VMware Fusion 3 or Parallels Desktop 5

[hansie]

Hi, which of the two Virtual Machines is the most useable for me. I would like to do the folowing things with Windows 7:

* Look how my site looks under Internet Explorer.
* Use Microsoft Office 2007.
* Play games from the Orange Box via Steam.

Which one should i take: VMware Fusion or Parallels Desktop?

 

[wrldwzrd89]

Testing your site on IE and using MS Office 2007 will work just fine on either. Playing games, though, will have varying results. Keep in mind that both Parallels 5 and VMware 3 are limited to DirectX 9.0EX (9.0c) support, and don't support DX10 or 11 yet.

 

[hansie]

I just saw at wikipedia that the orange box only needs directx 8. So that woul'n't be a real problem I think. Only the problem, at which VM the Orange Box is going to run better?

 

[maflynn]

If you're wanting to play games, then I recommend that you use Bootcamp over any virtual solution. If you're still intent on using virtual programs, parallels provides the best performance for games, but at a cost of stability.

That is vmware is a more stable product then parallels.

 

[hansie]

@maflynn:
so you recommend Parallels Desktop 5 for me?

 

[Darth.Titan]

Both Parallels and Fusion have free trials available. Just download and try them both.

Decide for yourself which you think suits your needs.