VMware launches Fusion 4 with 90 new features including Lion support - Page 2

That's not new with this release (at least not for the server Mac OSes hosting). And you can only run virtual OS X on an OS X computer (ie, only on a Mac). That is unlikely to change, especially when Apple makes all their money on hardware sales.


True, but I suspect in that case I'd end up just staying booted in SL anyway. Too much hassle to be going back and forth and not enough benefit in Lion to justify rebooting again to get back to it.

Use promo code "fusion20" to upgrade for $39.99.

Even servers may still need native support for hardware such as Fibre Channel cards and video cards.

Not sure why this is a problem. It's easy to turn off all these features and run Windows isolated.

I will retry it. I updated to Lion with a Windows VM already in place and had a lot of problems.Thanks.

No it's not. It's only cheaper NOW but come end of year it's more expensive.

Meanwhile Parallels is $49.99 for existing users whereas as the previous poster noted there doesn't seem to be any upgrade pricing for VMWare.

I'll try VMWare 4 until the demo runs out but I'm picking as I've done previously Parallels will be the better option and I'll gravitate towards that.

I prefer Coherance mode in Parallels to Unity. People may claim it's bloatware but the fact I can copy and paste and not have to deal with the crappy Windows bar it is a HUGE plus and NOT a gimmick as some claim.

Unity feels wrong for some reason to me.

Whinge whinge whinge.

How long ago was the last upgrade? A year or so ago? Meanwhile there has been huge amounts of development gone into Parallels 7 and VMWare Fusion 4. It's not a minor update and when people get that into their skulls maybe they will calm down a bit about the pricing. It costs about $65(NZ) for me and I'm more than happy with that a year for the amount of work I use Parallels for.

If you feel it isn't worth it then download the inferior VirtualBox for free and use that instead. It's not like you don't have choice.

Meanwhile us power users will choose a product that does everything we need and more thank you very much.

On 10.7.1 VMWare Fusion 3 has been reasonable with Windows7 64bit. If I need to use Windows for any reason in my next work I'll consider upgrading to Fusion 4. I switched to VMWare a while back so I'll just stick with it.

Pity it's not on the App Store though.

Why choose Parallels or Fusion when VirtualBox is free? I have just loaded it but haven't got Windows7 onto it yet. I am not too experienced but when I look at the outlay then upgrade costs of the others - by whatever offers they use - I can't see how they make sense. Or is Virtual Box that bad?

When Lion came out and I had to move from Parallels 4, it was cheaper to go Fusion 3 with the competitor upgrade from VMWare ($20) than it was to upgrade to Parallels 6 ($40) - and it was obvious 7 was coming because they offered upgrade insurance for some extra bucks ($20 I think but can't remember).

I would have gone with Virtual Box for free, but the converted VM (using VMWare) wouldn't boot in VB and I don't have the motivation to for yet another windows installation!

I'm going try to find out if I get Fusion 4 free as my upgrade was within the time limits.

"Availability and Pricing

VMware Fusion 4 is available until the end of the year for a promotional price of only $49.99. The suggested retail price for VMware Fusion 4 is $79.99. Customers who have purchased VMware Fusion 3 on or after July 20, 2011 are eligible for an electronic upgrade to VMware Fusion 4 at no additional cost."

Can't see any link on the VMWare site/store related to how to get the free upgrade if you purchased after July 20. Anyone have any further details?

Virtual Box is very good, but I built my VMs a long time ago, before it was available). They have all kinds of developer software installed and it would be a long hair-pulling exercise to rebuild them (one of the benefits of VMs is you don't have to keep rebuilding machines).

There is a technique for converting Parallels machines, via VMWare, to make them Virtual Box compatible, but the converted machine freezes on startup.

If you're building a VM from scratch, no reason not to give Virtual Box a go for free.

-Najinsky

After some good ol' Google searching, I found this:

https://www.vmware.com/support/produ....html#upgrades

I am not very experienced in this but can someone explain what I am missing. There seems to be a choice between Paralles and Fusion which both will cost in terms of initial outlay and ongoing upgrades. Then there is the free alternative of VirtualBox. Why should I pay when I can get a recognised product which does the same thing for substantially less ie nil. What is wrong with VirtualBox for there even to be a decsion?
Sorry for being simple but it usually works for me.

Parallels and Fusion offer some integration features not found in VirtualBox. My experience with Fusion is pretty old so I can't speak to its features (I found it to be horrendously buggy back in the day, while my experience with Parallels has always been good), but I can speak to some of what Parallels offers...

With Parallels you can choose which applications (Windows or Mac) open certain files. If you have Office for Windows but not for Mac, you can tell Parallels to always open Office documents using Office for Windows - meaning you can double-click on a Mac .doc file, or click a XLS attachment in Mail.app and Parallels will automatically fire up the corresponding Windows application. Likewise you can double-click a file in your Windows VM and it will be opened using a Mac application (if you choose to do so). You can also right-click on documents in either guest or host operating systems and choose which application (under either guest or host OS) to open the document with.

With Parallels you can drag files back and forth between OSX Finder windows and Windows Explorer windows to move/copy files between guest and host operating systems. It should be noted that, while this adds a level of convenience, it does so by opening up your host operating system to the guest. As such, if your guest OS (such as, say, Windows) becomes infected with a virus, that virus potentially has access to the files on the host operating system (but only if you enable this integration).

Parallels most likely has better driver support, meaning graphics performance is no doubt better.

Parallels offers "MacView" which makes your Windows applications look almost like Mac windows (the controls all take on the look of Mac controls, although each window has its own menu bar, just as in Windows). The Start Menu takes on a Mac appearance as well. This is just eye candy, and I've found that performance suffers in this mode. Besides, it's nothing more than lipstick on a pig.

In Coherence mode, individual windows not only blend in with Mac windows, but they behave well in Spaces. I'm not sure if VirtualBox windows behave this well.

If these features are not important to you (and admittedly some of them can be easily worked around in VirtualBox - shared files for example, as your Mac folders can be easily shared with your guest OS in VirtualBox), then VirtualBox is a very fine alternative. Parallels and VMWare also offer technical support with their products. VirtualBox is community supported.

One big advantage of VirtualBox over Parallels is that VirtualBox VMs can be moved between Mac, Windows, and Linux hosts. VMWare VMs can also be shared, but my experience with using a VM on Fusion that had been created under VMWare Workstation for Windows was less than spectacular.

Another advantage is one that you already know of: VirtualBox is free. VMWare does offer Server for free, but that edition does not run on OSX.

Me too, no problems at all.

Appreciated. It says those who bought it will get a new serial by email. I haven't received such an mail. I don't expect I qualify, and there was probably some small print somewhere when I bought the competitive upgrade, but the wording only refers to when it was bought, not how, and whichever way I look at it, I bought it in August, prior to which I was a Parallels user, so I'll pursue it via email. Worth a try.

Thanks,
-Najinsky