I am a very experienced programmer who just started using Parallels Desktop for Mac; I decided to try it after deciding to change from WinXP, which I was running via VMware Fusion 2 using a Boot Camp partition, to Windows 7. In fact I'm still on a trial license of Desktop 6. It's using an entirely new VM with Windows 7 installed from scratch, not the Boot Camp partition.
I've been using 6.0.11992 for only four days, but on the whole it's been a positive experience.
I'm posting this not to gainsay ChristophL's report, but merely to add another data point.
I did have one significant problem, which has been reported elsewhere on this forum: the prl_vm_app process slowly but relentlessly increasing its CPU and real RAM usage. About 36 hours ago I changed the number of CPUs in Configure::General from 1 to 2, and haven't experienced that problem since. We'll see...
MacBook Pro3,1 (late 2007); OS X 10.5.8
vm: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Last edited: Dec 30, 2010