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Parallels takes virtualization speed crown in head-to-head with VMware - Page 2

post #41 of 71
2/10/10 at 7:24am
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism View Post

I don't think that many care about a product that is free but well behind on features and capabilities. You can always do your own test.

How do you know VirtualBox is "behind" if there's no feature comparison anywhere?


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post #42 of 71
2/10/10 at 7:29am
Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffharris View Post

How do you know VirtualBox is "behind" if there's no feature comparison anywhere?

1) Because it's free.

2) Because I've used all 3. (I prefer Fusion for the reasons stated above: stability)
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post #43 of 71
2/10/10 at 7:53am
Quote:
Originally Posted by irnchriz View Post

Having used both VMWare 3 and Parallels 5 on an i5 and i7 MacPro


What i5 or i7 *MacPro* would that be...do you have a time machine...I am not aware of any i5 or i7 MacPro's
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post #44 of 71
2/10/10 at 7:59am
Multimonitor support? No? Still? Crappy networking support? Yes?

Hate ||s. VMWare may be slower but i'd never know it because I'm too busy avoiding running ||s due to it's 1 monitor limitation and networking issues. It's bogus.

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post #45 of 71
2/10/10 at 8:05am
Interesting, now get on the ball, VMWare!
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post #46 of 71
2/10/10 at 8:06am
Yea, sure would have been nice if they included it in the comparison...


Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffharris View Post

How do you know VirtualBox is "behind" if there's no feature comparison anywhere?
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post #47 of 71
2/10/10 at 8:49am
Quote:
Originally Posted by libertyforall View Post

Yea, sure would have been nice if they included it in the comparison...

parallels is also painfully slow when dragging files between windows and mac in addition to it's limitation of only using one friggen monitor.

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post #48 of 71
2/10/10 at 9:20am
I realize it is a little outside the objective world of benchmarking but IMHO the most critical component of VM software is how well it can recover from crash/corruption. *

Early on with Fusion 2 I several times found my VM corrupted beyond recovery. With how little I actually use Windows no amount of speed increase in regular or infrequent As the vae may be use could ever compensate for the frustration of those events which required reinstalling windows and apps from scratch. *Happily I haven't once lost my Fusion 3 Windows VMs (xp and W7), but again I don't use windows much...

What I honestly use virtualized far more often is Ubuntu Linux and as such really wish someone would do a little performance benchmarking of it between Parallels and Fusion.*

One last thing, does parrallels really not support multiple monitors? That to would be an instant deal breaker for me. * * * *
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post #49 of 71
2/10/10 at 9:29am
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism View Post

1) Because it's free.

2) Because I've used all 3. (I prefer Fusion for the reasons stated above: stability)

Number 2 is a really good reason. But why bring up number 1? It sounds like a non sequitur, to say the least.
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post #50 of 71
2/10/10 at 9:36am
Quote:
Originally Posted by solarein View Post

Number 2 is a really good reason. But why bring up number 1? It sounds like a non sequitur, to say the least.

Products that don't have a strong financial backing don't have a structure for good developers to spend 60+ hours a week coding for it. Ergo, they are less likely to be better products than ones that are given away for free, relying solely on volunteer work.
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post #51 of 71
2/10/10 at 9:52am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Isomorphic View Post

Speed is fine and all, but I feel like I'm paying to beta-test Parallels' product for them. I use Fusion when I want to get work done.

Amen, brother (or sister ).

Parallels may indeed run faster, but I had to butt heads with their tech support several times and never got it to work very well in my situation. VMware Fusion is far from perfect, and in fact seems to have taken somewhat of a giant step backwards with the 3.xx releases. It still works the best for me, so I stick with it.

I am sure there are many others who experienced similar frustration with Parallels who now use Fusion, and won't consider switching back.

Just my $1.25 worth. YMMV
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post #52 of 71
2/10/10 at 9:53am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Toyin View Post

Parallels naysayers remind me of the VW naysayers. Claiming that "VW's have electrical problems" based on old history.

