this.

To get more speed out of Virtual PC, we do have some suggestions for tweaking Windows to run faster in VPC.

Laurie Davis of Auckland, New Zealand, sent an update to his previous report about the question of how much RAM Windows Vista can access:

Just a couple of small updates on my last email:

I am using Vista SP1 on my MBP with 4GB RAM installed so I guess that explains the correct RAM reporting under Vista.

My numeric keypad now works under Vista. The issue was resolved by my 'discovery' of the 'Clear' key, which, of course, turns on the keypad. D'oh.

Adam Glick sent in a fix for the problem of Windows clients not connecting to Leopard Server. His tip is to shut off SMB and then delete .tbd files:

I just did an upgrade of an Xserve that was running 10.3.9 to Leopard Server 10.5.4. The server's previous role was a standalone server for a mostly Mac workgroup with 3 to 4 PCs connecting via SMB. It remained a standalone server in 10.5.

The upgrade went fine and all the Mac users noticed no difference for their AFP connections. PC users however were faced with a long hang as they tried to access the shares ending with the "network resource could not be found" error.

Check SMB -- yes green light. Check SMB logs and find this error: "smbd cannot open secrets.tdb". That sounds suspiciously like an auth issue. Googling found this thread: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=6572045

Here's what I distilled down that worked from that thread, found in a couple of places in it:

1. Stop SMB first
2. Go into /private/var/db/samba and delete secrets.tdb
3. Go into /var/samba and delete all .tdb files
4. Start SMB

You should now be able to login. My guess is that the 10.5 Samba version doesn't like the previous .tdb files from the 10.3.9 Samba version. Interestingly, the 10.5 upgrade installed Open Directory but we are not using that for user auths, just the local user db.

If you've tried this

Matt Pearson has a suggestion for fixing the "access_denied" printing error seen with Mac OS X 10.5.4.

Attaching to Windows Server 2003 print server in the past has been easy, but Leopard broke this with what appears to be the same problem as noted in the above article. I am running in a hybrid Mac/Windows network with over 200 mac clients and 200 XP clients on a primarily Windows network with AD running hybrid with 2000 and 2003 servers. I also have an old schema for AD.

Even at the UNIX command line I could not get the printer install to pass authentication to the Windows Server 2003 print server. I have had no problems with earlier versions of OSX (even 10.5.1).

The fix: Using the Directory Services app I created computer accounts in AD for the Mac computers. This changed the browsing behavior of the Mac from ten minutes to populate the domain and servers on it to less than one second. The domain controllers have guest access disabled (which is standard best practices in a hybrid environment). Once the computer is in AD I was able to browse the network for printers using the DEFAULT button in add a printer (not Windows button). Not only do they get installed quick, the location and drivers are automatically selected. Once done with the install the printer still does not have the correct credentials. Upon first print, credentials are requested and you can store them in the keychain. It seems in this way no credentials are ever stored with the printer and instead are passed via the keychain each time. Works great.

I have further discovered that the default protocol to search for printers has been indicated to be only Bonjour. This is confirmed in the \etc\cups\cupsd.conf file. By adding BrowseProtocols All under # Show shared printers on the local network you can get Unix based printers working.

If you've tried this

On the heals of Sun's VirtualBox 2.0 release, VMware announced last week that it will ship VMware Fusion 2.0 later this month. In beta since May, the new version of the virtualization software for Mac OS X will add a number of new features. In addition to previously reported new features, Fusion 2.0 will include the ability to keep Window applications in the Mac OS X Dock, the ability to assign up to four virtual CPUs in a virtual machine, and the ability to integrate with Apple's Time Machine backup device.

Last week Sun released xVM VirtualBox 2.0, a major new version of its free open source virtualization software for multiple host platforms, including Mac OS X, Windows, Linux, Solaris, and OpenSolaris. The new version adds support for 64-bit guest OS's, including Windows Vista 64-bit and RedHat Enterprise Linux, running on 64-bit hosts. Mac users get a new Leopard-native user interface and improved networking. (Sun has a complete list of major new features here.)

