Turn off ads

As I didn't get a PM on how to disable the ad messages and it's been quite a while, version 7 is the last ever version I bought from Parallels. Thank you, you've been good but got greedy. Goodbye.

 

My Major beef has been the blackmail attempt from Parallels after my version 6 stopping working after my Mountain Lion upgrade over the weekend.

The solution from Parallels? Pay $50 to upgrade to V7!!!

That and the fact that no matter how many times I selected the tick box to not see any more ads, it would always just be displayed again has resulted in another lost customer. I am GLADLY taking my business, and recommendations to friends colleagues, elsewhere. VirtualBox works perfectly and is FREE!!!

Goodbye Parallels, you will NOT be missed at all.

 

I had to register an account just to say this.

Parallels also lost a customer in me and will lose a lot of future sales (easily 50+) because I will never ever recommend them again. I already convinced 2-5 of my friends not to upgrade to 8 and to switch to the other product.

It's disgusting to see how Parallels cover this up here and does not realize how they're promoting pure advertising in a paid product and they're lying about this very clearly. People are not stupid and Parallels is clearly insulting us by suggesting otherwise.

I can't believe how far you guys fell, you were the best product but now, it's ruined by this.

 

Another customer out for good.

I also have a major beef with the ads; but then the move by Parallels to charge for bug fixes so that I can upgrade to a minor revision of OS X (Lion to Mountain Lion) was the last straw.

I posted a reply the other day about how I have successfully switched to VirtualBox, along with step-by-step instructions on how to do it.

The reply was promptly removed.

For those of you jumping ship, there is a way; search Google, since posting links and instructions here results in censorship.

Good luck.

 

Thanks

I was going to upgrade today but after a little google searching and a few reddit posts I think I'll go back to using Virtual Box. I will not deal with adds in a desktop application. Thank you users for all the information. I will be looking for a new solution today.

 

Mwuhahahaha...
Parallels is not only loosing existing, repeat customers because of their practices, but also can't attract new one's either.
;-)

 

I currently hold a license for PD7. While I only use Parallels 3-4 times per month, being presented with an ad each time I use the program is appalling for a paid product. Taking into consideration the lack of action by Parallels management team and the fact that posts are being deleted/censored, I will pass on upgrading to PD8. This might be a small issue in the scope of things, but it doesn't exactly give your public image any positive points.

 

Is this a US only thing or something? I bought PD7 early August and have never seen an advert?

I never did a trial, just bought and installed it.

Got the free upgrade to PD8 and no ads there either.

Do the ads only show if you install a trial first perhaps, and aren't being disabled properly when entering a valid key for the full product.

 

YanaYana

You've gone a little quiet...

I got my first ad this evening. Was not happy as I just got extorted of money having upgraded to mountain lion only to find the copy of version 7 I bought was now out of date only two weeks later. Thankfully I bought it on the 26th of July, only a day after the update period started.

Now tell me? What would have happened had I been a good little boy, done my research, found out that version 6 wasn't compatible with Mountain Lion and bought Version 7 first, in readiness for the new OS?

I know what would've happened. I'd be sitting here with software just over a month old, a version out of date and not even a reduced update fee. I'm sure you're planning to make sure that version 7 won't work with the next release of OS X meaning that anyone who falls into the above trap would be obliged to update for each new release of OS X.

How it must feel to be such an honourable, reputable company?

 

Yeah, I'm gonna have to go with the rest here and say "no" to Parallels 8.

 

Did any of you guys getting the Ads install a trial first?

If so have you tried completely removing it and re-installing, entering your serial the first time you are asked? Still haven't ever seen an advert in PD7 or PD8, but bet it's frustrating for those who are getting them!

 

no thanks

I was thinking about upgrading to parallels 8, but after reading about the ads I don't think I'll ever buy another parallels product again

Terrible company policy. I hope hitting them in the wallet gets their attention

 

Bye, Parallels! I don't want any ads in software I bought. I'm switching to Fusion!

