Parallels Desktop 14 ® for Mac makes it easier than ever to get back space on your Mac! Get up to 20 GB back with new disk usage optimization. Get up to 20 GB back with new disk usage optimization. Automatically reorganize your virtual disk to increase limits for optimal storage savings. VMware Fusion gives Mac users the power to run Windows on Mac along with hundreds of other operating systems side by side with Mac applications, without rebooting. Fusion is simple enough for home users and powerful enough for IT professionals and businesses. Try it for free today.
Since buying my first Intel Mac in 2006, I have used Parallels Desktop for virtualization. I used it mainly for running Windows for when I needed to either test something or run an important application in Windows. Since last year, I have been running Mac VMs in Parallels to build packages, to test package installs through Self Service, and test policies and configuration profiles before making them live.
This works well for the most part, but because of some unresolved problems with running Mac VMs in Parallels, I an contemplating a change to VMware before my Parallels Pro subscription comes up for renewal in September. To all the Mac admins to run Mac VMs, which do you think is better to use? Parallels, or VMware? I have seen a lot of demos at JNUC, and other places where the presenter was using VMware, and that has me curious about making a change. I've used both in the past, but for the past three years or so I've been using Parallels and haven't really had any troubles with it. I use it to test everything, just like you, and have even had very little trouble testing DEP workflows using it as well.
I think over the last few years the two products have reached a bit of parity and are very similar in function. I think it really boils down to brand loyalty and personal preference for most techs. But, I could be wrong, it's been known to happen.;-). One reason why I am contemplating making a switch to VMware is because I often lose mouse control while working with my Mac VMs. This never happens using a Windows or Linux VM.
I can get into the Mac VMs through Apple Remote Desktop, but it's still very annoying and time wasting to lose mouse control. This happens on both of my Macs, and Parallels support has done nothing so far except to acknowledge the issue, but they have given me no idea when to expect a fix. Parallels does have the ability to take snapshots. I configure the VMs to the exact way I need them to be, and then take a snapshot so I can revert back after building packages, or testing policies. I also make sure to turn off auto-updating so that I don't get update data caught in Composer.
Using VMs works great. I'm just getting frustrated with losing mouse control, and this usually happens at really inconvenient times. HI all =) I'm the Product Manager for VMware Fusion =) Obviously you know my preference, but I wanted to mention a couple things:.
As was mentioned 'vmrun' is our CLI and allows you to do just about everything you can in the UI from the command line. A newer and potentially better option is our new Fusion API. It's RESTful and built using Golang and Swagger. We just made it available in our ( free!) 2017 Tech Preview which you can check out here:. We support Microsoft VBS and Credential Guard in the Tech Preview, I don't believe other mac-based hypervisors do currently without some (probably unsupported) hacking.
Veertu actually exited the Mac desktop space and pivoted with a new name to focus on CI for iOS, so that's probably not a viable option any more. Happy to answer any other questions, cheers! -Michael Roy - mroy at vmware dot com.
What is VMWare Fusion? How does VMWare Fusion compare to Parallels Desktop for Mac?
This Q&A was 'archived' on August 16, 2008 and provides general information about VMWare Fusion and comparison to Parallels Desktop for Mac at the time it was released. For more recent comparison of the two programs, please refer to ' does the performance of Parallels Desktop for Mac 5 compare to VMWare Fusion 3? How does the performance compare for productivity applications? How does it compare for games?' First on August 7, 2006, released in a limited beta version on or around November 3, 2006, released as a public beta on December 21, 2006, and shipped as a 'final' product on August 6, 2007, Fusion is VMWare's virtualization solution that allows one to run other operating systems 'inside' or 'alongside' MacOS X. In much the same way as, VMWare states that Fusion provides: The ability to simultaneously run any PC OS - Windows, Linux, NetWare and others - on Mac OS X. Switch between operating systems by easily tabbing between applications and share data between the two operating systems by dragging and dropping files on the fly - all without needing to reboot.
What's more, you can create virtual machines and run them on other VMware products or run any VMware virtual machine on your Mac. Leaked memos regarding the then forthcoming VMWare Fusion mostly showed features already provided by the shipping Parallels Desktop for Mac, but of particular interest to many, VMWare also promised the following:. The ability to assign more than one processor, or more than one processor core (when available), to the program to improve performance. Access to physical devices from within VMWare, such as 'CD-ROM drives, video cameras, iPods, printers, and high-speed disks'.
Support for USB 2.0 devices. The ability to drag and drop files between MacOS X and the guest operating system running within VMWare Fusion. When the public beta was released VMWare listed the same officially on the company website. On November 29, 2006, when this Q&A was first published, EveryMac.com noted that Parallels Desktop for Mac used a single core on a dual core Mac, did not provide direct access to the physical CD/DVD-ROM drive, did not provide support for devices that require USB 2.0, and required users to share files using Parallels Tools, which is convenient, but not quite as convenient as drag and drop.
However, EveryMac.com also remarked that it was a safe bet that the programmers at Parallels were hard at work adding most, if not all, of the features that VMWare promised to the next release of Desktop for Mac. Sure enough, two days later, Parallels unveiled beta build 3036, with the ability to 'drag and drop' files between MacOS X and Windows, the ability to boot from a Boot Camp partition, a slick 'coherency' feature to 'show Windows applications as if they were Mac ones', improved graphics performance, and a slew of other improvements. On December 21, 2006, Parallels released another beta that added support for many USB 2.0 devices, CD burning, and Boot Camp partition support, and a few days after that (December 29, 2006), released 'Beta 3' (Build 3106) with better Boot Camp and USB 2.0 support, an improved version of Transporter that made it possible to 'migrate your real Windows PC, or existing VMware or Virtual PC VMs to Parallels virtual machines', a new interface, and more. When this Q&A was 'archived' on August 16, 2008, VMWare Fusion notably supported the ability to assign more than one processor or core to an application and Parallels Desktop for Mac did not, with the next version promised to do so, but otherwise both products are similar, high-quality and do the job of running Windows 'alongside' MacOS X admirably. In a wonderfully in-depth comparison that should be read in its entirety, the always excellent: If you want a virtualization product (that allows you to run Windows alongside Mac OS X), and you want the best performance for the types of things that we tested, then clearly you need to run XP and not Vista.
Furthermore, in our tests, both VMware Fusion and Parallels performed well, and were a good user experience. That said, Parallels was somewhat faster in general than VMware Fusion for XP.
If you want the best virtualization performance for Vista, then VMware Fusion is your choice. And, if you want to keep your Mac OS X and Windows environments completely separate, VMware Fusion's design may be your better choice (And, although we didn't test it, we would expect VMware Fusion to have better multi-processor support if you really have an application that is designed to take advantage of it confirm this). If your goal is tight integration between one or more Windows applications and Mac OS X, Parallels is the clear winner when running either XP or Vista. And, as we said before, if you want the best XP performance with the types of applications tested here, Parallels is not only faster than VMware Fusion, but it's faster than Boot Camp on average for the applications that we tested. Ultimately, Parallels Desktop for Mac and VMWare Fusion will continue to be improved at a rapid rate and each is available to download to try for free and you can decide which program you prefer. Site sponsor sells the latest versions of Parallels Desktop for Mac and VMWare Fusion.