HELP!! FH on 10.8.5 - no luck, just a lot of wasted time!

[freehandFred]

I'm a newbie to the forum so apologies if this has already been covered!

I love FH. Have used it since 1996. I don't like illustrator and don't wish to change (I have it, I just don't use it!)

I'm on a current model iMac. I use FH on my 2011 MacBook Pro 17 via screen sharing. Works perfectly except yesterday my MacBook died $%£!

So, I've tried VMware, Parallels and VirtualBox. None of which worked despite much effort and frustration. With VMware and Parallels the grey screen with the apple logo is replaced by a darker grey screen and the rainbow spinning wheel of terror and it doesn't progress past there. I did test virtualising on an older mac and it was fine so my Snow Leopard Server disc is fine. On the newer machine it just seems to get stuck...

I also tried Crossover and a windows version of Freehand but you can't open Mac files (of which I have many!)

Next option is to buy a PC and make a 10.8.6 hackintosh but that's costly and clunky.

Can someone out there shed some light?! Maybe someone who's had the same issue and overcome it!?

Many thanks!

Fred.

[FFH Mark]

Hi, I can't speak on everything you tried but can help a bit. I have Crossover and to have it open files you must add the extension .fh11 for your FHMX files. That works for me on Mavericks. Crossover has limitations however; you need all your fonts used on the file loaded into it. It also has rendering problems with very complex FreeHand vectors. But that said, I use it for all my touchups, quick editing, creating logos, and infographics.

FYI, I have Snow Leopard/FHMX as a separate boot drive so I will boot to that for projects. I don't have virtualization software added...yet. Maybe one of the members can help you there.

[Jonathun]

I have Freehand running in 10.6.8 on Parallels in Yosemite. Found it works well but I must logout of parallels when not in use or it crashes and then won't restart
And has to be restored from TC

[slv987]

I have 6 machines with Mavericks running Snow Leopard Server in VMware Fusion 7. 4 of the machines are 2009 - 2010 iMacs. The others are newer macbook pros. All have upgraded to 8-12 gb of memory. This seemed to be a huge help as before they had 4 gb and would barely run. I allocate 2-4 gb to the VM. We use these machines everyday in a production environment and they work great. As far as accessing FH11 files between Mavericks and Snow Leopard I have found it easiest to create a share on the Mavericks side access the share from Snow Leopard. This eliminates the need to add the FH11 extension. For some reason the VM Sharing won't read the files without extensions. If there are any other questions I could answer I would be happy to help.

[freehandFred]

I have 6 machines with Mavericks running Snow Leopard Server in VMware Fusion 7. 4 of the machines are 2009 - 2010 iMacs. The others are newer macbook pros. All have upgraded to 8-12 gb of memory. This seemed to be a huge help as before they had 4 gb and would barely run. I allocate 2-4 gb to the VM. We use these machines everyday in a production environment and they work great. As far as accessing FH11 files between Mavericks and Snow Leopard I have found it easiest to create a share on the Mavericks side access the share from Snow Leopard. This eliminates the need to add the FH11 extension. For some reason the VM Sharing won't read the files without extensions. If there are any other questions I could answer I would be happy to help.

Thanks for this info (and everyone else's feedback!!)

When you installed SLS into your VM (and yes, I've now tried with 4GB ram with no luck) did you use a disk image and if so what settings did you use!?

Thanks.

[slv987]

I ran into that trying to install it on a newer macbook without a dvd drive. I had to install it using the installation dvd on an external dvd drive. For some reason the disc image would not work. If you don't have an external you may be able to share the dvd drive from another mac. Hope this helps.