Re: Paralells and audio.
I run several windows apps on my MacBook Pro using Parallels Desktop quite successfully. CAD, EASE, DSP control software works extremely well. I have several different versions of windows set up as separate virtual machines so that I can run the latest or legacy software. I even keep a spare virtual machine to evaluate software, if I don't like it, then I simply restore the virtual machine file from a backup and I'm back to normal. That said, if you want to run audio software that receives audio from the MacBook, you can only do it through the windows media drivers, which limits you to two channels each direction, along with the associated latency involved in getting audio from one OS to the other, which can be annoying at times. If I need to run windows only analysis software, I won't use Parallels, I will reboot into bootcamp mode where I can take advantage of ASIO drivers. Most of what I do in Parallels/windows is for the programming of audio DSP's or CAD work. Everything else I do natively in Mac OSX or via Windows bootcamp.
