Today Apple has released what seems to be a legitimate answer to all of the dual-booting madness surrounding the new Intel-based Macs. With all of the chatter going back and forth about who can get their computer to natively run Windows XP first, Apple has now made the choice easy. The Boot Camp Public Beta is now available for testing and I have never wanted a new Mac more. “Boot Camp” (the name isn’t official and is likely to change) will be included in the upcoming OS X 10.5 release, known as “Leopard”.

For me, there are a couple different reasons why this is a good thing. First, as a web professional who uses a Mac, the thought of actually loading up Windows instead of relying on Virtual PC’s incredibly slow interface is very appealing. Browser testing would become an easier task because you could just switch back and forth to see how a site reacts to changes and then fix whatever problems you might encounter. Some may argue that it’s actually more productive to just have a PC seperately, but for me, it would be nice to load up either one when need be.

Secondly, I am about 99.5% efficient on the Mac. There are a small handful of programs that I have on my PC that would be handy to have at my fingertips without having to fire up another computer. Having the flexability to have any program on any operating system on a moment’s notice is what appeals to me. There have been times when I am reviewing a project with a client and it would have been great to be able to take their proposal, design, etc. into the Windows OS so that they feel more comfortable.

Today Apple has released what seems to be a legitimate answer to all of the dual-booting madness surrounding the new Intel-based Macs. With all of the chatter going back and forth about who can get their computer to natively run Windows XP first, Apple has now made the choice easy.