VMware Fusion 11 Released With Support for macOS Mojave, 18-Core iMac Pro, and More

[MacBH928]

Erm, it's a paid upgrade per major release, which may happen every year. The old version still works, you don't have to upgrade. Just because Apple moved to give OS updates for free, doesn't mean every software house has to become a charity too.

Back in the day, Software developers sold via retail shops (harder to reach customers on the opposite of a download link) yet they were sustainable and profitable. AFAIK, only big releases were to paid for which were like a new software not an update.

Now they claim they need to releases yearly updates (mostly same software) to keep on going although user base is much larger (I am sure more people use computers today than 1998). Its fine, but the developer has to understand the consumer does not have infinite pocket either. You pay yearly for VMWare, Apple Music, Netflix, Microsoft Office, Adobe Suite, 1password, Cloud Sotrage... you see where I am going with this.

1 time pay is fine, yearly is a bad business model due to consumer pocket limits. I think 3-5 years upgrade cycle is more acceptable.

HOW DARE THEY OFFER SIGNIFICANT UPDATES WHICH REQUIRE TONS OF WORK AND RESOURCES AND EXPECT TO BE PAID FOR IT!

I'm sure you work for free at your job.

Due to the nature of the internet business model, the developer can code once and sell many times. Ex... they write the software once and sell 1M copies. Thats $79M in this case. It should last them a nice while. You basically continue to make more money but not doing more work as more people opt for your software.

You also have the advantage of writing a little bit more code and releases it as "NEW" upgrade for the same price you sold it when you started from scratch.

Compare that to a car mechanic which can only fix 1 car at a time, and will get paid for fixing each car on its own.

 

[chucker23n1]

Back in the day, Software developers sold via retail shops (harder to reach customers on the opposite of a download link) yet they were sustainable and profitable.

Actually, consumer software has always had massive problems being sustainable. It's only enterprise software that has always found its way, in part due to support contracts.

Now they claim they need to releases yearly updates (mostly same software) to keep on going although user base is much larger (I am sure more people use computers today than 1998).

The user base has grown. The complexity has, too. Also, much unlike in the 1990s, basically all software is perpetually connected to the Internet. This leads to:

• assumptions that it is kept fresh
• higher risk and relevance of security issues
• higher compatibility concerns — even if users don't feel they need to update your software, they did in fact update many underlying components such as the OS. As a result, keeping it up-to-date is basically inevitable. Running an app built for iOS 4 on iOS 12 is impractical.

Its fine, but the developer has to understand the consumer does not have infinite pocket either. You pay yearly for VMWare, Apple Music, Netflix, Microsoft Office, Adobe Suite, 1password, Cloud Sotrage... you see where I am going with this.

1 time pay is fine, yearly is a bad business model due to consumer pocket limits. I think 3-5 years upgrade cycle is more acceptable.

I think where Apple errs regarding subscription models is that the fee has to be constant.

The (enterprise) software I make has you pay the full price once, then ~20% each year, so after five years, you have essentially paid full price again.

A similar 10% or 20% per year model in app stores would be more complicated to understand, but also more affordable.

Buy an up for $40 upfront plus $4 each year.

 

[k27]

Veertu does. They've pivoted to developer stuff, though. I'm not sure they ever bothered with consumer-oriented features like graphics virtualization, file sharing, etc.

AFAIK parallels can use it too.
Probably the free version has to use it to get into the app store.

 

[OldSchoolMacGuy]

Due to the nature of the internet business model, the developer can code once and sell many times. Ex... they write the software once and sell 1M copies. Thats $79M in this case. It should last them a nice while. You basically continue to make more money but not doing more work as more people opt for your software.

You also have the advantage of writing a little bit more code and releases it as "NEW" upgrade for the same price you sold it when you started from scratch.

Compare that to a car mechanic which can only fix 1 car at a time, and will get paid for fixing each car on its own.

