Hi. I'm having great luck with dictating via NaturallySpeaking into WordPad, hosted on Windows XP, which is running on parallels, running on my MacBook (OS 10.6.8, processor 2GHz, 3 Gb 667Mhz). I have given parallels 1Gb, 1CPU. I'd like to be able to install open office onto my Windows virtual machine, as well as run Zotero which will of course require Firefox to be running as well. So this means my virtual machine will be running the word processor associated with open office, Firefox, zotero, and NaturallySpeaking simultaneously. Can anyone tell me if this is going to be feasible in terms of the demands for processing speed that will be asked of my MacBook? Background story: I need to get this set up for the sake of writing qualifying exams that run over seven days and will involve writing about 100 pages. In other words I won't be needing to run software other than that mentioned above at the same time as I'm writing. Thank you so much for any advice or insights you can offer.
With a 2 GHz MacBook, 3 GB of RAM, and only 1 GB assigned to your Windows XP VM, you'll likely notice slowdowns when running Dragon NaturallySpeaking, OpenOffice, Firefox, and Zotero together. Dragon is particularly demanding because it continuously processes speech while the other applications consume additional memory. A few suggestions that may help: Increase the VM's RAM to 1.5 GB if your Mac can still run comfortably. Leave enough memory for macOS so it doesn't start swapping to disk. Keep Firefox limited to only the tabs you actually need. Zotero itself isn't too demanding, but multiple browser tabs can quickly use available RAM. Close unnecessary Windows background applications and startup programs. If possible, save your work frequently and test your complete workflow well before your seven-day exam to make sure everything remains stable over long sessions. Since Dragon works well with WordPad in your setup, consider continuing to dictate there and then copy the text into OpenOffice if you notice any lag while dictating directly into Writer. Given the importance of your qualifying exams, I'd strongly recommend doing a few "dress rehearsals" by running all four applications together for an hour or two. If the system remains responsive during those tests, it should be capable of handling your exam workload. If performance is marginal, adding more physical RAM to the MacBook (if your model supports it) would provide the biggest improvement.
