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Parallels or VMware

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I was involved in a conversation on the 888-PIRILLO line the other night, when the talk turned to using Parallels. The caller has been using Parallels, but has been having a lot of troubles with the CD drive not wanting to mount. It has been SO long since I’ve used Parallels. I asked if it’s happening on all builds, or just one Virtual Machine. My first suggestion, of course, is to try a second VM. If it doesn’t connect there, there may be an incompatibility with that drive and Parallels.

You might also try downloading a trial of VMware. They not only are one of our sponsors, they have an excellent product. Parallels has gotten a lot better lately. Some people swear by it, and some swear by VMware. I think either one is a fantastic product. I give more attention to VMware for a couple of reasons. One is that it can support two processors, instead of just one. The second reason is that it has been around as long as I can remember, much longer than Parallels. To me, longevity shows that a company knows what they are doing.

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50 Comments

spyware and my wife can manage her pictures, music, etc. The lovely Carin is actually very savvy and likes to login through the VPN at work to use a virtual desktop. As a result she’s asking about running Windows on her Mac. After digging in I foundChris Pirillo, freejacking on the cutting edge of tech, as usual, saying that the two are very close in features, price, etc. So, having already bothered Chris Penn with my Mac question of the day (do I use Super Duper or Time Machine for backups?), I decided to throw it on to twitter:

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affiliate marketing. Affiliate Marketing is a popular method of promoting web businesses in which you are rewarded for every visitor, subscriber and customer provided through your efforts, much like the practice of paying finder’s-fees […]VMware and Parallels for Virtual MachinesIt doesn’t matter if you’re running on Windows or Mac OS X – every power user needs either Parallels or VMware (or both). There’s never been an easier way to test software without destroying your primary operating system

Cool, me and my friend were just talking about VMware (and boot camp) today. Good video, thanks.

Seventh! (only joking). I am actually wondering whether anyone watching this video knows how to delete the recycle bin from the desktop in XP?

right click and select empty recycle bin =D

dicked around but its not mounting you say?

I don’t mean empty it, I mean actually remove the icon from the desktop.

did’nt know mac had those kind of effects. pretty cool.

Look up “Recycle Bin Disable Registry”, then once you install that fix, you can disable it in folder options.

lmao……. dicked around……….. mounting.

Parallels disappointed me in performance and stability. Once I checked out VMware, I never thought about going back to Parallels. VMware is better in all aspects.

And VMWare will run Linux as well, which to my knowledge Parallels only supports Windows.

where you get that cool screen saver?

Personally I think vmware fusion is the way to go esp. with that second processor.

Chris,

Actually, the parent company of Parallels (SWSoft, which recently changed its name to Parallels) is older than VMware.

VMware was founded in 1998; SWSoft in 1997.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWsoft
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VMware

Dwight.

Fussion is cheaper. Right?

It’s called fenetre volantes

nice to see that your MAC s posted on something…no the table…

how the fuck can a billonaire like Steve Jobs create and SELL a MacBook Pro that heats ups so fast that you cannot place it on a desk

this is such an insult.

it took minutes for it to start cooking on my lap the first time.

bad ventilation…clearly

Guess Steve Jobs doesnt want to cut into HIS profits of billions by releasing things that still have flaws.

very interesting…that really helped alot.

I Still like VMware

vmware needs a smart selection functionality like parallels. Then I see absolutely no reason to use parallels.

Parallels supports windows, DOS, and Linux
Parallels and Fusion have the same pricepoint
Parallels has been virtualizing Windows on Mac longer then VMWare has
Just so that all the facts are straight

VMware has the multi Processor support
Parallels has better integration of OSs
Both have similar 3d support
There will be great advances for both products in the future.

Parallels also supports Linux.

safarivsfirefox

March 15th, 2008
at 10:15am

I think that one of the best things about VMware is that it can import other virtual machine and non-virtual machine partitions including BootCamp and Parallels. Saves a lot of space on the hard drive. (Note: I haven’t personally tried it with Parallels, but from what I’ve seen it works for those who switch from Parallels to VMware.)

I’ve also heard several people comment on the speed of VMware over Parallels, but I haven’t used them both enough to say much out of my experience.

I recently got a mac, my first one ever. i’m a former pc user and use a lot of pc based software on my old computer. A lot of the stuff i used on my pc has their mac counterparts. Eg. I mastered Windows Movie Maker (look at my user name) and i’m pretty good a Sony Acid (loop creation program). with mac there is iMovie and Garageband. I’m trying to get use to the new programs and its quiet frustrating when you have to relearn something. I found out about VMware from watching a vid chris did comparing it to Parallels. I think virtually machines are great. Booting into a different system just to open a program is to hectic. I haven’t tried VMWare fusion yet, but I’m definitely going to, SOON.

