Anyone switching from Parallels 15 to VMWare Fusion 12 Free Player?

[tekfranz]

Parallels wants me to upgrade to version 16 for Big Sur support. Meanwhile, VMWare is offering Fusion 12 which supports Big Sur for free to Home users and students. https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/evalcenter?p=fusion-player-personal

Any Parallels users try Fusion recently? Will you be switching to the free tier? Paid tier?

Please vote in the poll above if you wish.

 

[tekfranz]

So i tried Fusion Player 12 free and gave it 4 CPU's and 4gb of Ram in Catalina.

1. Fusion 12 had a lot of trouble with the new Security in MacOS Catalina. I had to find a forum article to tell me to grant it full Disk Access. Parallels is clearer about the security needed. I would say many programs have struggled through the new security in Catalina. It just was not clear Fusion 12 Player needed Full Disk access. It only mentioned needing Accessibility.
2. It seemed slower and less responsive than Parallels.

I think it is a great option for those who need an occasional VM with no licensing cost, but I think I am spoiled by the speed & fluidness of Parallels.

 

[Wowfunhappy]

I'm surprised that you found VMWare Fusion was less responsive than Parallels. I had Parallels first, then switched to VMWare (back when it was still paid). I greatly prefer VMWare's interface—it feels more like a standard Mac app—and they felt about the same in terms of performance. IIRC, in actual benchmarks Parallels is slightly ahead in GPU performance, but VMWare is slightly ahead in CPU performance, and overall the two are super close!

Now that Fusion is free I'm not sure why you'd buy Parallels, unless you really like their "seamless mode" integration stuff, which is available in VMWare but is probably a bit less robust. For me, Parallels's seamless mode was actually a turn-off—it's enabled by default in new VMs, and although it's neat it feels too darn weird!

VMWare is also way better at running macOS guests, which is a thing I use a lot to test apps and to quickly load up newer and older versions of macOS.

 

[tekfranz]

I'm surprised that you found VMWare Fusion was less responsive than Parallels. I had Parallels first, then switched to VMWare (back when it was still paid). I greatly prefer VMWare's interface—it feels more like a standard Mac app—and they felt about the same in terms of performance. IIRC, in actual benchmarks Parallels is slightly ahead in GPU performance, but VMWare is slightly ahead in CPU performance, and overall the two are super close!

Now that Fusion is free I'm not sure why you'd buy Parallels, unless you really like their "seamless mode" integration stuff, which is available in VMWare but is probably a bit less robust. For me, Parallel's seamless mode was actually a turn-off—it's enabled by default in new VMs, and although it's neat it feels too darn weird!

VMWare is also way better at running macOS guests, which is a thing I use a lot to test apps and to quickly load up newer and older versions of macOS.

I haven't figured out how to run a MacOS guest yet, but I do run Windows and Ubuntu.

I might have had a better impression if I did not receive a cryptic error after I imported my VM. But if Parallels marketing is true and I have to pay $49 to upgrade to Parallels 16 for Big Sur support, then I might give give VMWare Fusion 12 another go. I should qualify that VMWare Fusion worked fine and I would definitely consider it an upgrade over using Virtual Box. Also, with Apple silicone coming maybe I shouldn't invest in Parallels Software until we know what direction Windows Virtualization takes.

And yes all the shiny chrome, tinsel and Add-On software Parallels pushes does get a bit annoying. I wonder if VMWare Fusion would consider fixing the Accessiblity issues after importing a VM? All they need is a dialog with clear instructions to allow Full Disk Access along with the message already there to allow Accessibility access.

 

[Wowfunhappy]

I wonder if Full Disk Access isn't always required, and it depends on something esoteric (and possibly known only to Apple)? It wouldn't be the first time TCC acted inconsistently.

(I can't say myself, because I haven't used any version of macOS newer than Mojave, except for a brief test with Big Sur in June before VMWare was compatible.)

 

[tekfranz]

I wonder if Full Disk Access isn't always required, and it depends on something esoteric (and possibly known only to Apple)? It wouldn't be the first time TCC acted inconsistently.

(I can't say myself, because I haven't used any version of macOS newer than Mojave, except for a brief test with Big Sur in June before VMWare was compatible.)

Here is the VMWare support Article that helped me.

