Parallels / Virtualbox / Crossover / QEmu

P

Pat Anderson

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And the winner is...Parallels!

Had a bunch of time to play with everything while in Mexico...

Crossover can sort of run Windoze programs, sometimes.

QEmu works, but is slow and the video is, well, awful.

Sun's Virtualbox is a great idea, not quite there yet. It is snappy, but at least without installing the Guest Additions - and I can't even find those for download - stuff works well enough, but the main problem for me is that the full screen mode is not really full screen. Need to keep an eye on this one though, it seems like it could be a sleeper...

Parallels does it all, magnificently. I now have four Parallels virtual machines on my MacBook - XP, Ubuntu, DOS 6.22 and FreeDOS. Going to add a Win 98 machine just for fun. In fact, I am typing this on Firefox under Ubuntu as a virtual machine under Parallels on the MacBook! Talk about cool! FreeDOS is a wonderful find - a ton of stuff, kind of a scoll down memory lane!

Love to hear what others think about this stuff...



 
Thanks for the report. It sounds as if you are going to need to upgrade the hard drive with all of these OS on board. I also picked up Ubuntu and was going to put it on an old machine I had run windows ME on.
 
I'd guess I've been using Parallels for a couple years. I've got it on both a Macbook and iMac. I use it in the coherence configuration and it's pretty much flawless.
 
Pat! I did not know that you had a techie streak. I just switched to Apple w/ the purchase of a Mac Book. I am still very new at the Apple thing. However, I am using Fusion by VMWare. The installation and use has been completely intuitive. I have been completely satisfied so far. It allows me to have both OS's on and switches between them seamlessly. The Spaces section allows me to switch between them on the fly.


My message to the PC users who might be thinking about jumping ship is, don't be afraid. It will be okay.
 
Can't tell from Pat's post, whether he's referring to Mac or Linux - I know he runs both.

From the Linux perspective, I'll suggest Parallels is not the best choice. Two reasons:

- It's not Open Source. I moved to Linux for many reasons, but breaking the chain from propietary vendors was a big part of it.

- Because it's not Open Source, you are dependent on the vendor to keep the propietary components up to date - which they have routinely failed to do. I used Parallels early on, up until about a year ago. On several occasions, I ran OS security updates, which included kernel updates. Every time, it broke Parallels. Sometimes, they would get a patch out quickly. More often, there were significant delays. The last time it broke, I waited over three months before I finally threw in the towel.

VirtualBox is my current choice on Linux. Works every bit as well as Parallels did for me. On the Macs at work, there's a mixture of VMWare and Parallels...folks seem to be happy with both.
 
Bill,

Sorry, I was referring to a Mac host computer. But I am also going to grab Virtualbox for the Linux machines (two, one at Fall City and the other at Birch Bay).

I hear you on the Open Source thing, and the failure of proprietary vendors to keep up sometimes. Parallels has done a good job of keeping up with the Mac OS updates - which are kind of few and far between anyway, unlike the Windoze patch du jour (couldn't help getting that jab in).

The most fun I am having is living in 1986 all over again with FreeDOS! When men were men and screens were 80 x 25! Got to get Virtualbox on the Linux machines so I can goop them up with FreeDOS and play with Turbo Pascal all night long!

Pat

 
Why didn't you try VMWare Fusion as well? I started out with Parallels but moved to Fusion and prefer it. However, it is often a see-saw battle between the two in terms of features.

Warren
 
Didn't try it because I don't have it! Parallels was the only VM software that I bought, all the others are open source / free...I got Crossover Pro on the one day free download that was posted here a while ago. Might give it a try some time I guess.


Doryman":3p9dr8uc said:
Why didn't you try VMWare Fusion as well? I started out with Parallels but moved to Fusion and prefer it. However, it is often a see-saw battle between the two in terms of features.

Warren
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