I've been using Parallels Desktop to develop & test Windows software from a Mac for the last decade. It's excellent, and I would definitely grab a perpetual copy of the current version while you can. VMware Fusion is the other contender, but consensus seems to be that Parallels is now dramatically faster than all the competition [1].

I just bought a Thinkpad and switched back to Windows, so I'm looking for VM software on the Windows side now. Hyper-V is just painfully slow compared to Parallels. If the Corel acquistion means Parallels is coming to Windows I'll be very happy, but I'd still like to know the best Windows VM software in the meantime.

[1] https://9to5mac.com/2018/09/02/a-long-time-vmware-fusion-use...

I would give VMWare a test on the Windows Side, it was always the best option from my own experience in Linux and Windows. That said, I mostly don't notice too much these days and mostly use Docker for (windows|mac) for anything Linux I'm working on in development. The only issue is anything that is a "shared volume" between the host and native will be very slow as it's copying actions in/out of the VM. Staying all in vm is better.

Are you using a GUI in the VM a lot?

Yep, I'm 100% GUI. I use Parallels to test how my Win32 based apps work on different versions of Windows. I'm also testing against different Photoshop plug-in compatible graphics programs, so its useful to be able to restore to a clean snapshot taken just after installing Corel Paint Shop Pro, for instance. Everything in Parallels has been running at near native speed lately.

On the Mac I was also using Parallels to test GUI apps I was writing for different versions of ElementaryOS / Ubuntu and also for different macOS versions, but I realize I'll lose the Mac compatibility with the switch back to Windows.

There's ways around the Mac client limitations, though I really wish Apple would just give us a decent power user option already. I almost wish they'd sell a "Developer Kit" which would be an apple branded mobo with an Apple bios with install media. Then you could stick any compatible intel cpu, compatible gpu, and diy it... maybe mobo + case as a barebones... even if it was $500-600 for the barebones, I and many others would still pay that much vs. hackintosh route.

Then they'd just need to release maybe 1-2 motherboards every 12-18 months. Say a full ATX and an ITX variant.

One of the issues I found is that Docker and WMWare on Windows are incompatible. Dockers enables Hyper-V, which in turn prevents WMware from running.

Yeah... which sucks. That said, I really don't have much need for full VMs anymore. At work it all gets deployed in Windows. I try to keep everything I make cross platform and use docker to keep the services I'm not actively working on running local for other stuff. (really appreciate MS SQL Server docker image)

If I need a full VM would probably just use Hyper-V anyway as it's "good enough" ... on my home hackintosh, I haven't needed windows much at all... I use the kid's PC for the handful of projects that must have windows when I have to touch them.

Docker really gets me pretty much all I need in terms of linux support. Even building node projects for AWS Lambda. If I did gui development (other than browser ui/ux), I would probably be a bit more involved.

Parallels is the best solution in my experience, but they do use a bunch of dark patterns. They used to sell ‘download insurance’ for example, and really push antivirus if you install windows. I doubt this acquisition will change that, though they do push their subscription package now.

I’ve been meaning to try alternatives, VMWare seem to be maintaining Fusion again.

Bootcamp is the best option in my experience. I needed to run some very heavy Excel workbooks on my Macbook Pro a few years ago, Parallels was much slower than 64 Bit Office on Bootcamp, Mac Office was also slow, was then 32 bit and not fully file compatible. Macbook pro Bootcamp is the best Windows PC I’ve ever had - has been rock solid for 5 years. I remember Microsoft publishing some stats that Apple macbooks were by far the most reliable Windows machines! I had a Windows 10 license already, based on a quick search, keys seem to be easily available for less than $20.

Seconded. Parallels has some nice features, like being able to run windows apps in OSX, but it's noticeably slower than booting directly into windows. Plus parallels lets you run your bootcamp partition from OSX if you need to.

I have parallels installed.

I started using it at Parallels 6 and currently using Parallels 10. The latest version is Parallels 14.

Don’t expect much from customer support. I bought parallels 10 just about 30 days before Parallels 11 came out. I talked to customer support and they simply said no to letting me instead get Parallels 11 even though the time period was so short. I understand it doesn’t say anywhere on their website about that they would honor new free versions if the old versions were purchased within a certain amount of time. But customer service is a thing and they don’t seem to care about it. All I I got was a short: sorry can’t help you. And I haven’t bought a new version since. I probably would have if they had offered me a upgrade back then. I’m still running windows 7 and I don’t need all the new bells and whistles new version of parallels offers. So it doesn’t bother me that I’m running a 4 year old version.