I'd have to agree. It seems many of these complaints are "it screwed me once, so I'm not going to try it again." I jump back and forth between the two. There was a time when I liked Parallels better. Then I vastly preferred Fusion, both running on XP. Then new versions came out and I'm firmly back in the Parallels camp again, running Windows 7. That may change again with Fusion 4.0. But I'm not going to let past experiences color my opinions of current products.
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post #53 of 71
2/10/10 at 10:40am
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism View Post

Products that don't have a strong financial backing don't have a structure for good developers to spend 60+ hours a week coding for it. Ergo, they are less likely to be better products than ones that are given away for free, relying solely on volunteer work.

Sun put a bit of effort into VirtualBox and Oracle hasn't killed it yet. It has some nice features and sits IMHO between Parallels and VMWare...more enterprise than parallels or fusion, not quite as enterprise as VMWare VSX.
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post #54 of 71
2/10/10 at 10:55am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rokcet Scientist View Post

Tried to install VirualBox on Leopard, a year ago, but the installation procedure crapped out on me, and froze, forcing a restart. Uninstalled VirtualBox. Nevertheless, since then VirtualBox refuses to start its installation process on my system. Apparently some corrupt VirtualBox auxiliary file still remains somewhere on my system, blocking a new installation. Can't find it, though.

But I thought Macs don't need uninstallers because all you have to do is drag the application to the trash.
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post #55 of 71
2/10/10 at 11:05am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Haggar View Post

But I thought Macs don't need uninstallers because all you have to do is drag the application to the trash.

Actually, I think Macs need a smarter system when it comes to apps. Not the complex method required by nearly all Windows apps, but something built into the OS or DMGs to know when you are trying to run the DMG and to ask you if you'd like to install it into your /Applications folder.

It would also need to remove the mounted Disk Image after it completes this task.

There are some 3rd-party apps that check for this but this needs to be part of the default setup as it's one of the areas in Macs that even long time users seem to get confused by.


PS: I use AppTrap, a Pref Pane item that runs at start up. If I delete an app it asks me if I'd like to remove the associated /Library files, too. It gives me a list allowing me to cherry pick any of them. It would be nice if this was also standard operation on Mac OS X.
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post #56 of 71
2/10/10 at 11:06am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Haggar View Post

But I thought Macs don't need uninstallers because all you have to do is drag the application to the trash.

Most of the time, this is the case. Applications which install kernel extensions require uninstallers. In these instances, the application installer should also have an option for uninstall.
Please don't be insane.
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Please don't be insane.
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post #57 of 71
2/10/10 at 2:07pm
When I think back to my history with both systems. The Fusion disk image has been corrupted or unusable more then the Parallels images. It's usually not a huge issue because at least once a month I allow time capsule to back up the images.

What's the problem with 2 monitors? Like I said previously I have PC software running either on my screen or an external 32" monitor, while the other screen runs either a DVD or iTunes. I can drag windows back and forth between both monitors. I also never had issues with dragging files to and from the 2 OSes. I found that cut and paste is a little buggier in Fusion, while application switching with cmd-tab or mouse click is better in Fusion.

I find it ironic that Parallels support is what get's the worst rap. Personally I haven't needed support for either product (knock on wood). Now that's not that I haven't had to troubleshoot issues, but most of the common issues are easily found online or by reading the manual and adjusting preferences.

Anywho, be happy with whatever your using. For my use (Windows XP in a windows network at work, and VPN to 2 hospitals), Parallels works better. Like I said earlier I have both products up to the latest versions and Parallels is the clear winner. These benchmarks support what I've suspected. It's up to you to decide if that's enough for you. The reason why I continue to try both products is because of all the glowing reviews of Fusion. I'm more of the school of "if you can make it better then try" not "if it ain't broke don't fix it".

peace
-Toyin
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-Toyin
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post #58 of 71
2/10/10 at 2:55pm
Dumb question perhaps and off topic, but is it possible to install both and run them alternately? One for performance , the other for reliability?

Parallels gave me lots of BSOD, VM Fusion solid, but evidently slower...

Thanks.
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post #59 of 71
2/10/10 at 3:27pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by bobcat22 View Post

Dumb question perhaps and off topic, but is it possible to install both and run them alternately? One for performance , the other for reliability?

Parallels gave me lots of BSOD, VM Fusion solid, but evidently slower...