They continue to release updates throughout the year which add features and address bugs and other performance issues. You act like they release software and then take a 364 day vacation.

They also provide support at an enterprise level. These things aren't cheap to do.

You sound as if you've never purchased software before.

If you don't see a value in the new version, don't buy it. It's really that simple. No one is forcing you to do so. You can continue to use the old version without issue.

 

[QuentinWilson]

Anyone have experience with migrating an existing Parallels VM to Fusion? From the documentation you should simply be able to open the VM in Fusion and it will make a copy for itself, as far as I understand it. Did anyone here try that and did the new container work without issues?

 

[sharpimage]

Parallels stops working EVERY YEAR.

That is so WRONG. I always upgrade to latest OSX but only upgrade parallels every two years. Works fine. In fact parallels have on occasion even issued a fix to their prior version to make it work with a later OSX.

Every year I run out of date parallels for a period of time on the newer OSX and only usually upgrade later as they only normally allow upgrades from N-1. Never had any issues. One year I was even running on N-2 parallels and still no issues. They don't force you to upgrade and it has never stopped working.

So the myth that parallels force you to upgrade is just a myth.

 

[emembee]

That is so WRONG. I always upgrade to latest OSX but only upgrade parallels every two years. Works fine. In fact parallels have on occasion even issued a fix to their prior version to make it work with a later OSX.

Every year I run out of date parallels for a period of time on the newer OSX and only usually upgrade later as they only normally allow upgrades from N-1. Never had any issues. One year I was even running on N-2 parallels and still no issues. They don't force you to upgrade and it has never stopped working.

So the myth that parallels force you to upgrade is just a myth.

Not sure about this? When I bring up PD it says my sub has expired and I cant open or create a new VM. Maybe I misunderstood.

 

[sharpimage]

Not sure about this? When I bring up PD it says my sub has expired and I cant open or create a new VM. Maybe I misunderstood.

Surely we are talking about perpetual licence versions here rather than subscription? Subscriptions work for a year and get automatic updates to the latest parallels version. If your subscription has lapsed then obviously it won't work irrespective of OSX version.

I only buy the perpetual licence version.

 

[jbryant705]

--DELETE--

 

[chrfr]

Surely we are talking about perpetual licence versions here rather than subscription? Subscriptions work for a year and get automatic updates to the latest parallels version. If your subscription has lapsed then obviously it won't work irrespective of OSX version.

I only buy the perpetual licence version.

Parallels Desktop Pro is only available as a subscription.

 

[jbryant705]

I'm curious to see some comparisons between Parallels 14 and VMware Fusion 11. When I was testing with the tech preview of Fusion to see if I wanted to switch from Parallels I found resuming and suspending in Fusion took up to a minute or two. In Parallels 14, resuming and suspending only takes seconds. That alone was enough for me to stick with Parallels. I don't work a ton in VMs, so when I need to get in I usually need to get in quickly.

 

[BiggAW]

Disappointed to see VMWare is going the same route as Parallels and releasing a new paid upgrade every year. Part of my reason to switch was the precise lack of nickel and dime-ing. Guess I’ll switch to Virtual Box now. Good riddance...

I absolutely HATE the paid upgrades on Parallels, although I'm done with them for now, as Apple has dropped my 2011 MBP from getting software updates.

I've tried VMWare for some classes, and I find it to be rather backwards in how the user interface works, and when I get it running, it seems a lot clunkier than Parallels. Parallels specializes in Mac virtualization, and their performance is incredible. I was able to get 7 VMs running at once on my 2011 MBP this past weekend, and the machine was noticeably slower, but still perfectly usable while they were running.

 

[sjinsjca]

Users can change their virtual disk type to NVMe to increase performance on Macs equipped with SSD storage.

This is very attractive.

But... for a VM running a Windows 7, 8 or 10 client, does changing the virtual disk type trigger a re-activation for Windows? Some virtual-hardware changes do, such as changing the number of processor cores. (Changing virtual hard disk size does not.)

