Rich’s Ramblings May 2005

Rich Schinnell=s review of iEmulator

Quoted from the press release on iEmulator:

AiEmulator.com Releases iEmulator 1.7.5, a Major Upgrade to the Popular PC Emulator for PowerPC-based Macintosh Computers

iEmulator is a high-performance PC emulator for Mac OS X 10.3.0 or later, and has been available since November of 2004. For more information please visit

http//www.iemulator.com

Priced at $23.95 (Only available via the Web)

Produced by:

BANG Studios Canada Edmonton, Alberta --- CA 780-554-2129

I have been testing the Virtual PC for the Macintosh and have successfully installed all the versions of Microsoft products from Dos 6.22 and Windows for Work Groups 3.11 to Windows XP home. Even Kubuntu Linux. All worked well and as you would expect, there was some slowdown, but still acceptable. The VPC for the Mac cost $129.95 at most any local store that sells Mac products.

So, I was enthused at the prospects of a real cheap emulator, so I bit and paid the $23.95 over the web to be able to download the product. It installed pretty easy and the documentation (all 77 pages) had to be printed. (Normally, I don=t read the documentation).

After reading how to install a dos session and it was successful. I then went to the section where it showed the step by step instructions to install Windows 98/SE. I had a heck of a time getting windows98 to install properly as the instructions did not specify the format c: /s option properly. I finally figured out that installing windows 98 on the hard disk is a lot easier if you copy all the Windows 98/SE files in a sub directory on the formatted hard disk created by iEmulator. After a couple of hours which seemed like an eternity, I was able to get to the main windows 98 desktop. It seemed to be fine. (or so it seemed)

1Macintosh Desktop W98

Macintosh desktop with iEmulator running Windows 98/SE

But: I had serious problems as the network on my MAC was not recognized. I went to the dos command line to find out what was the problem with my network and tried every trick in the book to get a IP address from my router.

2W98 running IPCONFIG.EXE /all

The output of the IPCONFIG /ALL command showed that the IP (Internet Protocol) number assigned to the network card was 10.0.2.25 which evidently is the IP translation from iEmulator and the Macintosh network card. I have no idea of what could be the problem but nothing I did would allow me to access the internet. I tried to execute the icon placed on the desktop which is labeled “connect to the Internet” and the screen opened to what would normally be a selection screen on selecting the method to connect to the internet. No Joy in mudville.

So, I then went to the “my computer” icon and selected properties to be able to check out the network card configuration. I then looked at this:

3Mac Desktop W98 Properties NIC

The selectable option for “exists in all hardware profiles” was not checked so I decided to check it and then rebooted the system. Still no network connection that would allow me to get to the internet.

I was just about stumped and this is from a person who does not give up easily.

Personal Opinion: I do not think that a normal Macintosh user who never has installed DOS and windows 98 would ever be able to get windows installed easily. I did it primarily based on my past experience in DOS and Windows days.

A few deficiencies in the iEmulator are that the clock seems to almost always be incorrect.

I e-mailed the help desk people at iEmulator and they were very helpful and they told me that this had happened a few times and they had no fix for the problem. After sending me an image file for a startup up floppy disk, I still had no luck in getting windows 98/SE to access the Internet. So, Rich gives up and goes to the next plan. Let’s try to install Windows XP Professional.

And over 3 hours later, I finally arrived at the desktop for XP. I was still not able to access the internet so I figured that maybe it was because I had not installed Service Pack 2. And then I discovered that I had only configured the hard disk with 2 gigabytes of space. There was not enough free space on the C drive to install SP2, I forgot about the swap file requiring 768Megabytes of disk space. I don’t have the patience to go thru all this again so I gave up after looking at this screen for almost an hour.

4Mac Desktop running Windows XP Pro (forever)

Bottom Line:

I do not recommend the iEmulator software for the timid at heart or those without a lot of patience. If a non-Windows person such as a Mac diehard went for this cheap product, they would be really disappointed as well as fully aggravated. If a Mac Head wanted to run Windows products, I very highly recommend Microsoft’s Virtual PC for the Mac. At almost $100 difference in price, you get what you pay for.

Rich Schinnell is a real long time Windows person who cut his teeth on DOS back in 1982 and struggled thru the windows evolutions from 1.0 up thru Windows XP. He bought a Mac-Mini and has really enjoyed using it. Mac-Mini is my personal recommendation for Windows people who are interested in trying out the Macintosh. He can be reached at schinnel@cpcug.org or Mac people can contact him at richnrockville@mac.com or as a last resort (301) 949-9292.

PS: Rich is a member of Capital PC User Group, Inc and Washington Apple Pi.