Thanks.

I used to get kernel panics when I accidentally launched a second virtualization application (Crossover excluded).

If you're getting BSOD then you may have too much memory allocated to Parallels or not enough system memory. I would go through the preferences and configure your system like they did for these tests.
-Toyin
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-Toyin
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post #60 of 71
2/10/10 at 3:44pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism View Post

Products that don't have a strong financial backing don't have a structure for good developers to spend 60+ hours a week coding for it. Ergo, they are less likely to be better products than ones that are given away for free, relying solely on volunteer work.

There are too many non sequiturs in this claim...
The price of a product does not necessarily indicate the financial backing behind a product. Just because a product is free doesn't mean it relies solely on volunteer work.
Developers who are getting paid do not necessarily produce better work than developers working for other reasons.
Developers working on a product for non-monetary are not necessarily volunteering their efforts. There are many other reasons for doing so.
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post #61 of 71
2/10/10 at 4:59pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Isomorphic View Post

Speed is fine and all, but I feel like I'm paying to beta-test Parallels' product for them. I use Fusion when I want to get work done.

Agreed

Quote:
Originally Posted by curtwilliams View Post

I tried Parallels because I read it was faster. But I had a lot of problems and got really terrible support. Finally gave up on them and went back to Fusion. Fusion works well.

I started with Parallels when I was new to Mac's. At the time everyone I knew said thats what you want to use. That was with version 2. I upgraded to three with little trouble, things went bad when I upgraded to 4. I had serious USB issues (wouldn't work at all) and I gave up and went to Fusion. When I'm in WIndows I'm either doing work or school stuff. For the relatively short amount of time I'm in the Windows environment I'm not spending anymore time searching for a better experience. On paper the new versions might be quicker and better but I'm not taking my time to experiment.

Quote:
Originally Posted by zunx View Post

To control USB-based devices from Windows applications from the Mac, the only viable solution os Fusion. Parallels simply does not deliver.

Agreed, as stated above.

Quote:
Originally Posted by FineTunes View Post

I have to agree with the sheff and ghostface's posts. Currently running Fusion 2 and Windows XP so I can run Office 2007 on my 17" uMBP 2.93 GHz with a 256GB SSD. When I did the research, Fusion 2 had a slight edge over Parallel 4. Although it seems that a lot of comments for each was a matter of personal preference to the users. I don't plan on upgrading to either Fusion 3 or Parallel 5, if it works and it's not broke then why switch. Also staying with Windows XP and Office 2007.

As for VirtualBox, I'm sure that they have made improvements over the last year, but when I was reading which to go with, they were dead last and had some problems.

I too had the same issues with VirtualBox when I looked at them before going to Fusion 2. I think if I come to a point where I need to upgrade Fusion, I'd probably look at VirtualBox one more time.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Toyin View Post

Parallels naysayers remind me of the VW naysayers. Claiming that "VW's have electrical problems" based on old history.

I'm a long-time VW owner and Parallels naysayer. Currently loving my Passat 5.5 with 4-Motion in the two feet of snow we have here. Looks like I have issues!
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post #62 of 71
2/10/10 at 5:37pm
USB issues?? I've never had any USB issues with Parallels. In fact Parallels had the option to designate which devices work with each OS before Fusion. I remember having to tell Fusion every time I connected my Suunto watch (windows only) that I wanted it to open in Windows.

Passat 4-motion eh? I was a heartbeat away from getting the CC 4-motion but opted for 305hp nsf sh-awd on the Acura TL ;-)
-Toyin
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post #63 of 71
2/10/10 at 6:52pm
I have all three. I have run Fusions since 1.0, and Parallels since 4.0. My day job is managing a very large VMware ESX Enterprise environment, so I know VMware products inside and out, and do love them. However these results on a Mac are dead on.

I have never had a show stopper with any of them. I do know or have read that Parallels 3.0 was buggy and that people that updraded over the top of 3 to 4 had problems as well. For me Para 4.0 ran great, faster than even version 3.0 of Fusion. 5.0 is just that much better. My test XP vm boots super quick, quicker than any PC I have used.

