Dragnmoon wrote:
My wife needs a Windows lap top for her new job but loves her Mac Book
Will she be able to use the Windows and Mac OS environments entirely separately, or will she want to use Mail and Safari and iTunes and so forth on her Mac while "at work"?
If the answer is the former, then you should consider using Apple's native Boot Camp environment. You can install Windows in a separate partition of the HD, then boot natively into it and basically just be running a Windows machine. The advantage of Boot Camp is that there is no emulation or virtualization, and hardware driver compatibility is essentially guaranteed.
However, Boot Camp does require a Restart to switch from Windows to OSX, so if she wants to move seamlessly from Mail to a Windows App and back to OSX, then you really want a virtualization package.
Dragnmoon wrote:
Looking into using Parallels, will that be simple enough for my wife to use? Is there another program I should use?
Sure. Look at VMWare Fusion. It is the main competitor to Parallels. Each has their advantages, so you can check sites like MacWorld and AppleInsider for direct, head-to-head reature comparisons and decide which better fits your needs.
Another route is to simply ditch "Windows" entirely and run Windows apps without it. Look into CodeWeaver CrossOver Mac. It is based upon Wine which you could actually download and use for free. They operate buy providing a compatibility layer, rather than an emulation layer ... basically giving the OSX System the software libraries it needs to run Windows apps natively without Windows being involved.
If it works, Wine/CrossOver is arguably the "cleanest" way to run Windows apps, since you just launch and use them natively and seamlessly as you would Mac apps. You just have to be certain that the apps you want to use have been tested and are fully compatible with Wine/CrossOver. Fortunately, there are lists.
Dragnmoon wrote:
Should I install the 32bit version or 64 bit version of Windows 7?
I would say this depends entirely upon what product you install.
Dragnmoon wrote:
I also will be installing Office 2007, since that is the main softeware she will be using, The Mac won't run the Macros she needs, even using the Mac version of Office.
Have you looked at Mac Office 2011? Microsoft has restored VBA Macros to Office for Mac in this newest version, so the Macros should work just fine.
However, if you have a Mac Store nearby then a trip to the Genius Bar might just be in order to confirm ... on all of this.
HTH,
Rez
