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Parallels 9 vs. Fusion 6 (Merged)
- Thread starter bsmr
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This is exactly why I uninstalled PD9 (even though I got a free license) and installed Fusion 6.
You stated what you want to do and both offerings will do it reasonably well.
Either get the cheaper one or go by what feels easiest to work with. I use both and candidly, for my needs they both accomplish the tasks at hand (5 applications plus access to DVD/Blu Ray external player via FW800).
Either get the cheaper one or go by what feels easiest to work with. I use both and candidly, for my needs they both accomplish the tasks at hand (5 applications plus access to DVD/Blu Ray external player via FW800).
Ah, true. Hadn't looked at that topic since mid-September when the moaning about it on various forums got too much even for me. Still, the fact that Parallels is prepared to pull tricks like this means you should wait before rushing to upgrade, just in case.
Parallels 8 reportedly had much lower battery usage than fusion 5 (mactech article jan 2013).
Are there any comparisons of Fusion 6 and Parallels 9 that analyse battery usage?
Is it typical of mactech to wait until January before publishing their analysis?
Are there any comparisons of Fusion 6 and Parallels 9 that analyse battery usage?
Is it typical of mactech to wait until January before publishing their analysis?
I'm using Parallels 9, because it came free with my new iMac 2013. I'm a new Mac user as of last Monday. I had to install Windows 7 because I sell Windows based software and I need to demonstrate via webinars.
My whole experience so far setting up Windows 7 and Parallels has been great! Everything works as if it was my old PC.
I had one problem with installing Acrobat Reader and Flash Player, they would not install via Adobe downloader. A helpful member here told me I should down load the complete installation packages. I did that and everything is installed and running just like my old PC. BTW the PC is for sale now. Just kidding.
My whole experience so far setting up Windows 7 and Parallels has been great! Everything works as if it was my old PC.
I had one problem with installing Acrobat Reader and Flash Player, they would not install via Adobe downloader. A helpful member here told me I should down load the complete installation packages. I did that and everything is installed and running just like my old PC. BTW the PC is for sale now. Just kidding.
I strongly recommend against using parallels. I used Parallels 7 and was not too unhappy with it, but when I wanted to upgrade to 9 those money grubbing morons wanted to cheat me and stealthily change the price int heir shop.
On their main page they claim that an upgrade costs $50, a full version $80. But in the shop when you want to check out, they increase the price to $72.43 and $115.90 respective!
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On their main page they claim that an upgrade costs $50, a full version $80. But in the shop when you want to check out, they increase the price to $72.43 and $115.90 respective!
The first image shows the upgrade price, the second shows the normal (aka full) version. When I hit the "upgrade" button that says 49.99 euro it will take me to the shopping cart where it lists "Parallels Desktop 9 for Mac Upgrade" as well as it being 49.99 euro. Something probably went wrong in your case. Maybe something on their side, or something on your side (certain browser plugins/extensions perhaps).
I've seen the VMware website do strange things like that as well. Using an alternative browser did help (it is caused by one of the extensions I use; the other browser doesn't have that extension).
I've upgraded my old Fusion 4 license to Fusion 6 Pro (I also have another license which is for Fusion 5 Pro; just wanted to keep that). First I test drove Fusion 6 and it ran a bit smoother than Fusion 5 did on my Mavericks Macs. Problems with my tablet were gone and the OS X vm's randomly freezing up seems to have disappeared too. Also liked the linked clones feature since it saves me diskspace yet I can still test certain scenarios with my vm's (it's actually better than using snapshots because they'll eat up space, even more so after you delete them; now I delete the entire clone and I get all of the used diskspace back). VMware is currently giving a discount of 35% so upgrading was a quickly made decision
I've seen the VMware website do strange things like that as well. Using an alternative browser did help (it is caused by one of the extensions I use; the other browser doesn't have that extension).
I've upgraded my old Fusion 4 license to Fusion 6 Pro (I also have another license which is for Fusion 5 Pro; just wanted to keep that). First I test drove Fusion 6 and it ran a bit smoother than Fusion 5 did on my Mavericks Macs. Problems with my tablet were gone and the OS X vm's randomly freezing up seems to have disappeared too. Also liked the linked clones feature since it saves me diskspace yet I can still test certain scenarios with my vm's (it's actually better than using snapshots because they'll eat up space, even more so after you delete them; now I delete the entire clone and I get all of the used diskspace back). VMware is currently giving a discount of 35% so upgrading was a quickly made decision
I am using Parallels, never seen an ad, where have you seen those?
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Yes, but without should be the default, this is force-feeding.
http://forum.parallels.com/showthread.php?258991-Turn-off-ads
http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=1163771
http://www.redmondpie.com/parallels...ull-support-for-retina-display-and-windows-8/
Just google it and you'll see a lot of hits. I can't speak for the current version but there has been a lot of discussion over the net about Parallels using advertisements in their commercial app.
It is not really a problem. The price in dollars is without any taxes. The price in Euro is with all those taxes (it's not just VAT!). That's just the difference between pricing in the US and EU (and yes we do pay a lot of taxes when buying products, that's just how things work in the EU).
The website automatically redirects you to the site for the country you're in currently. That is usually done because of legal stuff (in the EU listing prices incl. taxes is mandatory if you are aiming at consumers for example).
Anyway, for this you are pointing your finger in the wrong direction. Point it at your own government, they are to blame, not Parallels.
Fusion is on sale today.
One issue with fusion 6 is if you have a retina display it scales windows in unity mode too large. It's fine with full screen and windowed mode.
The over scaling happens if you have retina mode on and windows scaling set at 150% etc.
Not a big deal I just don't use unity mode.
Some users also report the cpu being maxed out even when the guest is idle ...
