Tired of Xara running on virtual machine

[gnurf]

I don't want to get into another Illustrator vs. Xara vs. hobby tool vs. pro tool vs. Mac vs. Windows Vista, but... I have used Corel Draw since v. 3 and it has always been almost as intuitive as Xara. I work in the graphical business (freelance and newspaper graphics) and have to use Illustrator from time to time. I guess it is a question of learning curve as it is with everything else, but even Photoshop is 100 times easier to learn than Illustrator... I've really tried to learn how to use Illustrator but it usually drives me bonkers: the selection tools are very non-intuitive, and fills and transparencies are over complicated too. I find myself doing most stuff (about 99 %) in xara and now I mean professional things like newspaper graphics (charts, graphs, tables, maps, illustrations and about everything else). The only things I have to use Illustrator to is editing material that is received as PDF.
When it comes to Windows Vista, it also drives me crazy... I don't really see this as a finished product yet. With our newspaper system and network there has been nothing but pain with the few Vista machines we have tested so far. The only Vista version is of course the most expensive Ultimate - Hell, we need an operating system that is simply an OS that runs the application we need. not the applications that are forced on us! And I would personally switch anytime to a Mac when my XP workhorse's days are over, so to Charles & Co, please consider making a Mac version soon. I'll have to take a closer look on Parallels (which many have suggested).

[Bob Hahn]

Those who are thinking of switching to Mac should not let the fact that there is not a Mac native Xara stop them. Parallels and VMware Fusion are excellent virtual machines. I have been running Xtreme on a low end Mac Mini for a year and a half with excellent results. The only penalty is adding 15 seconds or so to the time it takes to launch Xtreme, which not a lot to pay in the over all scheme of things. The cost for a VM is not high, $80 and you can find deals for around $50, so I say go for it.
adios
sunland

I agree with what you're saying. But from Xara's side of things, that is only catering to Windows users who switched to a Mac, or someone who uses both a Mac and PC and for those programs not available for Mac. There are many Mac users who don't use Windows, so it only makes sense that Xara and the powers that be get a Mac version of Xtreme finished. There could of been a lot of Mac usesers who stumble across Xara Xtreme, only to find out it's only for PC, then it's a "well, forget that then."

[sunland]

I agree Bob, I would love to see a Native Mac version and I do not quite understand why they are not moving forward on this a little faster.
I started computing on main frames, on to cpm, dos and then windows machines and I might still be on windows if my day job, database development, had not landed me jobs with companies that were using Mac computers. Eventually when it came time to buy a new home computer I went with a Mac. For a few months I had two computers Mac and PC running with a KVM switch on one monitor and keyboard, etc. Xara on the PC and everything else on the Mac. When the VM's matured I bought one and was very pleased with the results, Xara ran faster on the VM than my Pentium PC. But I am not the CEO of Xara so it is up to them to make their own decisions. The Mac version is mentioned from time to time, but I honestly do not sense much enthusiasm or energy in that direction. That is too bad as I believe it would be a great thing and do a lot to elevate Xara against the "industry standards."
adios
sunland

[pauland]

Yes, Magix is missing a real trick with this - to get Xtremes profile raised in an environment awash with creatives. Just realeasing it into the Mac environment will get it plenty of free publicity.

Paul

[RickX]

VM Fusion works fine, although I would rather have a native mac version.

Inkscape, I try it every time a new version is released, but display/screen drawing performance on both mac and windows versions are very disappointing.
I use Illustrator for mostly print work, xara for web design graphics.

Please finish the mac version, it is the graphic designers OS, xara belongs their.

[paljasken]

I thougt: "Maybe I'm using this Illustrator software the wrond way on my mac because... it can't be as complecated as it seems to do simple things" ... turns out it DOES!
A 8 week course on illustrator showed me the illustrator is good for doing work in a CMYK enviroment, far better then xara. But when it come to being fast and easy, it's total crap.

So why isn't xara moved to mac yet. I don't understand! So please let me put my Winhose by the garbage en use my mac for xara too!

[bshand1]

I'm waiting for 2 years Xara mac os version. unfortunaly there is no alternative vector editor for mac. how long do i have to wait?

I've only just caught up with this thread, but oh yes! yes! yes! please let there be a native mac version. I would switch to macs in a minute.

I am really really over Windows

[tekarts]

For what it's worth. I have recently switched to a mac with Illustrator. I needed a new computer, I always wanted to try a mac, and I figured that since most of my work goes to sites like iStockphoto and their requirements are ai 8 compatible eps file, and I need to have a copy of ai anyway to check the work, what the heck. Well, it SUCKS! It has been about two months of steadily creating illustrations in Illustrator with the hope that I could beat the learning curve but I still don't like it. The workflow is killing me. All of that tedious work with those tiny little nodes, selecting objects, the silly steps to create a transparency or drop shadows...AAAAAAH I am pulling my hair out, and I don't have much anyway. For a program that is all about "the line", it sure has a dumb way of making you work with them.

Please Xara, give us a mac version. Maybe Adobe has a stranglehold but they have basically no competition on the mac side. Inkscape? Nah. It is free but that is all it has going for it. If Xara jumped on board I am sure it would sell like crazy. PLEEEEASE!!!!

I do love my new imac BTW.

[gadgetdoctor]

I just thought I'd add a little here.

I switched to Mac almost 2 years ago buying a MacBook Pro. The only thing I missed from the Windows side was Xara so I've been running that in Parallels pretty much since Parallels came out.

It works very very well and is fast and useable. I have 3gig of RAM (max for my model) and often I'm using a 19 inch external monitor. I give 1gig of RAM to Windows XP. I have 9 spaces open and one of them is filled with a full screen Windows XP running Xara full screen.

I can handle pretty large drawings and I've usually got a ton of other things open on the Mac side while running Xara. The other advantage (!) of this set up is I can run all versions of Internet Explorer from 4 up on the Parallels machine to see just how broken that damn browser is.

Sure a native Mac app that used the GPU acceleration would be super but I have to say that comparing Pixelmator on the Mac (which does use GPU acceleration) with Xara on the PC Virtual Machine, its hard to say that Xara is slower (comparing photo operations). Xara is just very well optimized code and the latest version of Parallels is pretty good.

The biggest downside is the boot time of XP but once its up, its really very convenient.

[minimiro]

and to continue topic....

I found one very promising vector software for MAC... Vector Designer named

http://www.tweakersoft.com/vectordesigner/

It has transperancyes, CMYK, shadows, effects etc and working really fast
etc etc