External hard disk compatibility with Macbook Pro

I am a PC user and I am thinking of getting a Macbook Pro but have some reservations regarding the following:
Will my existing USB external hard disk drives continue to work with MBP?
Will I have any folder sharing issues between my PCs and MBP?
Or, should I really need to dual boot or virtualize Windows 7 to avoid these issues?
Any tips on how to dual boot or virtualize Windows 7 in MBP would also be much appreciated.
Thanks!

Will my existing USB external hard disk drives continue to work with MBP?
There should be no problem. Can you tell us how the drives are formatted?
Will I have any folder sharing issues between my PCs and MBP?
You shouldn't have any issues it's very easy to set up. Read this: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1812?viewlocale=en_US
Or, should I really need to dual boot or virtualize Windows 7 to avoid these issues?
That's up to you. If all you want to do is file sharing then there is no need to dual boot, simple networking will solve that problem.
Any tips on how to dual boot or virtualize Windows 7 in MBP would also be much appreciated.
You can use Boot Camp or Vitualization using Parallels or VM Ware Fusion. All three will allow you to run Windows on a Mac. If you go the Boot Camp route you have turned a partition of your Mac into a PC. If you use Fusion or Parallels this allows you to run MS Windows inside OS X. Performance for most tasks is excellent.
I would also suggest you study both:
Switch 101
Mac 101
Roger

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