Broadcom Community - VMTN, Mainframe, Symantec, Carbon Black

Broadcom Community - VMTN, Mainframe, Symantec, Carbon Black

communities.vmware.com

 

[tekfranz]

I just received an update to Parallels 15 adding Big Sur support, so i wonder if this is just Parallels pushing the upgrade cycle. Sounds like 15 will continue to work in Big Sur. https://kb.parallels.com/124724

 

[Dr_Charles_Forbin]

Be wary.. I just did the jump from Fusion to Parallels. I couldnt see paying $150 for a commercial License for player plus support (which is now $50/yr).. especially with all the posts about how Parallels has improved so much over the past few years. Imagine my surprise when product activation was triggered upon migrating the VM from Fusion to Parallels. Unless you have a clean key or a digital entitlement (which I thought I had), MS does not want to hear it. I’ll admit that my license may have been a bit sketchy but I got a very rude “the product has exceeded the activation limit - go back to where you purchased it and get a refund or a new key” from MS. Now I’m stuck buying a new key. Just know it going in.

 

[tekfranz]

Be wary.. I just did the jump from Fusion to Parallels. I couldnt see paying $150 for a commercial License for player plus support (which is now $50/yr).. especially with all the posts about how Parallels has improved so much over the past few years. Imagine my surprise when product activation was triggered upon migrating the VM from Fusion to Parallels. Unless you have a clean key or a digital entitlement (which I thought I had), MS does not want to hear it. I’ll admit that my license may have been a bit sketchy but I got a very rude “the product has exceeded the activation limit - go back to where you purchased it and get a refund or a new key” from MS. Now I’m stuck buying a new key. Just know it going in.

Good point. Moving VM's could trigger windows activation. Other than briefly running Fusion I haven't run Fusion long enough to see if Activation would get triggered for me but it is a real possibility.

 

[Wowfunhappy]

If you have a real, retail Windows key re-activation shouldn't be a big deal.

If you bought your Windows key on the gray market, it was probably an MSDN key that was never legally allowed to be resold, and that's going to be the issue there.

 

[posguy99]

I've got at least a year before I'll have to worry about what VM solution to use, so I'll be staying with Fusion.

 

[mj_]

I migrated two VMs from VirtualBox to Fusion (1x Windows 7, 1x Windows 10) on my MacBook, which did not trigger Activation. However, when I first migrated a Windows 10 VM von VirtualBox to Parallels on my iMac it did. It probably depends on the amount and extent of virtual hardware changes. Microsoft has a fairly extensive algorithm to determine when a re-activation is required.

I really hope that Parallels is going to continue supporting v15 on Big Sur. I have just recently purchased a license and am definitely not interested in a) a yearly software subscription, or b) yearly mandatory paid upgrades because they refuse to support their software for more than 12 months or more than one major macOS release. If v15 is not going to work on Big Sur I am definitely going to abandon Parallels again and purchase a VMware Fusion Pro license. At least that is going to be usable for more than 12 months and will support more than a single major release of macOS. Which would be a shame given how well Parallel works on Catalina.

 

[tekfranz]

I am trying the free version of VMWare Fusion player again. The migration was quick and simple and the machine seems snappy after I increased the CPU's and installed the VMWare tools program.

I think I am going to be OK with it and like it. The Disk Access was not an issue this time. Perhaps they fixed that or the setting is still there from last time.

I will try to provide an update of my experience in a few weeks.

 

[tekfranz]

Well that didn’t last long. Fusion is definitely snappy and fast, but now I ran into an issue with the mirrored folders not working. I spent way too much time researching that issue and it still doesn’t work. Plus all the Catalina security issues.It’s like Fusion isn’t fixing bugs anymore. Maybe it’s just all the platforms they support and their Corporate background that they don’t fix these Consumer Grade annoyances.

And I get hit with Windows reactivation.

So I reinstalled Parallels’s and the shared folders and most of everything else just works. And Parallels is so much more polished. I am thinking Parallels is worth the $50 for as much time I spent troubleshooting Fusion.

 

[mj_]

What was the issue you were experiencing with Fusion and shared folders? Granted, I currently only have one of my Windows VMs in Fusion and the rest still in Parallels but shared folders are working perfectly fine and without any issues whatsoever.

