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PC version of Flexi-Sign Pro on a Mac
- Thread starter raider
- Start date
choucove
New Member
While this may work in theory, it's completely counter-intuitive and I can almost guarantee it won't work quite right.
By running Windows 7 on Parallels on your Mac you may be able to install the Windows version of Flexi (again depending upon the version of Flexi you have) and get the program to install. However, you have to have a USB hardware key in most cases, and this device usually does not get passed along properly between the Mac OS X and the Windows OS. This means your Windows OS is not going to recognize the hardware key is even attached which means Flexi will not open.
Even if you use a software key only, there are some USB peripherals that have difficulty passing through from a host OS to a virtual OS, or won't recognize to be passed through period. This means if you plan on using the Mac computer (with Flexi running in Windows) to do any kind of printing or plotting, well, your chances of working are incredibly slim.
Then we just get down to simple efficiency. If you have to run Windows in Parallels to do your work then simply what is the point of even having the Mac? Get a Windows PC. When you run a virtual operating system within a host operating system your computer is utilizing a large amount of system resources just to run that extra OS. Depending upon the hardware capabilities of your specific mac, you may use up half or more of your available memory, processor, and disk IO simply RUNNING Windows virtual desktop, so that leaves you with very little resources left to do actual work such as running Flexi or Adobe or any other software you have open operational on either the Mac or the Windows OS. Plus you have to purchase additional licensing to run Parallels and licensing for Windows itself. This makes it much less efficient to work within Windows on a Mac computer because of this extra hardware and software overhead.
I guess it comes down to a few more details that are necessary to know whether this really will work for you. First, what mac do you have? Second, what version of Windows will you run? Third, what version of Flexi will you run? Do you plan on doing only design work on this system, or are you intending to also print or plot to devices directly from Windows and Flexi?
By running Windows 7 on Parallels on your Mac you may be able to install the Windows version of Flexi (again depending upon the version of Flexi you have) and get the program to install. However, you have to have a USB hardware key in most cases, and this device usually does not get passed along properly between the Mac OS X and the Windows OS. This means your Windows OS is not going to recognize the hardware key is even attached which means Flexi will not open.
Even if you use a software key only, there are some USB peripherals that have difficulty passing through from a host OS to a virtual OS, or won't recognize to be passed through period. This means if you plan on using the Mac computer (with Flexi running in Windows) to do any kind of printing or plotting, well, your chances of working are incredibly slim.
Then we just get down to simple efficiency. If you have to run Windows in Parallels to do your work then simply what is the point of even having the Mac? Get a Windows PC. When you run a virtual operating system within a host operating system your computer is utilizing a large amount of system resources just to run that extra OS. Depending upon the hardware capabilities of your specific mac, you may use up half or more of your available memory, processor, and disk IO simply RUNNING Windows virtual desktop, so that leaves you with very little resources left to do actual work such as running Flexi or Adobe or any other software you have open operational on either the Mac or the Windows OS. Plus you have to purchase additional licensing to run Parallels and licensing for Windows itself. This makes it much less efficient to work within Windows on a Mac computer because of this extra hardware and software overhead.
I guess it comes down to a few more details that are necessary to know whether this really will work for you. First, what mac do you have? Second, what version of Windows will you run? Third, what version of Flexi will you run? Do you plan on doing only design work on this system, or are you intending to also print or plot to devices directly from Windows and Flexi?
WildWestDesigns
Active Member
Not quite. You have to set up your USBs to be recognized on the windows side of the Mac.
I had to do this while I was using a mac to run one embroidery program that I had. That does require a usb device. Like a dongle, but it also was a card reader to upload and download embroidery files, so it served two purposes. No issues what so ever when I was doing that. You just have to setup within Parallels for the USBs to be used by the Windows OS.
cgsigns_jamie
New Member
I run VM Ware Fusion with Windows 7 and Flexi 8.6 everyday without issue.
As I mentioned in the other thread, this has proven to be more stable than running the Mac version of Flexi 8.6, which IMO is terrible.
As I mentioned in the other thread, this has proven to be more stable than running the Mac version of Flexi 8.6, which IMO is terrible.
choucove
New Member
All in all it comes down to the virtual machine software that you use I imagine then. A while back we had tried using a couple different programs (Windows Virtual PC and VirtualBox) to create a virtual machine of Windows 7 and Flexi 10 to use for testing purposes. We never could get the USB dongle to pass to the virtual machine properly. We had better luck with the Graphtec plotter, though only about half the time.
I was going fro my experience from using these programs, so I apologize that I was misleading in saying you might have difficulties passing through the dongle. If others have explained this is simpler in other programs, then you may be having better luck than I had imagined!
I was going fro my experience from using these programs, so I apologize that I was misleading in saying you might have difficulties passing through the dongle. If others have explained this is simpler in other programs, then you may be having better luck than I had imagined!
round man
New Member
with vmware workstation you can download a virtual machine to run the mac osx on an intel based pc,...the problems most people run into are user related and not the software,... virtually any os albeit sever os or single client os can be run on this piece of software in a virtual environment and most of the cloud servers are using it to create cloud servers,...the reason? because it works period,...if you do your homework and learn how to use the program it can be done,...I'm not saying it will be simple just that it can be done,...that being said I have no clue or experience with mac vitual machine software so take this comment for what its worth,..just my two cents