One issue with fusion 6 is if you have a retina display it scales windows in unity mode too large. It's fine with full screen and windowed mode.
The over scaling happens if you have retina mode on and windows scaling set at 150% etc.
Not a big deal I just don't use unity mode.
Some users also report the cpu being maxed out even when the guest is idle ...
No. What has happened is that the check-for-updates-on-start feature has suffered a bit of mission creep and periodically tells you about Parallels' latest amazing offer for antivirus software or suchlike. Not cool - but not the showstopper some people make out.
When thou buyeth the upgrade, know thou that Parallels Access is a turkey and thrice deny the offer (yea even with the free trial for nine score days and nine score nights) and on the third denial the website shalt finally recognise thy righteousness and deliver unto thee a copy of Parallels desktop unencumbered by Access.
US Prices exclude sales tax.
EU prices include VAT, which is typically 19-20%.
I paid £34.99 including 19% VAT which is actually a tad less than $49 at today's rate.
Switzerland has more taxes than just VAT like any other country in the world. You need to add ALL taxes, not just VAT. Take a look at other foreign companies as well. Apple has lower prices in the USA than they have in the UK, EU, Switzerland and so on.
This is just basic economics. Again, this is your governments fault (or yours since you vote for them).
the main reason that I stay with Vmware is so that I can continue to test and play with things like vsphere, which is frequently used in my profession (IT Pro). I also just like the vmware interface better.
But as others have said, performance is basically the same and features are very similar as well.
But as others have said, performance is basically the same and features are very similar as well.
My experience with Parallels is from several years back. Maybe Parallels 3 or 4, I can't remember exactly. I found that it tried to integrate the Windows virtual machine too much with OS X with no easy way to turn it off. So, for example, if I right click on a file in OS X and went to "Open with", I would be presented with like 30 Windows apps to open that file with. It was extremely annoying and ROYAL pain to turn off.
When I finally had enough and wanted to remove Parallels entirely, I found that it installed crap everywhere. It ended up messing up my Windows virtual machine enough that I needed a total re-install.
When I finally managed to get rid of any trace of Parallels, I moved on to Fusion and have not looked back. It allows me to easily sandbox the virtual machine, which is exactly what I want. It performs well and is stable.
I have never attempted to game in either Parallels or Fusion, so I can not comment on how either does in this regard. I leave my computer on 24/7 and I have noticed that after being active for a stretch, Fusion does use a bit over 100% CPU for no apparent, good reason. This is on a Mac Pro, so I have lots of cores and it's not really a problem for me.
When I finally had enough and wanted to remove Parallels entirely, I found that it installed crap everywhere. It ended up messing up my Windows virtual machine enough that I needed a total re-install.
When I finally managed to get rid of any trace of Parallels, I moved on to Fusion and have not looked back. It allows me to easily sandbox the virtual machine, which is exactly what I want. It performs well and is stable.
I have never attempted to game in either Parallels or Fusion, so I can not comment on how either does in this regard. I leave my computer on 24/7 and I have noticed that after being active for a stretch, Fusion does use a bit over 100% CPU for no apparent, good reason. This is on a Mac Pro, so I have lots of cores and it's not really a problem for me.
Nope. I just bought VMWare Fusion, which came to around 44$, INCLUDING the 8% sales tax. For a full version. (Or an updated version from Parallels
. Much cheaper than the 72$ Overpriced lying scumbags from parallels ask for an update. Or the 116$ they want for the full version.The price hike has NOTHING to do with the government, or taxes, or import duties, or anything like that. It's purely the fault of the parallels people that ask more money from me than anyone else. No other company does that. Not a single one (That I have tried to buy from)
Can't go wrong with Fusion.
Parallels has its charms, but in my testing just didn't work as well.
And I'm still annoyed by that company's total lack of support of me back when I was a customer of theirs on the Windows platform. Not that VMWare is any sterling paragon of customer service, but my Parallels experience ranks among my very worst customer experiences ever.
Parallels has its charms, but in my testing just didn't work as well.
And I'm still annoyed by that company's total lack of support of me back when I was a customer of theirs on the Windows platform. Not that VMWare is any sterling paragon of customer service, but my Parallels experience ranks among my very worst customer experiences ever.
Funny you should say that because VMware applies the exact same tactics as Parallels does just like Apple and many many more
The price you talk about is solely taxes, etc. etc. that has been determined by your government that your people voted for. You can keep telling yourself lies but this is how things work around the world. Switzerland is no exception to this at all!Btw, as of Fusion 6 you can actually upgrade. Before that you couldn't (Fusion 4) or could to the more expensive version (Fusion 5; Fusion 5 Pro was the only thing that you could upgrade too; Fusion 5 was a full version). There were a lot of complaints about this in the VMware forums (let me not mention Fusion 3 and performance issues...it was 1 big flamewar at the time with customers threatening to go to Parallels and others wanting their money back) and there are complaints about Fusion 6 too, similar to Parallels 9: you pay a lot for something that is no more than 5.1 (or 8.1 in case of Parallels).
Yet I upgraded to Fusion 6 Pro due to the linked clones feature and the fact that it ran fine on my Mavericks Macs with a Wacom tablet (Fusion 5 had some issues with that combination which seems to have disappeared in version 6).
@sjinsjca: same experience here: Fusion just seems to work a bit better but that is mostly due to the fact that I run non-Windows systems. Parallels is not the right candidate for running those. If Windows is the only thing you want to run then by all means go for Parallels. Also, since VMware became part of EC2 there seems to be a decline in service. Before the takeover they were quite technical with all sorts of documents, in the forums, etc. but now it is more management & marketing with phrases like "we do not comment on future features in our products", "I am not allowed to discuss these things". Not to mention their pricing... (the ESXi 5 pricing was a big joke and they reversed it with 5.1 and 5.5). Quite sad