Maybe somebody here can provide an intelligent answer/feedback. Parallels Support sucks. Very disappointing. Took me 2-weeks. They did not respond to email and after multiple attempts I reached someone at the corporate office who created a ticket and then 2-days later, I got a completely useless answer that seemed to be a stock pre-prepared answer that I have 30-days to get my money back guarantee without answering any of the questions. This is what I wrote the support agent. Understand, I was looking for feedback. If you don't know 100% certain of a particular software's compatibility, I can accept that. BUT, NONE OF THE QUESTIONS WERE ANSWERED. None. After 2-weeks of waiting. Here is what I wrote: Hi, this is pre-sales question. I am considering purchasing a Macbook Pro with the M1 chip, top of line, over $4000, but, I have a lot of Windows software. While I know that Parallels works on Windows, I am still concerned. I have memory and processor intensive audio and video and creative software in Windows versions that I do not want to have to replace, all at once. I also have seen other music engineers that have said many plugins they have do not work, yet, with MAC. Solution would be to run Parallels and use Windows to run stuff as I have done using Boot Camp for years on my older Macbook Pro without a virtual drive. I would want to use Parallels to run Sound Forge Professional audio software, Vegas Pro video editing software, an older version of Adobe Creative Suite including Photoshop and Adobe Premiere (not the cloud versions) so I want to know if I can expect Parallels to run these type of audio and video programs without any issues. I know it works with simpler software like Microsoft Office. What you tell me is very important to my decision to buy the Macbook Pro.. After I would spend over $4000 for the computer, I do not want to spend another $2000 or more to replace all my software with Apple versions, all at once. If you don't think it will work well, I will have to think harder about purchasing the Apple Macbook Pro, at all, right now. Could you give me some feedback on what my expectations should be? In addition to having the older software with original CD discs that works in Windows 10, I could take the drive out of my old computer which is Windows 7, it is an SSD, and wondering if I can just convert that to a virtual drive that would run in Parallels, also? My Windows 7 SSD runs on an olderMacbook Pro in Boot Camp. So, it would be nice to be able to convert that Windows Boot Camp version to a Parallels virtual drive complete and intact. Is that possible, as well? Every time I tried to take Boot Camp running Windows 7 and convert it into a virtual drive (without Parallels) it would not work and I could not do a backup of the drive using standard Windows Laplink software, either. Boot Camp is not a standard Windows drive that works with all Windows backup software. So, that is why I am wondering about this, also. Thank You for your help. If you can't answer all the questions 100% accurate, just give me your best feedback to help me make my decision. Thank You. WHAT I GOT BACK FROM THIS SUPPORT AGENT, as I said, was a stock answer about the guarantee. I asked her to escalate it to someone with more knowledge, but, I have no idea if she will (that could take days.) I did "lose it" in frustration in my 1st response back to her, but, I left it like this as my final interaction response: If you or someone who reads this want to understand my frustration: 1. you made no attempt to check Sound Forge. I found a knowledgebase article in 2019 for MAGIX products indicating that it should work, but, it had no updates for the M1 chip. 2. You made no mention or answer to my question about using my SSD and trying to create a virtual drive of my old Boot Camp drive (as opposed to just a simple Windows drive that is not Boot Camp 3. You had no information about legacy Adobe products on CD and not cloud; hard to imagine that has never come up since using Adobe with Apple/MAC is very common. 4. IT TOOK 2-WEEKS TO GET A PERSON AT PARALLELS TO FINALLY PREPARE A TICKET AND THEN ANOTHER 2-DAYS FOR YOU TO RESPOND WITH YOUR USELESS ANSWERS AND LAZY RESEARCH TO EVEN FIND INFORMATION. 5. YOUR BLOG WITH YOUR PRODUCT MANAGER DOES NOT ALLOW ANYONE TO POST ANY QUESTIONS; only read the blog (yes, I'm finally trying the forum) IF YOU DON'T KNOW SOMETHING, THEN JUST SAY SO. IF YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND OR CAN'T ANSWER THE QUESTION, THEN, HONOR MY REQUEST TO TRANSFER THE SUPPORT TO A HIGHER LEVEL OF ESCALATION, SO, AN EXPERIENCED, MORE KNOWLEDGEABLE PERSON CAN ANSWER THE COMPLEX QUESTIONS PROVIDING MUCH BETTER FEEDBACK. DON'T JUST EMAIL ME BACK USELESS STOCK ANSWERS THAT ARE PRE-WRITTEN FOR YOU TO INSULT MY INTELLIGENCE AND WASTE MORE OF MY TIME. Is there anyone out there that can help with some quality feedback from your experience of using Parallels with the M1 chip? I'm not asking for 100% gurantees, but, before I invest in a 16" Macbook Pro with 64gig ram and a 2TB hard drive at well over $4000, I would think I could get an intelligent answer from the manufacturer of a product that boasts of working seamless with Windows and was created for this purpose. I used to run Boot Camp 100% of the time so the computer could use all its resources to run intensive audio/video instead of using older versions of Parallels. Now, of course, Parallels is the only option to run Windows on a MAC. Even if you only have a generic answer like it's working in Adobe Premiere Elements or it generally can provide seamless performance at rendering and intensive memory and processor sucking demands and it should handle the demands in a virtual drive or it is not compatible and won't work well. HELP ME OUT HERE, GIVE ME SOME HONEST FEEDBACK. Thank You.
I think Apple has a 14-day return policy. Also Parallels has a trial period. You can download Windows 11 arm64 from uupdump and test all software out. There may be compatibility/performance issues or not.
So far I could say personally I can run Windows 11 arm64 with Parallels smoothly on a M1 Pro 14inch. But the legacy x86/x64 programs, ie, Visual Studio, are not that satisfactory.
