Let’s get this out of the way right now, I’m a big fan of all things Apple, I love my Macs and when the time comes for a friend or relative to replace their computer, usually after their PC’s umpteenth re-infection, I unashamedly suggest they purchase a Mac. I may also drop a subtle hint about not supporting them any longer if they don’t buy Apple, but they know I’m too nice and only half mean that, sort of. But what really pushed my parents, grandparents, brothers and sister-in-laws and most all of my friends to consider a Mac is the fact that Intel-based Macs run Windows; better than most PC’s in fact, as several recent reports show.

Die hard Mac addicts consider it blasphemy, but there are plenty of reasons both personal -familiarity- and professional -custom or line of business applications which demand windows- that make a great case for running Windows on a Mac. No matter what the reason, there are two main options for running Windows and any accompanying Windows software on a Mac: using Apple’s Boot Camp or using one of the commercial virtualization options such as VMWare Fusion 3 or Parellels Desktop 5. Let’s take a look at each. Note: you will still need to own a fully licensed version of Windows.

Boot Camp – Free
Since Mac OS X 10.5, known as Leopard, Boot Camp has been a native feature. The current version of Boot Camp 3.1 allows Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7 to be installed, and using this method, runs Windows and it’s applications at native speeds -meaning the operating system and applications have direct access to the hardware resources and no other software stands between them. Once setup, using Boot Camp is pretty straight forward. At startup you can select to boot into Mac OS X or Windows and from there the selected operating systems loads. Boot Camp is free and offers the best performance, but the only way to “switch” between OS X and Windows is by shutting down one OS and booting into the other; with Boot Camp it’s this or that. So while Boot Camp let’s Windows perform great, it can only run one OS at a time. If you need the ability to work with Windows and Mac applications at the same time without rebooting, then Parallels or VMWare Fusion are the “both-and” solution for you.

VMWare Fusion 3 and Parallels Desktop 5 – $80
Virtualizers bring the benefits of a Boot Camp installation (better performance) AND virtualization (you’ll be able to run Windows and Mac OS X side-by-side at the same time). The new versions of each offer the best of both worlds in that they now recognize Boot Camp Windows installations. In other words if you have a Boot Camp partition with Windows installed, VMWare Fusion 3 and Parallels Desktop 5 will recognize it and can run it in a virtual session; talk about tres chic tech. Obviously spending a little cash gives you a lot of great options. Need better performance to play a round of Team Fortress 2? Boot Camp into Windows. Going to be bouncing back-and-forth between Outlook, Office 2010 apps and Apple Keynote? Run that same installation as a virtual session while in Mac OS X.

Since purchasing my MacBook Pro two years ago, I’ve been using VMWare Fusion 2 to run Windows XP SP3 nearly every single work day at the office. While the applications I primarily run are not all that taxing (Internet Explorer 8, Office 2003 and some custom line of business applications that I use constantly) it performs great, allowing me to work seamlessly between both the Mac and Windows world. At the time I opted for VMWare’s Fusion 2 two years ago, it was simply because it happened to be on sale and offered a nice rebate for new users. I have no complaints whatsoever about VMWare Fusion but when I upgrade next time, I may give Parallels Desktop 5 a try for a while, since they are offering VMWare Fusion customers the chance to purchase Parallels Desktop 5 for Mac at a special price. Limited trials of both solutions are available if you’d like to give them a whirl.

The question to ask yourself is how do you want to work? It depends on what your needs are, but no matter which path you pick, be it installation or virtualization, one thing is clear: A Mac can run Windows just fine, as long as you don’t mind offending all the sensibilities of OS X.