 

I had a thread I posted about a week ago deleted. I can only imagine it is because I mentioned a competitor or it was because it was talking about the SPAM. Not sure, but I'm not sure why it should have been deleted. It was a valid question that could help many potential customers... if only someone would answer it.

I'll repost it here and maybe someone will eventually get around to giving an honest answer.

Hopefully someone can answer. To the admin who deleted the thread... it seems like it would make much more sense to simply just answer the question. I thought it was a pretty cut and dry, easy to answer question... but maybe I'm mistaken. If your response is "I couldn't do that because you mentioned a competitor's name"... well note that the competitor's name and their price has been redacted in this post so hopefully that won't be an excuse.

 

Hello,

Our In-Product Notification is a tool that is used by Parallels to alert customers of product updates, notifications from Parallels and offers from our software partners with special offers for our customer. The specific notification can be disabled by clicking the Do not show again - checkbox.

 

That is the spam I was referring to. I know you can turn off an individual piece of spam (after you have already seen it)... I was just wondering if you fixed it to where you separated the spam from the in-product notification like it should be. We all know that you can have product update notifications separate from "special offers from software partners". I see that you have chosen, still, not to fix that and not allow customers to opt out of the special offers spam.

That is all I was curious about. I made the switch last week to another virtualization tool that doesn't force-feed spam down their paying customers' throats. They don't even force it down their NON-paying customers' throats. I always liked PD, but I can't support practices like that. Fix that in a future release, let us all know that it has been fixed, and I'm sure we'll be back (I know I would be). But in the meantime, I gotta stick with the competitors who know better than to do that. Hopefully you'll one day come to your senses and treat your paying customers better than that.

Make two products... a paid product without the spam and a free product with the advertisements. That way it wouldn't be spam... it would be ad-supported software. You get revenue from both products and maybe even open up your software to more potential customers. But we all know it isn't ad-supported software if you have to pay for the software and you can't opt out of the ads... that is just spam.

I'm glad I asked before making the upgrade. I figured the silence was all the answer I needed, but wanted to be sure. Thanks for the reply.

 

You have my email address. Just email me when you get the ads out of the product. I'll just use Boot Camp until you come to your senses. Parallels 9, 10, 16, 25, 73, doesn't matter to me, I'll be back when you turn off the ads. Until then, don't bother me.

EXTREMELY disappointed with this.

 

Not interested

No thanks. I paid good money for Parallels 6, paid for the version 7 upgrade. I'm not jumping through hoops to stop something that shouldn't be in there in the first place. You want me to see ads, then send it to my email with an option for me to opt out. But I'm not watching this every time I fire it up. Until they are removed, Parallels 8 is not going on my new MacBook Laptop, I'll just use boot camp or take another look at Fusion. Time to wake up Parallels.

 

....or just use Fusion. I'm not jumping through hoops, when Parallels wants my business back, remove the ads from the product I have already paid for and I'll jump back in.

 

Tired of Ads - And I'm a Reseller!

I own Parallels for our own office AND I am a reseller for all of our clients.

And I am sick of these ads.

We legitimately pay for a product and are blasted with ads. Imagine my day when I have to click close on 20 of these stupid advertisements. Not discreet ads, but massive, virtually full screen ads.

My customers look at me funny because they are wondering what sort of operation this "parallels" is running.

Click "don't display again" is ONLY GOOD FOR THAT ONE AD (and on that one machine, of course).

A month later there is another one that bypasses this and the cycle begins again.

In my case I script backups of our parallels images and these F'ing ads mess with my start/stop scripts.

I log into my servers to check on things and find my backups haven't been running because there is a "Ready for Windows 8? We Are!" ad blocking my script.

(and yes, the ForcePromoOff command does work, but only until the next major patch, then it's back to terminal)

Not to mention the fact that these ads are downloading "quietly" in the background... what other communications are going on here?

I'm running tests with Fusion to see if they actually respect their customers.

Like others have said: Parallels - send me an email when you've removed these ads.