Using M1 Macs

Are you guys running Windows or MacOS on Macbook? At first thought, I wouldn't think MacOS would be compatible with various PLC software like logix 500 or 5000.

I've been doing it for nearly a decade.

The Macbook runs MacOS, and MacOS runs virtualization software (either VMWare Fusion or Parallels) which run virtual Windows machines.

Rockwell software doesn't know or care whether Windows is running on metal or virtually, it runs just fine either way.

I'm surprised the hardware is good on the MacBook, I always thought Apple products were built a bit more brittle than other competitors. I haven't used one in over a decade, so my experience is minimal, but very interesting to read about y'alls positive comments about the product.

When I read Phil's comment about the next Macbook going fanless, I was surprised something like this would even run with all the heat being generated? Maybe technology is improving in this regard.

I'll admit I'm a bit of an Apple fanboy, so I'm probably biased, but with the exception of the 2016-2019 MacBook Pro's, Apple hardware has wiped the floor with its competitors for a long time now IMO.

The apple silicon in particular is light years ahead in terms of efficiency and runs very, very cool. They also have some really neat engineering with regard to heatsinks and heat transfer.

To illustrate - the only difference between the MacBook Air and the MacBook Pro is that the latter has a fan, which means you can run it harder because it has more capacity to cool itself if your increase the load beyond the capacity of the passive cooling systems. But I've had mine on my desk running 2x 4K monitors, three VM's and a heap of other stuff all simultaneously, and I've never once heard the fan spin up. Whatever they're doing with regard to efficient processor design and passive cooling, it's clearly working.

One of our engineers is still using a 2014 MacBook Pro as a daily workhorse. That thing has been in all sorts of factories, building sites, kicking about in backpacks on planes all over the place, and the hardware is absolutely fit for purpose.

ASF said:

I'll admit I'm a bit of an Apple fanboy, so I'm probably biased, but with the exception of the 2016-2019 MacBook Pro's,

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What are the deficiencies of the 2016-2019 MacBook Pros? I feel bad now, we bought both our kids MBP for college. One in 2017 and the other in 2019. Aside from one kid breaking a screen (thankfully covered by some insurance my wife bought) they are still going fine.

My daughter did switch to a Dell last year because of running AudoCAD in her classes and the mac version being different. She got sick of bootcamp switching and didn't want to have anything to do with VMs (but I'm sure she would have come to be OK with it after a while). Actually OK with me because now we get the MacBook for our home computer.

ndzied1 said:

What are the deficiencies of the 2016-2019 MacBook Pros?

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That was the stage where there was a massive push for "thinner, smaller, lighter" at all costs, at the expense of best practice design.

Even the highest spec Pro had nothing but USB-C, and the keyboard design was terrible and led to a LOT of keyboard replacement claims:

Apple's butterfly keyboards were highly controversial and have been called out as one of the company's worst design decisions due to their penchant for failure due to small particulates like crumbs or heat issues.

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The 2020 Macbook Pro reversed that trend and became slightly larger and heavier, but ditched the terrible keyboard. In 2021, they gave you back magsafe charging (which has saved my laptop from serious damage several times onsite), HDMI and an SD card slot.

Personally I held off on the 2020 MBP because (a) being the first apple silicon release they had a few limitations like only supporting one external monitor, and (b) the rumours were already circulating that magsafe et al was coming back on the next revision.

ndzied1 said:

My daughter did switch to a Dell last year because of running AudoCAD in her classes and the mac version being different. She got sick of bootcamp switching and didn't want to have anything to do with VMs (but I'm sure she would have come to be OK with it after a while).

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You can run VMWare and Parallels in unity mode, which makes it appear as if Windows is not there at all. You double click on a Windows file and it quietly launches window in the background (if it's not already running) and uses the Windows engine to launch the software in a normal-looking Mac window. That's how I've set up the macs for our non-engineering guys who don't need the same involvement with Windows as the engineers, but still need to run the occasional Windows app. If you set it up like that your daughter may not even realise she's running Windows!

Resurrecting an old thread but I’ve finally taken the plunge and got a m1 MacBook Pro. Does it matter which Ethernet dongle I get? Or do they all work fairly well?

Welcome to the club!

I've only ever used the Belkin ones that Apple sell on their website*. I've never had any issues with it, nor have any of the other guys using them.

That said, a USB-C to ethernet adaptor is pretty ubiquitous these days. Don't go buying a $10 off-brand bargain, stick to a reputable brand - but other than that you should have no issues. Every site I go to now has dozens of them kicking around in the engineering office, all various brands.


*I do also use a dock in the office so that I can plug in one USB-C cable and get charging, 2x external monitors, gigabit ethernet and some USB-A ports. That also works fine

Looks like Fusion 13 just released with full support for Apple silicon.

Since I’ve just started to setup my MacBook, would there be any reason I would pick one software over the other? (Parallel vs Fusion)

Ooooh!

I used VMWare Fusion for years and found it extremely reliable and powerful. Rock solid.

I've now been using Parallels for about a year and found it to be pretty well just as reliable. Some things it does slightly better than VMWare, some things it doesn't do quite as well. Honestly, it's hard to pick a winner from sheer user experience, they're slightly different, but neither is (IMO) inherently superior to the other.

VMWare does have a much wider user base and is a bit more "industry standard", so you could consider that in your decision if that's important to you, but for my money - I'd download them both and have a play with the trial period, and see which you like more.

Can parallels run a VMware VM.?

Moving machines between windoze & mac was relatively seamless

No, it can't. That could be one reason to switch to Fusion.

however, if the fusion VMware VM is running ARM windows, will that work on Windows VMware?

...true. Probably not. Unless the Windows machine also had an ARM processor.

ASF said:

No, it can't. That could be one reason to switch to Fusion.

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I think this needs a bit more than just a no.

As you do ASF, I used some years ago a macbook pro 2016 (had it repaired 3 times for the keyboard mess... ). I also am a bit of an Apple fanboy but to my defence I became one as I used to be a hater of Apple when I never have used any of their computers. The iPhone tempted me to try an Apple computer after having used windows since early 2000s. Then I used linux (tried a whole lot of distribution and ended with Archlinux) for around 10 years. Then tried macOS and ended ditching linux because you don't need tinkering with macOS and it frees time

Now for the subject on hand, I used Parallels and VMWare on that macbook pro 2016. Every virtualisation software that deserves our interest is capable of converting VMs from one to the other. I was using Parallels but my colleagues were using VMWare on Windows machines so I did convert VMs quite a lot and I did not have much issues there.
I should say that I used both softwares licensed and I did run without issues RA RSLogix5000, RA FTView, Siemens TIA Portal, Phoenix Contact PLCNext Engineer, Saia PG5, PCVue, Inductive Automation Ignition, Wonderware System Platform... So it does work quite nicely.

So I'd say Parallels is totally capable of running VMWare VMs if the virtualised OS runs the same architecture (x86/ARM) as the machine itself. You just have to convert it with the software you want to use.
THE drawback is you can not easily share VMs with people who use a different processor.

Btw, thanks ASF for all your explanations here. I was looking for that kind of information as I plan to create my own company and go back to use macbooks for work as I like macOS better and their ARM processors kicks asses