Parallels Desktop: Better or Worse than VMware?

L

Leauki

Hunter
I am just about to switch to VMware. But before I do, I want to know if I will be missing a release with exactly the features I have been waiting for for so long.

1. Will there be a Cocoa GUI for Parallels? (I _HATE_ the current GUI.)

2. Will there be a headless mode for VMs? (I.e. can a VM run in the background without displaying a window and wait for Remote Desktop connections?)

3. Will there be a command line interface for Parallels?

If the answer is still NO for those three questions I will switch to VMware. I have enough. I don't care about DirectX support (although VMware supports that too, apparently), I need a convenient way to run Windows applications for development.
 
Since I couldn't find any information about those oft-asked questions I decided to try out VMWare.

I installed the demo (which is a full version working for one month) and 64 bit Vista, Office 2007, and Visual Studio 2008. Everything works. Plus Vista reboots faster than under Parallels.

I will be migrating my 32 bit XP guest from Parallels to VMware this week and install VMware on my MacBook (32 bit XP guest) as well. I will throw away my 32 bit Vista guest, don't need it any more.

Incidentally, VMware has a Cocoa GUI, supports a headless mode, and has a command line interface and scripting abilities. Plus it has up-to-date Windows and Linux versions.

Unless Parallels gives me reason to think that it is not a dead-end, I will complete my switch within the fortnight.

Thanks to everyone here who asnwered questions and helped.

It seems like Parallels are just shooting for other types of users. I am more interested in 64 bit than in DirectX support, and more interested in scripting than screen effects.

(Although Parallels screen effects are nice and helpful! I would love it if VMware gave me visual feedback like Parallels does when switching to Unity (=Coherence) mode.)
 
I have been using VMware for a week now.

I converted all relevant Parallels machines. Here's what I found:

1. VMware doesn't support OS/2. (I knew this.)

2. I can start VMware, start a VM, kill the VMware program and log out the Finder session and the VM continues running in the background, accessible by Remote Desktop etc..

3. There is a switch that allows the headless mode to be added to the View menu: full screen, Unity (like Coherence), single window, headless. Headless mode allows quitting the VMware application and the VM will keep running. This allows getting rid of the VMware window on the desktop until the VM is needed again. Plus I don't accidentally shut down or freeze the VM!

4. VMware runs 64 bit Windows and it runs it well.

5. VMware seems to be faster.

6. VMware slows down OmniWeb (Web browser) for some reason.

7. There is a command line interface but I haven't figured it out yet.

8. Vista reboots faster (like XP) and the VMware tools install faster.

9. 3D graphics support only works in XP SP2 (which is not a problem for me).

10. I can point a VMware VM to the physical disk drive and disconnect it and it won't grab a disk when inserted making me look for the disk in Finder until I realize that my flatmate has a VM running in his session that stole the disk. In Parallels I worked around that problem by pointing all VMs to an empty cdrom.dmg file.

11. VMware works better with Spaces.
 
will VMWare allow you to reduce the size of your disk image partition so you can have more disk space available to mac os x? That's the only thing about parallels that I don't like...
 
Wish I could make the switch. But again, I am thwarted by test taking software. The software seeks VMWare, if it detects it - it refuses to run, even if VMWare is not active. End of story. It detects Parallels, it runs anyway - as long as I am in BootCamp.

Uninstalling VMWare doesn't fix the problem - as VMWare does not uninstall all of its components! It leaves tidbits around, which are what the software detects [of course!]. So, I have to do a manual uninstall each time I test.

I suppose, eventually, I may do just that . . . probably after the summer, if Parallels hasn't fixed these problems or released a major update that makes these issues moot for me.

I too would like 64-bit Vista & multiple processor recognition . . . Not to mention all the other little perks.
 
New Parallels Desktop version 4 is coming, to all problems I can say yes, they will be solved in Parallels Desktop 4.
- 64bit support
- multiple CPUs in VM
- improved USB support
and many others.
I suppose it is worse to pay $ for another software
Also do not forget Parallels Server is coming
 
well...

this is really simple i don't have much to say.

from my experience parallels is much better for xp3 and vista

but for Sp2 go with vmware....
 
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