 

[Ungibbed]

I'm on the fence but leaning towards the $49 permanent license upgrade for Parallels. I love the speed I have on 15 using just Windows 10 occasionally. But Fusion is free and can't beat the price. It's always worth a shot.

 

[drmeatball]

I've been purchasing Parallels + upgrades since version 4. Worth the yearly $50.

Tried Fusion back in the day but it never supported talking to esoteric USB hardware (LightORama Christmas lights controllers), just worked fine with Parallels.

The one thing that bugs me with Parallels is the 8GB ram limitation. I understand wanting to upsell to developers, but it really should be a 16GB limitation with all of the PD focus on Windows gaming.

 

[tekfranz]

What was the issue you were experiencing with Fusion and shared folders? Granted, I currently only have one of my Windows VMs in Fusion and the rest still in Parallels but shared folders are working perfectly fine and without any issues whatsoever.

To clarify, the Fusion shared folders worked fine, but the mirrored ones did not.
The following Mirrored folders in Parallels do not show any content from the host:
Documents, Downloads, Music, Videos and Pictures. Desktop mirrors fine.

Another small complaint is that when you set fusion to allow opening Mac Apps in the guest and Windows Apps in the host it creates Duplicates of all your app. I solved this by filing the Apps named -Mac in a separate folder, but it was concerning to have my Applications folder suddenly cluttered like that.

But yes can’t argue with free and fusion is a cut above virtual box so I am not complaining just trying to justify the $49 upgrade to parallel 16.

 

[ght56]

I'm not using Big Sur as the host and don't plan to for at least a year, but I do use Fusion 12 Pro. I previously had Fusion 11 (non-pro) and went to the Pro version upon reading about how the Pro version extensively uses the GPU, as I have a 16-inch MacBook Pro with the 5600M. With the exception of shared folders, I use the OS' in more of an isolated fashion. I've read Parallels is by and far better when wanting to merge the apps of guests and the host though. IMHO, if I was going in that direction, I'd probably pay for the updated version of Parallels.

 

[tekfranz]

So I moved back to VMWare Player to save some money and Parallels kindly gave me a refund. VMWare Fusion is very stable and performance is great as was shared. There are a few minor annoyances in Fusion and Parallels is definitely the more polished and the easier to configure of the two. But the more I use the Fusion Player the more I am impressed at the core product even if Fusion doesn't have the bells and whistles of Parallels.

 

[Dr_Charles_Forbin]

I really liked Fusion - I’m used to it’s big brother. But I like support if I have a problem.. I fight enough fires at work to worry about this crap on my time.

 

[drmeatball]

Want to amend my position on Fusion. Holy crap does it blow away Parallels now. And it's free. Gaming actually works (not talking about performance, it's always been great, mainly FPV mouse issues in parallels keeping you from gaming).

I'm testing my Steam library, the only game that doesn't work is No Mans Sky (uses some weird 3d HAL Vulcan or something).

No spinny mouse!! No having to switch to gaming mode (which never fixed spinning mouse).

Parallels is better at the Coherence I'll give them that, so if you use productivity stuff it'll feel more in sync. But games galore on Fusion. Wow!

No more money for Parallels from me. The product isn't good, and they just started bombing us with ads inside the program itself. Crappy.

 

[Dr_Charles_Forbin]

I’m finding Parallels to be really annoying... constant pop ups and nag screens. I think it is better at Coherence but 99% of the time I like to isolate the machines. I don’t see the performance gains that reviewers raved about either.

 

[A1MB1G]

I'm giving Fusion another shot... Does anyone know if you can use the same personal license key on two different machines? I have a laptop and an iMac and want to try running Fusion on both. Curious if the same key can be used on multiple devices as long as you're only using it for personal use?

 

[tekfranz]

I'm giving Fusion another shot... Does anyone know if you can use the same personal license key on two different machines? I have a laptop and an iMac and want to try running Fusion on both. Curious if the same key can be used on multiple devices as long as you're only using it for personal use?

Looks like 1 key is good for 3 machines for personal use.

What is VMware Fusion | FAQs

Can I use a single license on more than one Mac?
VMware Fusion for personal use:
You may install and use VMware Fusion Player for personal, non-commercial use on any Apple-branded products running macOS ("Mac Computer") that you own or control.
You may install and use your VMware Fusion Pro license for personal, non-commercial use on up to 3 devices that you own or control.