Before I screw things up with my VMs, I'd sure appreciate assurance from someone who has tried this!
[doublepost=1537975725][/doublepost]

Has someone managed to migrate an existing Windows 10 VM using SCSI to NVMe? Windows seems to boot into automatic repair afterwards.

(edit) works now.

That's good to hear, but I'm sure it was a disturbing glitch.

Did Windows need to be re-activated on detecting "new hardware"?
[doublepost=1537975865][/doublepost]

Veertu does. They've pivoted to developer stuff, though. I'm not sure they ever bothered with consumer-oriented features like graphics virtualization, file sharing, etc.

Veertu is amazing stuff. Unfortunately their VM product has been de-emphasized in their business. It's really sad, as Veertu VMs were swift and unbelievably small.

 

[loon3y]

Erm, it's a paid upgrade per major release, which may happen every year. The old version still works, you don't have to upgrade. Just because Apple moved to give OS updates for free, doesn't mean every software house has to become a charity too.

Exactly, being in the software business people its expensive. Developers are expensive, especially if you want to sustain quality.


I sell software to businesses and if there older or not tech savvy they tend to think its easy and say "you don't have any costs, inventory to store, etc, etc"

But to maintain our servers, Cloud servers (PROPERLY, so they have efficient ram and storage), have quality programmers and give them proper salary/raises.

And not to mention most programmers have a higher salary than most of the employees we sell to. I know theres cost of garment, but god how can you waste our time and expect not to pay.

Its not something as simple as cutting a few inches off. We change logic and we can be faced with chargebacks we can never pay back (on huge shipments) if we're not careful, done properly, or have someone that is experienced and have efficient knowledge that is CAPABLE OF CRITICAL THINKING

 

[MrGimper]

Has someone managed to migrate an existing Windows 10 VM using SCSI to NVMe? Windows seems to boot into automatic repair afterwards.

(edit) works now

I'm not entirely sure whether it's because I updated VMware Tools or whether first changing the non-boot volume to NVMe, booting Windows, having the NVMe storage controller appear in Device Manager, shutting down, and only then changing the boot volume as well fixed it. Or both.

I've got the same issue ... I'm assuming that changing the non-boot device to NVMe installed a driver, and then changing your boot device worked as the NVMe driver had been installed.

 

[chucker23n1]

Did Windows need to be re-activated on detecting "new hardware"?

I don't know. This is an enterprise Windows through MPN; I'm never getting activation prompts.

Veertu is amazing stuff. Unfortunately their VM product has been de-emphasized in their business. It's really sad, as Veertu VMs were swift and unbelievably small.

Yeah, I don't think the business model worked out for them. They need to compete with the free(!) VirtualBox on the one side, and the very-high-end enterprise contract VMware on the other; hard to find a niche in between that still pays sufficient money.
[doublepost=1537982790][/doublepost]

I've got the same issue ... I'm assuming that changing the non-boot device to NVMe installed a driver, and then changing your boot device worked as the NVMe driver had been installed.

Yeah, that sounds right. (There was never any notification in Windows, though.)

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

I just bought the last version less than six months ago (June 28th, I believe) and now they want a paid upgrade AGAIN already (free upgrades only for people that bought the last version after August 21st). Screw VMWare!

 

[Skoal]

Glad to see this. 10 was quite nice. Not sure why software devs get hammered for paid upgrades when virtually no other industry does. With 10 I got several upgrades over its lifespan. I guess software is one industry where you are supposed to work for free. Oh well.

 

[Skoal]

Erm, it's a paid upgrade per major release, which may happen every year. The old version still works, you don't have to upgrade. Just because Apple moved to give OS updates for free, doesn't mean every software house has to become a charity too.

THIS! I don’t get why people feel software developers should work for free when virtually no other industry does.

Car dealers don’t give me a free car when I trade mine in. In fact they don’t even offer an upgrade.