Like another comment mentioned, they do use dark patterns. I can’t count how many times I’ve clicked on “Don’t show again” on the new version ad they show you when yours is outdated. Yet it still pops up to this day.

I’ve never used their recommended settings. I just pick one and go back into the settings and change it to whatever I usually default to.

All that said, their interface is a lot more polished than the other software. I’ve done research on VMware fusion, and I always read comments saying that Parallels is better. I haven’t tried fusion myself.

I also love the fact that I can simply copy the parallels file if I need to mess with it and not have to worry about messing up my original install. For this purpose, I always keep a fresh copy of windows on my computer. Whenever I feel like I’ve added too much junk to my windows image, I simply delete it and make a copy of the fresh install and I’m on my way again.

I’ve never used Parallels Access so I can’t comment on that.

Let me know if I can answer any other questions.

I use VirtualBox myself.

I started out using Parallels at first, but can't see having to continually pay to upgrade, especially when I'm mainly using Linux images although I do run a copy of Windows periodically.

VirtualBox is free and supported by Oracle.

> VirtualBox is free and supported by Oracle.

What people are learning, though, is that nothing from Oracle is ever really free, it's simply deferring time evaluating licensing terms and legal costs into the future.

For example, Oracle's interpretation of "personal use" in the VirtualBox Personal Use and Evaluation License (which applies to the Extension Pack) changed completely sometime in late 2016 / early 2017, without notice. Compare [1] with [2].

Before: "Personal use is when you install the product on one or more PCs yourself and you make use of it (or even your friend, sister and grandmother). It doesn't matter whether you just use it for fun or run your multi-million euro business with it." [1]

Now: "Personal Use and/or Educational Use expressly exclude any use of the Product for commercial purposes or to operate or run a business, organization, governmental organization, or educational institution." [2]

Oracle does track downloads and will make inquiries if they suspect commercial use.

[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20161108235524/https://www.virtu... [2] https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Licensing_FAQ

Agreed. Microsoft also supplies free VirtualBox (and other) VMs for various versions of Windows + IE/Edge for testing purposes...

https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/tools/v...

I have and use both Parallels and VMWare Fusion on a Macbook Pro. Personally I prefer VMWare because I've run into less problems managing VMs with Fusion than I have with Parallels. In my experience Parallels updates are more likely to break compatibility with old VMs. I don't really use the "Linked Clones" snapshot feature of Parallels so VMWare's Snapshots work just fine for me too. I was pretty sure Parallels use to cost much more than VMWare for a single seat but a quick check shows that they're both about $80USD at the moment.

I also use VMWare Fusion Pro for Mac. It's more professionally oriented, and its GUI performance is highest among the three.

People are also happy with Parallels and its remote access service, but VirtualBox on Mac is only good for headless virtualization it seems.

I wrote my Ph.D. thesis on a XFCE desktop on a Mac (via VMWare). It was basically seamless. I recommend it wholeheartedly.

I (used to?) own a student license for Parallels Desktop circa 2012, though it may have expired by now.

In my experience, I could see no major differences between their solution and, say, Virtualbox. There were some Mac-specific features like working well with Exposé when in Seamless mode and a few other UI niceties, but Parallels seems primarily geared towards supporting Windows. Linux Guest OS support of features like Seamless mode refused to work unless you had specific kernel versions and was always several versions behind in my experience. I'm sure the feature parity gap between Virtualbox and Parallels Desktop is even smaller today than it used to be.

The pricetag is usually less for Parallels products compared to the leading commercial competitor, FWIW.

> In my experience, I could see no major differences between their solution and, say, Virtualbox.

What software were you running inside the VM? Parallels performance is good enough I can actually play a lot of games, which was amazing to me after years with Virtualbox.

TBH, even for simple stuff like Internet Explorer, I'm surprised you didn't notice a performance difference.

I’ve been using the free Parallels Desktop Lite from the application store. Well its free for Linux and Windows. It also doesn’t do bridging networks - only NAT and host networking. Considering it is an App Store product which should follow the sandboxing rules I suspect its just a fronted for the native hypervisor framework.

I just need to fire an ocasional Linux vem to test something it is more than enough to me. YMMV.

I just skimmed through https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18723936 and there were multiple comments about pros and cons of your different choices for Mac.

I’ve been using VMware Fusion for several years. It’s pretty solid and Linux integration works well, including 3D acceleration.

I use VMWare.