Well, I probably wasn't using Parallels long enough to tell if it's much different now. I am though very impressed with it so far.
I upgraded yesterday and since then I've had a couple of problems. I have two VMs running on my nearly new Mac Pro with 5Gb RAM, a Vista installation and Debian Linux.
The first problem seems to have sorted itself out. After the upgrade the Linux VM had real problems starting. Running Parallels seemed not pause at the configuration screen and wood attempt to boot Linux without my asking. It also added a series of "1"s to the name of the VM! Not sure why. It did the same on my Vista VM too though less so. The Linux VM was suddenly called "Debian Linux 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1". A hard reboot of the Mac Pro (a rarity for me and a reluctance) appears to have sorted these issues out.
The other one continues and seems to affect the Vista VM only. Four or so times now I've left the VM running and the mac has switched the monitor off as per the Power Saving settings. I'll come back and Vista will be displaying the login box. I think it must be rebooting itself after a BSOD. I get messages about a bad boot.
Now, I don't really know much about Windows as I've been Mac only for years now. Usually though, if the Vista VM crashes or is just turned off it will display a boot option screen on restarting. Obviously if I'm seeing the login screen it's bypassing that. Maybe it's behaving like the Mac 'reboot after power failure' option? If so maybe the screen-off event in the host is triggering a virtual power failure.
That said, I've tested sleeping the mac with the VM running Vista and Linux and both restore ok on waking up. This reboot problem only happens when the screen has switched off (and possibly when the disks have spun down), not when the Mac is sleeping. Sometimes, but not every time, returning to wake the screen up will see the Vista VM 'paused' and a Parallels message asking if I want to un-pause it. When this has happened I myself haven't paused the VM.
All else seems to be ok. Though the Vista reboot issue is a big problem.
I realise this is off-topic but I'm actually staggered how much quicker Firefox renders pages on Windows: Noticably faster than Safari or Firefox on the Mac. Mind you the Vista windowing is horrendous in comparison. Windows judder round the screen if you drag them. This might be Parallels video rendering issues though. I'd love to see full video/3D support soon so I can see just how far MS have gone with Aero. On the whole I'm reminded how plasticy Windows is. After all these years it still feels 'cheap' and I'm reminded what a pleasure using the Mac interface is in comparison.
Last edited: Sep 14, 2007