Sun also introduced a paid tech support plan called the Sun xVM VirtualBox Software Enterprise Subscription, starting at US$30 per users per year. The plan provides 24/7 tech support and a Right-to-Use License, which allows customers to deploy xVM VirtualBox using their own software deployment tools.

For more on Sun xVM VirtualBox, see our VirtualBox Tips and Reports page.

For more on Sun's plans for VirtualBox click here.

Several readers responded to last week's report of Windows Vista 32-bit version crashing a Mac (Boot Camp) with 4-MB of RAM. Although these readers did not have the crashing problem, the did verify that Vista only reported 3 MB in a Mac with 4 MB or RAM. As we've previously reported, Windows Vista and XP reserve a certain amount of RAM for addressing video memory, which means Windows "can't see" the rest.

It turns out that Vista Service Pack 1 changed how Vista reports RAM. Although it cannot address any more RAM, SP1 now reports a full 4MB in a 4MB Mac. Apple Insider has an article that mentions the change:

In Vista and prior, it reported usable RAM, while in SP1 they changed it to report installed RAM ignoring the fact that much of the RAM was unusable due to overlap with video memory." And so many PC users are installing 4GB of RAM in their PCs and thinking that it is being used by the system, when in fact it is no more beneficial than if the RAM were simply poked halfway into the CD slot.

Apple Insider also describes why this is not a problem with Mac OS X:

With Intel's "Santa Rosa" platform, Apple's Core 2 Duo machines gained chipset support to internally handle 8GB of address space. This allows Santa Rosa Macs to shove MMIO up into the high end of the space and reclaim all of the addresses below the 4GB mark, making the full amount available to the system. No version of 32-bit Windows supports this, and conversely, there is no 32-bit version of Mac OS X Leopard, so the "where is my full 4GB?" issue is now a Windows-only problem going forward.

(Thanks to John Schumacher in the United Kingdom for the link to article.)

Cameron Palm thinks the problem with Vista crashing in 4 GB may be hardware:

I haven't had this problem at all. My Mac is the 2.4 GHz. MacBook Pro 17" with HD display Santa Rosa motherboard. My RAM is from crucial which is a third party is the user using Apple's RAM? Or better question. Does he have the Santa Rosa motherboard that sees 4 gigs for Mac? I could see there being a conflict if his motherboard isn't built to run 4 gigs. He should run the Apple hardware check.

Paul Kropp also sees 3 GB in Vista:

Well, FWIW, my MacBook Pro 2.4GHz with 4 GB memory (2 matched 2 GB sticks @667 MHz) runs Vista 32-bit without any problems whatsoever. Yes, Vista is seeing only 3 GB when it's running, but that's just Vista 32-bit and it's running just fine.

Laurie Davis of Auckland, New Zealand verified this phenomenon, including an upgrade to SP1. He also likes Vista on a Mac:

I recently installed Vista Business as an upgrade from XP on my MacBook Pro (Santa Rosa, 2.4GHZ). The MBP has 4GB RAM installed and this reports accurately under Mac OS 10.5.4. Reporting under Vista, however, indicated only 3GB until the other day. Whether something has changed in the last few days, maybe auto update [to SP1], I'm unsure. But Vista is now reporting, correctly that 4GB is installed on the MBP.

My experience of Vista is far more positive than with XP. With the latter I had many problems getting Boot Camp to install the OS, and drivers to install etc. With a clean install of Vista the problems have largely disappeared. The only exceptions are that the numeric keypad on the new slimline aluminium keyboard still won't work (all other keys do) and Airport Extreme doesn't work. The slimline keyboard is a superb accessory if using the MBP as a de facto desktop, incidentally.

Ron Bellman solved the previously reported problem with Windows Vista crashing in Boot Camp: For 32-bit Vista, use 3 GB RAM. For 64-bit Vista, 4 GB works. Bellman's report:

I had the problem of random crashes with my 2.4 GH MacBook Pro with 4 GB of Apple memory but I discovered that if you're not running Vista in the 64-bit version Vista cannot address that much RAM. If you want to continue running the 32-bit version you need to cut back your RAM to 3 GB maximum.

