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VMware Fusion 13 Now Available With Native Support for Apple Silicon Macs

CosmoCopus said:
I run an old version of AutoCad (release 14) on Windows Vista thru VMware on my intel macbook pro. Would I be able to do the same on an Apple silicon MacBook Pro with Windows 11 arm and VMware 13?
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You’d be emulating the software via the Windows x86 compatibility layer, possibly running compatibility settings for Vista, all while pumping that through more emulation with VMware.

Good chance you’d see issues or poor performance, but there’s no way to know without trying.
 
CosmoCopus said:
I run an old version of AutoCad (release 14) on Windows Vista thru VMware on my intel macbook pro. Would I be able to do the same on an Apple silicon MacBook Pro with Windows 11 arm and VMware 13?
Click to expand...
25 year old software? (as in R14, not 2014?) Supposedly yes, but it involves hacks. Your question is really about running ACAD R14 on W11, and not really related to Fusion 13 specifically, so if you're looking for more info, I don't think this news article is the place to figure that out. I would suggesting googling "Installing Autocad R14 on Windows 11" to see what you come up with. I don't know anything about Longbow Software, but they claim to have a tool that will allow ACAD R14 to run on W11, but it costs money. I've also read about a free hack to do it (YMMV), which you can easily find via google.

The biggest issue from what I understand is the R14 installer is 16-bit which won't run on modern versions of Windows without the hacks.

If you can get it running on W11, it should run on W11 ARM. You can install a "trial" version of W11 using VMware on your current setup to see if you can get it working. Performance should be just as good on ARM.

I know that current version of ACAD run on W11 ARM.
 
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theluggage said:
Downloading the Fusion Pro 30 day trial works fine. As far as I can tell there's only the one Fusion download - when you run it you get the option of entering a license key or starting the 30 day Pro trial, with links to "Buy Fusion Pro" or "Get a free Personal license for Player" (or words to that effect).

Trying to get the "Free personal license" for Fusion Player just leads to a blank page. So if you're just curious you might as well download Fusion Pro and start the 30 day trial (which works) and hope the fix the free license bit. Evaluating it took me a whole 30 seconds, not 30 days (see above).
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Sorry. I thought you couldn't find any version. I bought the real version as I may use it for work, and wasn't looking for the free version.

22.10 Ubuntu works.
 
NanoG6 said:
How the f do I install Windows 11 ARM on Fusion 13? Downloaded Windows 11 ARM ISO using UUP dump, but then unable to continue because no network adapter detected, which need VMWare tools, that only able to install after Windows installed.
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I got this far as well. Given that I was doing it in the wee hours of the morning I gave up and decided I come at it again when I was fresher. Which I haven't done yet.
 
Can this run old macOS versions like SnowLeopard? I’m about to drop some money on the final Intel i5 Mac mini for this reason…but would prefer an M1 mini if Snow Leopard could be virtualised…
 
Spectrum said:
Can this run old macOS versions like SnowLeopard? I’m about to drop some money on the final Intel i5 Mac mini for this reason…but would prefer an M1 mini if Snow Leopard could be virtualised…
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You cannot virtualize/emulate Intel versions of any OS on an Apple Silicon Mac. You can’t even run Apple Silicon versions of macOS inside of Fusion on Apple Silicon hosts.
You can still virtualize Intel versions of macOS in Fusion on Intel Mac hosts.
 
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chrfr said:
You cannot virtualize/emulate Intel versions of any OS on an Apple Silicon Mac. You can’t even run Apple Silicon versions of macOS inside of Fusion on Apple Silicon hosts.
You can still virtualize Intel versions of macOS in Fusion on Intel Mac hosts.
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OK - looks like we'll go ahead with the Intel i5 purchase as planned. Maybe over time QEMU/UTM will make this possible on Silicon.
 
bobcomer said:
You need to worry about much more than the framework itself. Context changes are killers, especially when you have more than one OS running at the same time. No good way to optimize that.
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I don't know what to tell you.

I've tested two things:

  • a command-line app I wrote, comparing native macOS against Linux in a Docker container using Virtualization.framework. A CPU-bound method was 1.09% slower (48.37ns vs. 47.85ns). An I/O-bound method was 107.1% slower. This was on macOS 12.5.1.
  • Geekbench 5.4.5, on macOS 13.0.1, comparing native macOS against macOS inside Parallels 18.1.0. Single-core was 0.9% slower (1747 vs. 1731). Multi-core was significantly slower (12428 vs. 7611), which makes sense, given that the VM gets 5 rather than 10 cores.
So, I hope virtualized disk I/O improves significantly, but as far as CPU goes, it's near-perfect already.


bobcomer said:
It's always a problem.

