To me, I can't see enough of a difference to notice between Windows running in Parallels and Windows being booted on my MacBook Pro. Parallels taps into the Intel VT extensions, so it's quite smooth. The only limit on Parallels pretty much is lack of Direct3D hardware acceleration. You can use USB devices only in Windows without a problem, and it can sit on the network as if it were a second computer plugged into a switch.

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* Wondering if there's a GOOD app for web development for OS X. It's hard enough to find one on Windows (and I've tried quite a few editors) where there's a much larger selection of them.


Can't really answer this one, haven't done any serious web development in ages now. Dreamweaver does run on OS X, but no idea if you like that, nor how well it runs

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* NOD32 isn't available for Mac. Drat.


No need for it. Either the platform is too obscure for people to target, or the security built in is working. Either way, I've never run an AV client on my Mac and don't feel a strong need to either.

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* Is there any difference between playing WoW on PC and on Mac? Would it run okay on XP in a Parallels installation?


WoW is identical between Windows and Mac, down to using the same install discs, same addons, same file structure, and such. You can even move your settings back and forth. WoW (and any other 3d game) won't run via Parallels. It can run if you dual boot to Windows though.

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* Is it a bad time to invest in a new Mac Pro? Some might suggest so (such as http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/ ). If I bought one, and a week later Apple announced immediate availability of new machines with high def optical drives or 8-core processing or some other cool innovative thing, that would be sad. Also, perhaps there's a compelling reason I'd want to wait and have it packaged with Leopard (I would think a later upgrade would be perfectly fine - but then I'm not a Mac expert)


Yes, wait. NAB is a pro media convention coming up in mid April and Apple has some announcements in the wings. This tends to be the time when they show off the machines to get the Final Cut Pro users drooling, and a new Mac Pro would do it. Hopefully a street date will be announced for Leopard too. Typically once a date is announced, buyers of the current hardware get the next OS for the cost of shipping.

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* Would I still have to rely on Samba or other network-based services to share a filesystem between OS X and Windows in Parallels? I expect it's so.


Depends on how you want to share files. Parallels has it's own link between the two OSes, and you can also drag and drop files between Windows in Parallels and the Mac side.

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* Would all of the various mouse buttons still work in Windows? The little things count.


Yes. And right click opens context menus on OS X, and other buttons can be bound to various functions. Apple even ships a multi button mouse with the desktops, and the laptops all support right clicking on the trackpad too.

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* Will running Apache/PHP/MySQL on OS X work as well as it does on my Fedora box now?


Likely even easier to deal with. Out of the box Apache is turned on via one checkbox in the system preferences, and PHP is right there too. Adding MySQL can be done from source, or from an installer package, or via DarwinPorts. Tons of useful info via a quick google search.

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* Is package management on the Mac pretty sweet? Installing and removing software, finding dependencies, etc.


See DarwinPorts above for the pure unix stuff. It works similar to yum/apt/emerge. OS X side, it's easier. Most apps install via a simple drag and drop(even Microsoft Office), and some use the built in installer system. Uninstall is typically drag and drop to the trash, though more work might be needed to nuke support files in /Library. Nothing real difficult.

I'm planning on pushing for a Mac Pro at work shortly to throw under my desk to replace a Mac Mini, Windows PC and Linux box. The only major hassle so far with the Mini at work has been a typical BOFH who doesn't turn on IMAP on Exchange for unknown reasons, and also claims to have to investigate security issues with the OWA and URLScan tool. (aka, he didn't RTFM when he installed the URLScan tool into IIS and it broke OWA).