Fusion was never really bad, just odd stuff like railing CPU's when the VM was doing NOTHING. Unity on my Macbook Unibody is really slow especially with Aero on in a Win 7 VM. Its faster if you turn on classic mode but Para 5 with Aero in Cohesion is way faster and smoother. Fusion has alot of screen tearing with Unity. Full screen both run well, but Para is faster.

Para just has so many little nice features that Fusion does not have. Cloning, cloning to template, tweaking of many more features, way better sharing between OS X and VM. Plug in a USB device and Para will prompt you "Mac or VM".

For whom ever said Fusion is more mature, does not know what they are talking about. Fusion is newer on the Mac, Parallels has been around longer.

Virtual Box is very nice to be honest, especially for a free product. Its vmotion/transporter feature is simply amazing for a free product. The fact that its basically the same across PC/Mac/Linux is also very nice. I dont like that task bar in Unity mode (or whatever its called).

IMHO on a Mac I would go with Parallels, VB, and Fusion in that order. I also would NEVER upgrade any of these products. I would remove the old version, save my VM's and install the new versions after a reboot.
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post #64 of 71
2/10/10 at 6:55pm
Forgot to add, while VB is free, the other two often run specials where they are less than $50 which is not bad at all.
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post #65 of 71
2/10/10 at 8:40pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by webraider View Post

What about Crossover for the Mac? This is the most interesting of all the solutions. You don't even need windows to run programs. I would be interested in seeing a new review of it.

Crossover for the Mac is simply a commercial version of WINE for which the mac version is still being updated by Mike Kronenberg under the name WIneBottler

WINE is still majorly limited compared to a virtual machine despite the improvements and can require a lot of tweaking to get some programs to simply run.
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post #66 of 71
2/10/10 at 8:56pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism View Post

Products that don't have a strong financial backing don't have a structure for good developers to spend 60+ hours a week coding for it. Ergo, they are less likely to be better products than ones that are given away for free, relying solely on volunteer work.

That is true up to a point. Plenty of counter examples of free but good quality programs abound.

OpenOffice and its Mac sister Neo Office immediately comes to mind. OpenArena in the FPS gaming genre is another.

Then you have the fact that about every major browser you can think of is free.

Finally there is Darwin-the core of Apple own MacOS.

Just because it it is free doesn't mean that the quality is any less than commercial products. Sturgeon's Law is just as applicable to commercial software as it is to free stuff.

Besides some commercial products never see the light of day even after years of development. Can you say Duke Nukem Forever? I knew you could.

Then you have the commercial stuff that basically has you as beta tester (or given the quality perhaps that should be alpha tester). Age of Conan fits very nicely in this category.
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post #67 of 71
2/11/10 at 12:53am
Quote:
Originally Posted by bettieblue View Post

I have all three. I have run Fusions since 1.0, and Parallels since 4.0. My day job is managing a very large VMware ESX Enterprise environment, so I know VMware products inside and out, and do love them. However these results on a Mac are dead on.

I have never had a show stopper with any of them. I do know or have read that Parallels 3.0 was buggy and that people that updraded over the top of 3 to 4 had problems as well. For me Para 4.0 ran great, faster than even version 3.0 of Fusion. 5.0 is just that much better. My test XP vm boots super quick, quicker than any PC I have used.

Fusion was never really bad, just odd stuff like railing CPU's when the VM was doing NOTHING. Unity on my Macbook Unibody is really slow especially with Aero on in a Win 7 VM. Its faster if you turn on classic mode but Para 5 with Aero in Cohesion is way faster and smoother. Fusion has alot of screen tearing with Unity. Full screen both run well, but Para is faster.

Para just has so many little nice features that Fusion does not have. Cloning, cloning to template, tweaking of many more features, way better sharing between OS X and VM. Plug in a USB device and Para will prompt you "Mac or VM".

For whom ever said Fusion is more mature, does not know what they are talking about. Fusion is newer on the Mac, Parallels has been around longer.

Virtual Box is very nice to be honest, especially for a free product. Its vmotion/transporter feature is simply amazing for a free product. The fact that its basically the same across PC/Mac/Linux is also very nice. I dont like that task bar in Unity mode (or whatever its called).

