How to check out Windows 10 on your Mac right now
Installing the Windows 10 Technical Preview isn’t overly complex, but what do you do if you don’t have a Windows PC handy? Use a Mac instead. The team behind Parallels, the cross-platform app that allows Mac users to run Windows without rebooting, has put together a guide for installing the Technical Preview in Parallels Desktop 10.
Before you begin, it’s worth noting that Parallels can’t guarantee that its tools will be compatible with Windows 10. Even Microsoft can’t account for the bugs that are likely to pervade the early software, so be safe and make sure you know what you’re doing before you dive in.
The first thing you need to do is download the free trial of Parallels Desktop 10. Then you can sign up for the Windows Insider Program and download the Windows 10 preview. Next, download Parallels’ Windows 10 Technical Preview VM shell (download link), unzip it and then move the files to ~/Documents/Parallels/. Open the .pmv file and the Parallels Desktop app will ask you if you have moved or copied the virtual machine. Click “Copied.”
If your Mac has 4GB of RAM, the app will now prompt you the decrease the amount of RAM allocated to the virtual machine. Click “Don’t Change.”
After that, a PXE screen will appear in the virtual machine. Find the Actions menu at the top of the screen and click “Stop.”
Go back to Actions menu -> Configure… -> Hardware tab -> CD/DVD 1 page -> Connect to: -> Choose an image file… ->locate WindowsTechnicalPreview.iso file and choose it. Launch the VM shell within the virtual machine and proceed with your Windows 10 installation. When it finishes installing, create a user account and access the Windows 10 Technical Preview Desktop.
You’re nearly finished! Now you need to install Parallels Tools. Click on the Devices tab -> CD/DVD 1 -> Connect Image… -> locate prl-tools-win.iso at:
Applications -> Parallels Desktop -> Contents -> Resources -> Tools
Connect that image to the virtual machine. Once you’ve done that, go to This PC in the virtual machine, double-click on DVD Drive (D:) Parallels Tools and finish the installation. Finally, you shut down the virtual machine and rename it whatever you want.
So even if you’re a Mac user, you don’t have to miss out on the future of Windows. Head over to the Parallels website for more information.
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This article was originally published on BGR.com
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