In the discussion of VMWare Fusion vs. Parallels, why is no one mentioning that Fusion is a one-time purchase whilst Parallels is subscription only?
That’s essentially true, but VMWare generally releases an upgrade whenever macOS has a major change, i.e., yearly, to take advantage of new features in macOS and to throw in a few new features of their own. But you can keep using the previous version without any reduction in functionality.
The bigger thing worth mentioning is that you can test drive Parallels for free for 14-days and you can use VMWare Fusion Player for non-commercial use indefinitely for free. The “free” version of Fusion is not a stripped down version either. It’s equivalent to the Pro version of VMWare Workstation for Windows because it supports snapshots, which you have to pay for on Windows.
The bottom line is that anyone can test drive either of these tools, or the free VirtualBox, for free. The only opinion that matters is your own and how something works in your environment, on your machine, serving your needs. These tools all basically do the same thing but some have more or fewer bells and whistles that may or may not matter to you.
The practical limits with these tools are that you need to have a host machine with decent processing, memory, and storage. My 10 year old iMac i7 with 32 GB RAM and external SSD more than suffices for my personal needs. Another limitation is when you are creating Windows VMs, you’ll need licenses for those VMs unless you can live with the subtle limitations of running non-activated copies of Windows. Linux and Mac VMs don’t have this issue.
Finally, at least while BootCamp was still an option, BootCamp could still be a better option than using a hypervisor. I have an older MacBook Pro that has plenty of storage space but only 8 GB of RAM. It was better for me to use BootCamp, partition the storage between Mac and Windows, and boot into either Windows or Mac because both OS’s would have access to the full 8 GB of memory rather than having to share it at the same time, which is the case with virtual machines. It’s all about using the right tool for the right job, and more specifically for the job that you have to perform. If you can try-it before you buy-it, all the better.
Re: "Also, users can't currently create macOS-based virtual machines, though VMWare is looking into that for the future."
I assume this only refers to the technology preview edition of Fusion. All current and prior versions of Fusion 12.x absolutely support creating and running macOS/OS X virtual machines. I use Fusion 12.x on my Intel iMac to run the last version of macOS that supported 32-bit apps. i.e., Mojave (10.14) as well as Windows 10 Pro and the latest version of Linux Mint. The free (for non-commercial use) version of VMWare Fusion Player is an amazingly useful and reliable tool.
They're talking about the M-crap processors, not the far better Intel Macs.
I think we’ve found proof of parallel universes
That's just darkvader being darkvader. However, some of us do wish he was on a parallel universe and left ours alone!
I wish AI and others would write clarify Windows 11 compatibility in a clearer way.
They are referring to Windows 11 ARM right? VMware Fusion will NOT bring Windows 11x64 to ASi Macs right?
You are right, sadly. However, I am currently running ARM based windows 10, on Parallels on my new M2 Air. On this windows 10 I have installed my accounting package (was Peachtree now its SAGE) which is Intel x86. Windows 10 emulator is taking care of it. Result - Sage accounting is running very well. Seemingly no slower than it ran on a native Intel Windows PC.
Fine for a one person shop? But not in a company with a IT department from hell. However it would be useful for retrieving/converting files.
They are referring to Windows 11 ARM right? VMware Fusion will NOT bring Windows 11x64 to ASi Macs right?
Oh come on! If the headline, or the story clearly and concisely said that, you wouldn't click!
Clicks = eyeballs = revenue
Some things don't need to be said, there was no expectation that VMWare would bring x86/64 emulation of the OS. It's very slow to run this, other software does this and is about 10x slower than native and without graphics acceleration. This will run all sorts of x86/64 OSes on M1 but the speed isn't suitable for a commercial product:
Comments
The bigger thing worth mentioning is that you can test drive Parallels for free for 14-days and you can use VMWare Fusion Player for non-commercial use indefinitely for free. The “free” version of Fusion is not a stripped down version either. It’s equivalent to the Pro version of VMWare Workstation for Windows because it supports snapshots, which you have to pay for on Windows.
The bottom line is that anyone can test drive either of these tools, or the free VirtualBox, for free. The only opinion that matters is your own and how something works in your environment, on your machine, serving your needs. These tools all basically do the same thing but some have more or fewer bells and whistles that may or may not matter to you.
The practical limits with these tools are that you need to have a host machine with decent processing, memory, and storage. My 10 year old iMac i7 with 32 GB RAM and external SSD more than suffices for my personal needs. Another limitation is when you are creating Windows VMs, you’ll need licenses for those VMs unless you can live with the subtle limitations of running non-activated copies of Windows. Linux and Mac VMs don’t have this issue.
Finally, at least while BootCamp was still an option, BootCamp could still be a better option than using a hypervisor. I have an older MacBook Pro that has plenty of storage space but only 8 GB of RAM. It was better for me to use BootCamp, partition the storage between Mac and Windows, and boot into either Windows or Mac because both OS’s would have access to the full 8 GB of memory rather than having to share it at the same time, which is the case with virtual machines. It’s all about using the right tool for the right job, and more specifically for the job that you have to perform. If you can try-it before you buy-it, all the better.
Fine for a one person shop? But not in a company with a IT department from hell. However it would be useful for retrieving/converting files.
Clicks = eyeballs = revenue
https://mac.getutm.app
However x86/64 emulation works inside the ARM Windows OS with hardware acceleration so x64 software runs like how x86 Mac software runs on M1.
https://mspoweruser.com/x64-emulation-windows-11-on-arm-pcs/