 

[robbyx]

I think where Apple errs regarding subscription models is that the fee has to be constant.

The (enterprise) software I make has you pay the full price once, then ~20% each year, so after five years, you have essentially paid full price again.

A similar 10% or 20% per year model in app stores would be more complicated to understand, but also more affordable.

Buy an up for $40 upfront plus $4 each year.

That's a very interesting idea. At first I did not agree, but the more I've thought it through, I think it's an excellent suggestion. If nothing else, the monthly constant payment model shouldn't be the only model. In many ways I think it is the worst model.

The problem with subscription software in my mind is that many developers are overcharging when it comes to the constant pricing model, especially when one considers a person's potential total spend on subscriptions per month. That's what turns people off. They start thinking about paying for all these different apps and services and it feels like death by a thousand cuts.

Yearly payments are far less obnoxious. I use a few services that offer a yearly subscription option and that bothers me far less than the constant drip of small charges. If I'm able to pay yearly I'm far more likely to consider subscribing to an app or service than if the charge is monthly.

 

[370zulu]

Does Fusion finally support graphics acceleration for Mac OS VMs? I tried creating a Yosemite VM in Fusion a few years ago and it looked like I was running System 7 again with the UI all flat and white because of no "transparency" support. It also did not support screen resolutions higher than 1024x768.

Same question here as well. No acceleration makes MacOS VM tough to navigate smoothly.

 

[Skoal]

VMware has the courage to charge more frequently for their product.

Replace courage with smart business plan.

 

[Skoal]

There is no problem with paid upgrades. But if you read the post you quoted again the complaint is that VMWare moved from a 2 or 3 years paying upgrade cycle to a yearly one, making it quite a lot more expensive than it used to be to always stay up to date.

Of course they are free to make that choice, but their customers are also free to be dissatisfied with it and move away from VMWare which has lost one of its competitive advantages.

In my opinion VMware is just better all around compared to parallels.

 

[MacBH928]

They continue to release updates throughout the year which add features and address bugs and other performance issues. You act like they release software and then take a 364 day vacation.

They also provide support at an enterprise level. These things aren't cheap to do.

You sound as if you've never purchased software before.

If you don't see a value in the new version, don't buy it. It's really that simple. No one is forcing you to do so. You can continue to use the old version without issue.

I agree but many software stops working as they update the OS. I bought software that used to work on iOS 9 now it won't work on iOS 12. Its not the software developer problem that I updated, but the platform owner (Apple), forces you to updated if you buy a new device (new iPhone), keep older OS and risk security issues, or simply some features will stop working like Cloud Syncing.

Its a chicken and egg problem, you either update everything together and keep paying forever just to keep the software working or don't update a thing including buying newer hardware.

I am not sure what programmers do, but I always see new updates almost on weekly basis, but the software still does and work the same for years. I have few example like IMDB, YouTube, DropBox, and Twitter. Sure they had few big re-designs over the years but the keyword here is years. I don't know what happening on weekly basis.
[doublepost=1538037992][/doublepost]

The user base has grown. The complexity has, too. Also, much unlike in the 1990s, basically all software is perpetually connected to the Internet. This leads to:

• assumptions that it is kept fresh
• higher risk and relevance of security issues
• higher compatibility concerns — even if users don't feel they need to update your software, they did in fact update many underlying components such as the OS. As a result, keeping it up-to-date is basically inevitable. Running an app built for iOS 4 on iOS 12 is impractical.

.

All of this should be factored in the purchase price IMHO. When I buy software I don't expect it to work just for the day or the next 6 months. I really expect(and i believe everyone else too) for it to work at least 3 years.

 

[Deep_Thought]

Does anyone know if its possible to run "headless" vm's yet in Fusion? I do prefer Fusion to Parallels but the inability to do so has forced me down the Parallels route..

Headless mode for anyone interested... https://kb.parallels.com/en/123298