I had 2 modules of 2 GB's each and I removed one of the modules and replaced it with a 1 GB module. When I reduced the RAM to 3GB my problem went away; everything has been working fine since. I have recently upgraded to the Vista 64-bit version, reinstalled my 2 GB module for a total of 4 GB and everything works fine.

If you've tried this

See our Boot Camp Tips and Reports page for more.

Bill Heintzberger inadvertently installed Service Pack 3 in Windows XP without first updating Boot Camp to version 2.1. Version 2.0 is incompatible with SP3. Here's what he did:

We accidentally installed Service Pack 3 before updating to latest version of Boot Camp on a 24" iMac. We'd get a black screen with blinking cursor when booting after installing SP3. The problem was that we neglected to install latest version of Boot Camp before installing SP3.

The solution was to boot Windows in Safe Mode and use the Window Restore function to roll back operating system prior to installation of SP3. I then installed the newest version of Boot Camp, and reinstalled SP3.

See our Boot Camp Tips and Reports page for more on Boot Camp.

Readers report: Win won't boot in Boot Camp if external drives attached

Timothy Austin verified a fix for the changing clock problem in Boot Camp:

The rEFIt fix worked great ,thanks! I loaded Vista 64 first and set the time zone for myself "GMT+8" west coast. Then on the restart, I used the "shell" to change the Mac Time "timezone -s 08:00" and it booted with the correct time for the first time in a year.

Craig Carr had a problem with Leopard and using AFP for accessing a Windows 2003 Server. When he created a folder, other users couldn't write to it. He fixed it, but the fix create a new problem:

Techno-Grafik Software announce has released iTaskX 2.5 Beta, a prerelease version of and MS Project-compatible project management solution for Mac OS X. The new version can import native MS Project (.mpp) files. iTaskX 2.5 also supports Micrsoft's MS Project XML and MS Project MPX formats, and can exchange calendars, resources (persons/material), baseline, and more than sixty additional task fields.

Two readers commented on the problem with Leopard 10.5.4 which causes the error "NT_STATUS_ACCESS_DENIED" for printers attached to Windows PCs. One reader offers a workaround while another reports on comments by an Apple software engineer.

Scott Lerwill provided the workaround:

I was getting the exact problem while trying to connect the company's Macs onto a network printer requiring AD authentication. In the end I found that the solution is to add the following printer in advanced printer: smb://<adusername>:<adpassword>/<printerservername>:139/<printqueue>

Therefore by adding the port 139 into the queue finally allowed our Macs to connect to the printers.

If you've tried this suggestion

Dan Stranathan reports that Apple's author of the CUPS printing software in Mac OS X has commented on the problem, saying that Apple is planning to fix it:

The access_denied problem has been commented on by Michael Sweet, the creator of CUPS and now an Apple senior printing engineer.

I have mentioned this issue in the Apple list server: printing-request@lists.apple.com (Go to lists.apple.com and subscribe). I bring up the topic every couple months to get an update. I have ben testing this since October 2007 and its still "broken". Macs that are bound to AD can "see" the Windows IPP print queues in the Printer Setup/Add printer panes, but they cant actually print to them.

There are a few issues with CUPS, IPP, Kerberos regarding this topic. I think Michael mentioned to me at WWDC 2008 that it would be fixed in Leopard at some point in time.

James Balderson had success with that a procedure we recently reported to fix a problem of Windows Vista accessing Mac OS X shared files. He said simply "Thank you this works perfectly."

If you've tried this workaround

Diana Winkler says that she had success with a previously reported workaround for the problem where Boot Camp Assistant falsely claims that there isn't enough drive space to partition a drive:

Thanks for the tip in MacWindows Report: Boot Camp in Leopard Tips and Reports regarding the workaround for Boot Camp insufficient drive space issue. I was trying to install Win XP SP3 and as getting that error. I had to do 2 things:

1. First install the Boot Camp update 2.1 with the original Mac OS 10.x disk in the CD drive.
2. Then I did the registry workaround described on your page.

I'm now all up to date.

