[N3WBI3]

(1) Unlike VMWare wine does not add the extra overhead of CPU emulation, does not reserve a given chunk of memory for a VM.
(2) Wine shares directly the file system of the host operating system, no need to depend on SAMBA or NFS to share files between a VM and the hosts. A side benefit is you can save yourself a couple of gigs worth of windows operating system install on the disk.
(3) Windows application can be called directly by native os components, for example links in your email or chat programs can directly open internet explorer.

[SunkenCiv]

"links in your email or chat programs can directly open internet explorer."

That's not sweetening the deal. :')

[surely_you_jest]

(1) Unlike VMWare wine does not add the extra overhead of CPU emulation, does not reserve a given chunk of memory for a VM. (2) Wine shares directly the file system of the host operating system, no need to depend on SAMBA or NFS to share files between a VM and the hosts. A side benefit is you can save yourself a couple of gigs worth of windows operating system install on the disk. (3) Windows application can be called directly by native os components, for example links in your email or chat programs can directly open internet explorer.

Is there something like WINE available for the G5 chip?

[antiRepublicrat]

Unlike VMWare wine does not add the extra overhead of CPU emulation, does not reserve a given chunk of memory for a VM.

No more emulation, same platform. Plus VMWare doesn't reserve all of the physical memory, it shrinks and grows as needed up to the maximum allocated (but you can prevent VM memory from getting swapped). What is the stability of running Windows in with OS X? As far as file transfers, it's pretty much transparent, you just share out folders and move your files around as you normally would.

Sorry, the "ick factor" of putting Windows into OS X is just too up there for me. I'd prefer to have a nice wall between the two.