Greetings, GnomoBoss.

Given your focus, it’s not hard to figure out how you missed some others. VirtualBox, qemu, and MS Virtual PC are rough equivalents of the software you mentioned.

You can go a step up also, via open source software like Xen and KVM. While I don’t know the first thing about Macs, Xen and KVM are available for linux. Along with the commercial VMware Server, these run on `bare metal’ and provide a significant performance gain.

VMplayer and Qemu run on Win/lin (sorry, not sure about Mac). You’d be surprised how easy it is to create and run a different OS in the free VMplayer.

If you need a quick bit of isolation in Windows, you can run a program under SandboxIE. At very least it can help keep the internet nasties out of your OS when viewing questionable sites (not that WE would do anything like that).

Keep up the good work,

-leftystrat
Thermionic Emissions

This is a stab in the dark but I’m trying to download the Parallels trial and it’s asking for a cd, can you help?

“The second reason is that it has been around as long as I can remember, much longer than Parallels. To me, longevity shows that a company knows what they are doing.”
More importantly, this means that the VMware virtualization engine is much more proven and it’s internals much more well-known than Parallels.

Unless you need to run 64-bit VMs, Sun’s VirtualBox is well worth a look. As an added advantage that neither VMware nor Parallels has, the latest release of VirtualBox allows the equivalent of Unity or Coherence (i.e. guest OS windows open on OSX desktop) for guest OSes beyond Windows. You can’t possibly beat the price, and many VMware appliances can be persuaded to run in VirtualBox.

As I would like to use my legacy hardware which HP does not provide drivers for Vista and especially 64-bit vista, is there any way to use a VM with say XP Pro or 2K in a vm in vista to run the hardware. My impression is that only the hardware drivers in the base OS can be used, not ones in the VM OS, to operate hardware.

Appreciate any help.

its 2 good

VirtualBox from Sun is free, opensource and capable of cross platform function.
“Presently, VirtualBox runs on Windows, Linux, Macintosh and OpenSolaris hosts and supports a large number of guest operating systems including but not limited to Windows (NT 4.0, 2000, XP, Server 2003, Vista), DOS/Windows 3.x, Linux (2.4 and 2.6), and OpenBSD.”

http://www.virtualbox.org/

What about VirtualBox?

- It’s Open Source.
- It runs on multiple OS platforms – it is stated to run on Windows, Linux, Mac & Open Solaris.

I had a developer tell me about it the other day. He brought it up because of his frustration with VirtualPC from MS being so behind on updates, patches and releases and the compared cost to VMWare (which is what I normally use).

I’m going to give it a try myself and thought you might be interested in hearing about it/seeing it.

http://www.virtualbox.org

Just downloaded the trial for VMWare Fusion and I am loving it! I installed Ubuntu, and loved the ease of install and subsequent ease of making sound, network and bluetooth work with my computer with several clicks of the mouse.

VMWare’s integration with OSX is superb, including the ability to put Ubuntu apps in my dock, and run them side by side with other OS X apps.

I will be buying this one for sure! Thanks to you, Chris, I can get a coupon and save a little money! :-)

Cheers,
Curran

I have fusions installed on my mac air (works great) and my mac pro (works not so great). The mac pro has duo processors. I keep getting a message: “make sure you have rights to run the program and to access all directories it uses and rights to access all directories for temporary files.” I then have to uninstall and reinstall fusions. The good news is my virtual machine remains intact during the process and will stay that way so long as I don’t restart the computer or put it to sleep. Unfortunately, after using fusions for about two weeks it does it anyway. I was told it is because I have to designate it to use only one processor- in opposition, it seems, to your opinion that it supports the duo processor. Please advise. Thank you.

If you’re running Vista using Boot Camp and want to use a VM program to access it, definitely use Fusion. Parallels is WAY too troublesome in this situation.

Personally I prefer Fusion. Simpler, better graphics, more power. Plus you can get it half off if you’re a student!

David Marshall

May 15th, 2009
at 3:41pm

The Parallels vs. VMware argument is like the Mac vs. PC, or Apple vs. IBM, or Amiga vs. PC. Mostly comes down to preference. Both have good products. Both have a ways to go to make it better. Parallels (SWsoft) may have founded earlier, but VMware was virtualizing the x86 platform longer. The Mac product is based on the Workstation code which has been beaten on by users since 1999.

Watch for the new client Type 1 hypervisors. Better with performance, and are showing a lot of promise. Virtual Computer, Citrix and Neocleus are building solutions.

What Do You Think?