Virtualization works great for a lot of things. I use it mainly for testing, isolation, and utility, but I wouldn't even use it to play chess (maybe command line chess would be okay, I just can't stand jerky video) not to mention something that's heavy graphics.
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I can't comment on (and don't care about) graphics.
 
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the writer said:
I had the same issue. I'll try that. Thanks. :)
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still stuck in the same place... windows install is looking for a network connection during installation... windows itself is not up yet so I can't mount any disk from within the VMWare window... so I'm not sure what you mean?
 
ixxx69 said:
Unless you've already done your research, you might want to check into how you plan to run SL on a 2018 mini.
Click to expand...
Yeah - that's working fine on a number of Macs including a current i7 mac mini. Running 10.6.8 Server via VMWare Fusion. Having said that, my current VMWare SnowLeopard hosts are running either Catalina or Mojave, not Big Sur like the new mini will arrive with...but I have assumed that the host OS version won't make a difference. Or am I wrong...?
 
ixxx69 said:
25 year old software? (as in R14, not 2014?) Supposedly yes, but it involves hacks. Your question is really about running ACAD R14 on W11, and not really related to Fusion 13 specifically, so if you're looking for more info, I don't think this news article is the place to figure that out. I would suggesting googling "Installing Autocad R14 on Windows 11" to see what you come up with. I don't know anything about Longbow Software, but they claim to have a tool that will allow ACAD R14 to run on W11, but it costs money. I've also read about a free hack to do it (YMMV), which you can easily find via google.

The biggest issue from what I understand is the R14 installer is 16-bit which won't run on modern versions of Windows without the hacks.

If you can get it running on W11, it should run on W11 ARM. You can install a "trial" version of W11 using VMware on your current setup to see if you can get it working. Performance should be just as good on ARM.

I know that current version of ACAD run on W11 ARM.
Click to expand...
Ok I’ll give it a shot. Thanks for the info.
 
vitamanic said:
You’d be emulating the software via the Windows x86 compatibility layer, possibly running compatibility settings for Vista, all while pumping that through more emulation with VMware.

Good chance you’d see issues or poor performance, but there’s no way to know without trying.
Click to expand...
Ok thanks for the info.
 
Spectrum said:
Yeah - that's working fine on a number of Macs including a current i7 mac mini. Running 10.6.8 Server via VMWare Fusion. Having said that, my current VMWare SnowLeopard hosts are running either Catalina or Mojave, not Big Sur like the new mini will arrive with...but I have assumed that the host OS version won't make a difference. Or am I wrong...?
Click to expand...
If you're running SL server in a VM, you're fine. Regular SL isn't support (AFAIK), and it obviously won't run natively, so just wanted to make sure you knew.
 
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chucker23n1 said:
I don't know what to tell you.

I've tested two things:

  • a command-line app I wrote, comparing native macOS against Linux in a Docker container using Virtualization.framework. A CPU-bound method was 1.09% slower (48.37ns vs. 47.85ns). An I/O-bound method was 107.1% slower. This was on macOS 12.5.1.
  • Geekbench 5.4.5, on macOS 13.0.1, comparing native macOS against macOS inside Parallels 18.1.0. Single-core was 0.9% slower (1747 vs. 1731). Multi-core was significantly slower (12428 vs. 7611), which makes sense, given that the VM gets 5 rather than 10 cores.
So, I hope virtualized disk I/O improves significantly, but as far as CPU goes, it's near-perfect already.




I can't comment on (and don't care about) graphics.
Click to expand...
What I originally commented on was about games, hence graphics. If you're not talking about that, we have a failure to communicate.
 
sorgo said:
Tried using Windows 11 for ARM after finally figuring out how to register for a free personal use copy of VMWare Fusion 13, installing Homebrew and QEMU, and then converting the Windows 11 ARM64 Insider Preview image to something VMWare could read, but in the end it seems VMWare couldn’t use or didn’t have access to my wifi adapter :confused:

I played around with the settings a bit but no dice. Surely I must have been doing something wrong, for clearly I am a noob
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sorgo said:
Tried using Windows 11 for ARM after finally figuring out how to register for a free personal use copy of VMWare Fusion 13, installing Homebrew and QEMU, and then converting the Windows 11 ARM64 Insider Preview image to something VMWare could read, but in the end it seems VMWare couldn’t use or didn’t have access to my wifi adapter :confused:

I played around with the settings a bit but no dice. Surely I must have been doing something wrong, for clearly I am a noob….
Click to expand...
I tried repeatedly to register for a personal license to use with Fusion 13 Player, but can’t get out of the loop of registering, opening an account, the download page saying I’m “not registered for this product”, logging into my account, and again being told I am “not registered” for a free personal use license, then clicking on the “Register Here” link, to no avail. How were you able to finally secure a Personal Use license?
 
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