If you've tried this

Emy Amstein is having a problem where Windows randomly crashes in Boot Camp:

I would like to report a problem with my MacBook on WinXp. My specs:

• MacBook 2.4GHz (1 month old)
• 4GB RAM
• WinXP Pro SP2
• BootCamp 2.1

Yesterday, Mediafour released MacDrive 7.2.1, a maintenance update for the Windows software that enables Windows to read and write to Mac-formatted disk media. MacDrive also enables Windows running in Boot Camp to see the Mac disk partition. This update addresses a few issues with running Windows on a Mac with a Boot Camp partition.

The MacDrive 7.2.1 ensures that the Mediafour product activation when running Windows/Boot Camp with VMware Fusion and Parallels Desktop. The update also fixes a Boot Camp a problem with Windows hibernation that caused and "disk consistency issues." The update also includes various other bug fixes.

If you've used MacDrive 7.2.1

Yesterday, CodeWeavers released CrossOver Games 7.1, and update that enables Mac OS X to run certain Windows games and applications, without using Windows. The update fixes bugs related to running a number of games, and is available for the Mac and Linux versions of CrossOver Games.

CrossOver Games owners with active support entitlements can download the update at the CodeWeavers site, logging in with the email and password used when purchasing.

If you've used CrossOver Games what you think of it.

For more on CrossOver, see our CrossOver Reports page.

Michael Jalkut has the same printing problem reported on July 15 regarding an "access_denied" error when printing to a Windows printer. Oddly, Jalkut can print from Windows running a virtual machine, but cannot print from Mac applications:

I'm trying to print from Leopard 10.5.4 to Windows XP SP2, which is connected to a shared USB Canon MP470.

I've spent a week now trying every setting and every thing and program I could get hold of.

I can print with no problem from Fusion on the Mac. But from OS X, nothing much.

I get the same symptom exactly as you reported on July 15.

I did get it to print once using DAVE on the Mac. But even that was only after a day of trial and error. That must have been a fluke, because I can't do it again. I tried ExtremeZ-IP with no luck. I tried singleclick, and maybe a couple more. Only DAVE showed any sign of life.

If you've seen this problem

After updating Leopard to 10.5.4, John McCutcheon discovered that his IPSecuritas virtual private network client now longer works:

I use IPSecuritas on a MacBook Pro running Leopard to connect to my office PC running Windows XP using the MS Remote Desktop Connection (RDC) for Mac. It worked great until I installed the 10.5.4 update. When I tried to log on, IPSecuritas shows that my IPSec VPN is connected but I cannot ping anything on my remote network, nor can I connect via RDC. I know the remote network is O.K. because I can connect to it fine using PPTP VPN running on a WinXP machine and run Remote Desktop via PPTP VPN.

If you've seen this problem

For more on related topics, see our Leopard VPN Tips and Reports page.

Sun's xVM VirtualBox isn't found on as many Macs as Parallels Desktop or VMware Fusion, but Sun has ambitious aspirations for its free desktop virtualization software.

"We want to be the FireFox of virtualization," said Andy Holl, Sun's senior product manager for xVM VirtualBox.

Giving away VirtualBox away as open source software is one way to do it. In May, Sun was claiming 10,000 downloads a day for the Windows, Mac OS X, Lixux, and Solaris versions...

Matt Wheeler verified that adjusting Active Directory fixed Leopard's 0-kb file copy problem.

Neither 10.5.3 nor the 10.5.4 update fixed this issue, but the tweak explained at MacWindows fixed it. Windows Server 2003 + User accounts in Active Directory security groups = Unhappy Mac. Used to work fine in 10.3.X and 10.4.X. Upgrading to 10.5.X broke it for us. Thanks for this fix!

Neither 10.5.3 nor the 10.5.4 update fixed this issue, but the tweak explained here fixed it. Windows Server 2003 + User accounts in Active Directory security groups = Unhappy Mac. Used to work fine in 10.3.X and 10.4.X. Upgrading to 10.5.X broke it for us. Thanks for this fix!

Tim P verified a previously reported fix for a Leopard problem logging into Active Directory after one user has logged in. The fix involved editing the hostconfig file. Tim P also offered a correction:

I tried the fix posted by Stuart Sims regarding "Problem and fix for Leopard AD: First user okay, subsequent users can't login" posted on www.macwindows.com/LeopardAD.html...