IMHO on a Mac I would go with Parallels, VB, and Fusion in that order. I also would NEVER upgrade any of these products. I would remove the old version, save my VM's and install the new versions after a reboot.

Hi bettieblue,

I've got a quick question, if you don't mind.

To free-up some hard drive space on my laptop, I plan to move a few infrequently used virtual machines I keep solely for troubleshooting and tech support reference purposes to an external hard drive; then, when needed, I'll open and run one of them from the external drive (via 1394b).

In this scenario, do you know if one virtualization product runs better than the other?

Thanks for any heads-up you might have.



ps - I'm choked they shutdown the 303rd Logistical Studies Group.
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post #68 of 71
2/11/10 at 1:11am
Quote:
Originally Posted by columbus View Post

Can VirtualBox virtualise a Bootcamp partition?

I'm on VMWare 2 still, because I got a cheap offer for 1 and a free upgrade to 2.

To be honest, it does everything I need. I tried a demo of three, but having Aero there just seemed to make everything slower. I can live without it.

No, VirtualBox can't virtualize a Bootcamp windows-partition. It would be nice though, and the development is going in such a pace that it wouldn't surprise me when it will support it in the near future.
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post #69 of 71
2/11/10 at 1:16am
Quote:
Originally Posted by bettieblue View Post

I have all three. I have run Fusions since 1.0, and Parallels since 4.0. My day job is managing a very large VMware ESX Enterprise environment, so I know VMware products inside and out, and do love them. However these results on a Mac are dead on.

I have never had a show stopper with any of them. I do know or have read that Parallels 3.0 was buggy and that people that updraded over the top of 3 to 4 had problems as well. For me Para 4.0 ran great, faster than even version 3.0 of Fusion. 5.0 is just that much better. My test XP vm boots super quick, quicker than any PC I have used.

Fusion was never really bad, just odd stuff like railing CPU's when the VM was doing NOTHING. Unity on my Macbook Unibody is really slow especially with Aero on in a Win 7 VM. Its faster if you turn on classic mode but Para 5 with Aero in Cohesion is way faster and smoother. Fusion has alot of screen tearing with Unity. Full screen both run well, but Para is faster.

Para just has so many little nice features that Fusion does not have. Cloning, cloning to template, tweaking of many more features, way better sharing between OS X and VM. Plug in a USB device and Para will prompt you "Mac or VM".

For whom ever said Fusion is more mature, does not know what they are talking about. Fusion is newer on the Mac, Parallels has been around longer.

Virtual Box is very nice to be honest, especially for a free product. Its vmotion/transporter feature is simply amazing for a free product. The fact that its basically the same across PC/Mac/Linux is also very nice. I dont like that task bar in Unity mode (or whatever its called).

IMHO on a Mac I would go with Parallels, VB, and Fusion in that order. I also would NEVER upgrade any of these products. I would remove the old version, save my VM's and install the new versions after a reboot.

My windows XP installation in VirtualBox takes 20 seconds to boot! And that didn't change in time!
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post #70 of 71
2/11/10 at 12:17pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Toyin View Post

USB issues?? I've never had any USB issues with Parallels. In fact Parallels had the option to designate which devices work with each OS before Fusion. I remember having to tell Fusion every time I connected my Suunto watch (windows only) that I wanted it to open in Windows.

Passat 4-motion eh? I was a heartbeat away from getting the CC 4-motion but opted for 305hp nsf sh-awd on the Acura TL ;-)

Acura, what a boring car, every time you turn the key the car starts and runs like a champ. I prefer to live life on the wild side. You never know what's going to happen when you try start a VW.
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post #71 of 71
2/11/10 at 4:54pm
I have only used Parallels and Fusion in trial mode. Okay, but not without troubles. I like VirtualBox. Something as simple as Windows Solitaire does not work. I use VB in both Mac OS Leopard and Windows 7 RC, via BootCamp. VB is an all-around better experience with Windows as the Host OS. It looks better in Windows, at least for me. There is an issue with audio running slow with most distros of Ubuntu. It is frequent when Mac OS is the Host OS. Once in a very blue moon, it happens with Windows as the Host OS.
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