Xara and Apple

**Tabvla** · 06 February 2012, 09:41 AM

Does Xara produce Apple-compatible versions of its software?

T.

**steve.ledger** · 06 February 2012, 09:51 AM

No

**Tabvla** · 06 February 2012, 11:27 AM

Thanks Sledger

T.

**gwpriester** · 06 February 2012, 03:48 PM

There was a Mac version in the works but that got put on hold when Xara was acquired by Magix.

Users who have Macs can run Xara using a Windows emulator such as Parallels.

**Tabvla** · 06 February 2012, 07:01 PM

Thanks for that info GW

Anyone know if Parallels is any good?

T.

**avalon** · 07 February 2012, 03:24 PM

I run XARA in VirtualBox VM/WIN XP PRO service pack 3. It installs and runs flawlessly on my 27" Intel iMac. All the versions I have of XARA run fine.

There is a trial version of Parallels give it a try ... it is an excellent product. You will not be sorry ...

VirtualBox VM is free! It installed fast and was up and running in no time at all.

And let me add I am Extremely happy to have XARA, EXTREMELY, on my iMac. I am also learning Illustrator for other reasons that I will not get into.

**Drwyd** · 07 February 2012, 07:16 PM

I run XARA in VirtualBox VM/WIN XP PRO service pack 3. It installs and runs flawlessly on my 27" Intel iMac

That's good to know Avalon

Losing Xara would take the shine off of a new Mac

**Tabvla** · 08 February 2012, 09:41 AM

Thanks Avalon - that is very useful info.

When running Xara on a Mac in a Windows Emulator do you notice any changes in colour rendition as compared to running directly on a Windows platform?

For example.... If you created a .xar file on a Windows PC and then loaded that file onto a Mac with a W-emulator would there be marked differences in the way colour was rendered on the screen?

T.

**avalon** · 08 February 2012, 03:50 PM

The color is rendered far better on my iMac and I was using a Sony Trinitron CRT and thought that was great.

One thing I should add ... it was just a bit confusing to get correct read/write NTFS storage without creating any drive problems on the external PC USB hard drive. Surely we both know how critical this is! Be cautious.

In a nutshell ... read/write to NTFS WIN XP PRO was just fine in VirtualBox VM itself. Read/write to an external was a different animal. I'll hope I'll be solving that today with Paragon NTFS for OS X.

Again I am THRILLED to have Xara ANYTHING on my iMac. I hope someone from Xara reads this! Like many of us I have using Xara for over a way over decade as many of us have.

If they were to release their product for a Mac ... WOW!! Amazing how we all became so loyal ... and for good reason.

Originally Posted by Tabvla

Thanks Avalon - that is very useful info.

When running Xara on a Mac in a Windows Emulator do you notice any changes in colour rendition as compared to running directly on a Windows platform?

For example.... If you created a .xar file on a Windows PC and then loaded that file onto a Mac with a W-emulator would there be marked differences in the way colour was rendered on the screen?

T.

**silence** · 21 February 2012, 08:38 PM

I use Xara with VMWare Fusion. It works great, and in "Unity" mode Xara window acts just like any native Mac os Window. It's even possible to drag an image from Finder to Xara – and it's accepted miraculously! Funny that WinXP SP3 + Xara takes less memory than Illustrator loaded with 10 documents

Of course there are downsides; you have to install all fonts both on Mac and on Windows; there are printing issues (I have to export to PDF and then print it from Mac Os)...
But it works good enough. Still, native Xara for Mac is a dream for many many years, and I really hope to see it someday... No alternative so far.