In a nutshell,
I've long been curious about Parallels.
Can anyone tell me how it works vs Bootcamp.
Most of native performance?
Can you work via 'coherence' to use your 'Windows' apps via the Mac dock?
If I have Bootcamp set up...can Parallels access my Windows apps whilst I'm still in the Mac?
GPU performance decent..?
VM vs. running directly on the hardware (Bootcamp), there's a decent speed improvement for the latter, but that's more critical for CPU/GPU intensive apps (design, CAD, games).
When you're in Bootcamp, well, you're running fully dedicated Windows machine, no access to MacOS services (I still don't even think access to the APFS filesystem ...). So if you prefer your primary computing platform to be MacOS, and want access to all those services/resources, a VM is the way to go. Otherwise you might have to use cloud storage, a common browser platform (or a bookmark sync solution, etc.), think if it like two physical computers that can't run at the same time (so if you find yourself in need of something on the Mac, it's a reboot ...)
Coherence mode removes the Windows OS window (that normally constrains apps running in the VM), and let's them float in their own native Windows window
, if they're minimized, they're down on the Dock, there's a popout Start Menu available in MacOS, it's pretty well integrated - it's the mode I use 99% of the time, as I like have the couple of Windows apps I use across multiple displays, co-minlged with Mac apps (productivity [mail, calendar, Chrome], development [XCode, Postman], etc.).
VMs also have the advantage of just being a large file sitting on your MacOS (they run fine on a [fast] external drive as well). That means, they're easily backed up, restored/recovered from the Mac.
This question:
If I have Bootcamp set up...can Parallels access my Windows apps whilst I'm still in the Mac?
Not 100% clear on what you're asking, but I'll point out a few things:
Bootcamp is some support files and a dedicated drive partition, so when it fires up, it has its own allocated space, runs totally self-contained.
A Parallels VM is the app running plus a file that contains both the "machine" configuration and a virtual HDD (that's also accessible even when its not running).
Finally, you can virtualize your Bootcamp partition - so when creating the virtual machine in Parallels, you point it to a Bootcamp partition - what this allows for is running Windows both in a VM (where it operates just like any non-bootcamp VM instance) or, rebooting into a Bootcamp where it operates exactly like a standalone Windows machine.
GPU performance has continuously increased, but I'd assume still less than "native-esque" in Bootcamp, but I don't do anything GPU intensive, so don't have a good answer
kb.parallels.com
