Virtualization Solutions for MacOS and Linux If you want to have full access to all Windows Live features and programs, including Windows Live Essentials. However, let's pretend you weren't so lucky, or you absolutely needed to play the Windows version. Virtualbox, unfortunately, has very limited support for 3D Acceleration, which is needed by most video games. VirtualBox is a powerful x86 and AMD64/Intel64 virtualization product for enterprise as well as home use. Not only is VirtualBox an extremely feature rich, high performance product for enterprise customers, it is also the only professional solution that is freely available as Open Source Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL) version 2.You're in luck.If there was a perfect solution, developers wouldn't spend enormous amounts of money creating native mac versions. Virtualization Isn't Just for Macs. Of course virtualization isn't only for the Mac.
![]() ![]() Virtualization Programs Full Access ToInstallation and general operationInstalling Fusion 4 is surprisingly simple: You just drag and drop the program to any directory you wish. So if you want to run your virtualization program on more than one Mac, Fusion will cost less—potentially much less.Advantage: Fusion (for the moment). Parallels Desktop, on the other hand, requires one license per machine, and it uses activation to check those serial numbers. Fusion’s license (for non-business users) allows you to install and use it on any Macs that you own or control. No matter how much you pay for a virtualization program, remember that you’ll also need to factor in the price of Windows itself.There’s a big hidden cost in those prices: the software license. Payroll for quickbooks macInstead, they remain within the Fusion application bundle and automatically activate on subsequent launches.More importantly, they’re deactivated when you quit Fusion. But those extensions aren’t hidden away in some low-level system folder where you’ll never find them. When you first launch Fusion, it asks for your administrative password and activates its extensions. Both of their preferences panels are reasonably well organized, doing a decent job of categorizing the various settings. Preferences and virtual machine settingsBoth of these programs have lots of settings options Parallels Desktop has more of them and, consequently, has a more complicated preferences screen. These processes don’t take much RAM or CPU power, but they’re there.Advantage: Fusion. In addition, two background processes continue to run after you quit Parallels. Taking a program as complex as Fusion, and making it as easy to install and uninstall as any simple utility, is a major accomplishment.Parallels, by contrast, is installed via an installer, its extensions are installed in the System folder and are always present, even when Desktop isn’t running. This setup also makes uninstalling a snap—just drag the app to the trash, and you’re done. (VMware calls this mode Unity Parallels calls it Coherence.)In this mode, both programs seem to treat these windows as though they’re regular Mac apps. Windowed windowsBoth programs can be run in an “integration” mode, meaning Windows applications aren’t bound inside a single Windows window rather, they appear side-by-side in the OS X graphical user interface with Mac programs. Some users may prefer one over the other, but I find they both work reasonably well.Advantage: Neither (or both). Its settings window mimics that of System Preferences, while Parallels uses a tabs-and-lists layout. Fusion offers a similar program, but you have to opt in, not out.Fusion (left) and Parallels (right) take slightly different approaches to their preferences windows.When it comes to changing the settings for a virtual machine, the two programs take a slightly different approach: Parallels Desktop uses a floating window that’s independent of the virtual machine being configured that makes it easy to toggle between the settings and the virtual machine, but it’s also easy to lose track of the settings window if you click another window to the foreground.Fusion, by contrast, dims the virtual machine, and presents a fixed window in the center of the screen, on top of the virtual machine. If you open Mission Control while you’re using Fusion, each running Windows app gets its own entry.If you prefer to think of your virtual machine as a single entity, you’ll probably prefer Parallels Desktop’ Coherence mode. This means, among other things, that if you use a window-management utility, it may not work correctly.Fusion (left) and Parallels (right) treat Windows apps’ windows differently when running in their respective integrated modes.Fusion, on the other hand, treats each Windows app like a window from any OS X application: The system treats them as truly separate from one another. You can see this if you activate Mission Control in OS X Lion: Regardless of how many Windows applications you’re running, they’ll all be lumped together in one Parallels Desktop entry. Fusion has a slower update cycle. Parallels Desktop pushes out updates rapidly, so users get the latest features and fixes as quickly as possible. The two companies handle updates differently, however. And in that case it makes more sense to treat the windows the way Fusion does.Programs of this complexity require frequent updates there’s just so much going on that there’s always going to be another feature to add or another bug to fix.
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