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Fusion or Parallels?

k2k koos

k2k koos

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jan 21, 2003
611
242
Somewhere between yesterday and tomorrow
Which is the better one? Is there a difference in speed?
I recently bought a base model Mac book for my wife, who also needs to run windows apps (not me, and am still on my trusty old PB G4), but like that to be a seem less and fast as possible.
Is the basic memory config of the macbook sufficient to run it well (no need for gaming, but business/accounting software should run without trouble).

Any thoughts?
:apple:
 
lugesm

lugesm

macrumors 6502a
Sep 7, 2007
572
9
Bought both. Tried both. Threw Parallels out.

Fusion was easy to install; works flawlessly.

Fast. Trouble free.
 
webgoat

webgoat

macrumors 6502a
Sep 20, 2007
592
0
Austin, TX
i used the trial of both and ultimately settled with fusion... i suggest you do the same and make your decision based on your own experiences with the trials
 
O

omore1234

macrumors member
Jan 21, 2008
53
0
What if I had to use a huge program like AUTO CAD on my computer. Would you guys still go with Fusion?
 
lugesm

lugesm

macrumors 6502a
Sep 7, 2007
572
9
omore1234 said:
What if I had to use a huge program like AUTO CAD on my computer. Would you guys still go with Fusion?
Click to expand...

Good question. I only have to use a few small programs that will not run (or are inferior) on the Mac, so I can't answer that. It runs beautifully with my 4 existing programs, the largest of which is Quicken with TurboTax.

Hope someone with experience with such a large, complicated program can address your question. I look forward to the answer.
 
R

RainCityMacFan

macrumors 6502a
Jun 10, 2007
930
5
NC
omore1234 said:
What if I had to use a huge program like AUTO CAD on my computer. Would you guys still go with Fusion?
Click to expand...

I haven't tried Parallels but I LOVE VMware Fusion. However, I HATE Windows hehe.

As for AutoCAD, I would use Fusion + Bootcamp, it's a great combination. But I would use Bootcamp specifically.
 
O

omore1234

macrumors member
Jan 21, 2008
53
0
Guys thank you so much for your input. I do have to be honest, i'm new with Mac's and am not really up to date on them. What is bootcamp? and doesn't it come standard on a MacBook Pro?
 
AdeFowler

AdeFowler

macrumors 68020
Aug 27, 2004
2,319
362
England
omore1234 said:
Guys thank you so much for your input. I do have to be honest, i'm new with Mac's and am not really up to date on them. What is bootcamp? and doesn't it come standard on a MacBook Pro?
Click to expand...

It's Apple's emulator and comes with all new Macs or as part of Leopard. As the name implies you boot into it, where as Fusion and Parallels run alongside OSX.

http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/bootcamp.html
 
F

Flowero4ka

macrumors regular
Jan 24, 2008
178
0
k2k koos said:
Which is the better one? Is there a difference in speed?
I recently bought a base model Mac book for my wife, who also needs to run windows apps (not me, and am still on my trusty old PB G4), but like that to be a seem less and fast as possible.
Is the basic memory config of the macbook sufficient to run it well (no need for gaming, but business/accounting software should run without trouble).

Any thoughts?
:apple:
Click to expand...

Hello, k2k koos! You know, I'm in the same situation. I'm choosing between two apps: Fusion and Parallels. I've decided to ask my friends and everybody from them said me to try both, but advised to start from Parallels, because they use it - this prog is easy to install and no problem to work with it!
It's your choice, k2k koos, but I'll start with parallels, because I believe my friends! Let's share our experience then! Good luck!
 
elgrecomac

elgrecomac

macrumors 65816
Jan 15, 2008
1,163
162
San Diego
An issue with Fusion you may want to consider

If you decide to use converter in Fusion to convert your old pc to a virtual machine you WILL encounter a window licensing issue. you will be prompted for an activation key that IS NOT the one associated with the old pc...it is looking for a new license key for windows...so you'll be forced to give Billy of Redmond more money.

I have been told this is NOT an issue with parallels but is a real problem with Fusion. Go to the VMWARE forums and search for acivation key threads.
 
C

ClassicBean

macrumors 6502a
Jun 20, 2004
642
3
Torontoland
Fusion, Fusion, Fusion.

I used Parallels but switched to Fusion after upgrading to Leopard and experiencing some issues. I was amazed by the Fusion experience. It was so friendly, so flawless.

For example, I run it both on my iMac and MacBook Pro. I installed Windows on my iMac through Fusion. Rather than going through the install process again, I just copied the virtual hard disk from my iMac to my MBP. When I ran it on the MBP, Fusion asked me, in layman terms, "Hey, I noticed you're trying to run a virtual hard disk that seems to have come from another machine. Did you move it or copy it? Let me know so I can adjust the system settings for you." <- I am paraphrasing here but that's pretty much what it said.

Beats Parallels error messages, that's for sure.

What's more, while I don't know how good VMWare customer service is, I can say that Parallels offers some notoriously poor support (no email responses, etc).

Go with Fusion. Download the trial. You will LOVE it.
 
B

butterfly0fdoom

macrumors 6502a
Oct 17, 2007
847
0
Camp Snoopy
I'd go with Fusion, too. I used to use Parallels, but when VMWare and Parallels 3.0 were released, since upgrading to Parallels 3.0 would require paying, I tried the trials for both and decided that Fusion had the better interface and had less issues.
 
pastrychef

pastrychef

macrumors 601
Sep 15, 2006
4,754
1,453
New York City, NY
Southernboy said:
It's Apple's emulator and comes with all new Macs or as part of Leopard. As the name implies you boot into it, where as Fusion and Parallels run alongside OSX.

http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/bootcamp.html
Click to expand...

It's not an emulator. Bootcamp simply helps aid in the installation of Windows on your Mac and helps create a disc with all the necessary drivers for that Windows install. Once booted in to Windows, nothing is being emulated. It all runs native.
 
J

jturn00

macrumors member
Feb 1, 2008
72
0
Which is better to will handle these two applications?

Ok. I am about to purchase a new MBP and I will be installing bootcamp. Two applications I am looking to run are Quicken and software for my online backup (idrive.com) to backup my NAS. For idrive to work and not have to backup everything again, it needs to see the mapped drive exactly the same as before. U:\Data\

Which application would be better in this instance? While I am sure that this can be done under bootcamp, I want to one of these software tools as I might want to have the backup occuring in the background while working on other apple tasks.

Jeff
 
sushi

sushi

Moderator emeritus
Jul 19, 2002
15,639
3
キャンプスワ&#
I've had great luck with Parallels, and the opposite with Fusion.

One of these days I may give Fusion another look since so many have favorable things to say about it. But for me, Parallels just works and works well for what I need.
 
justflie

justflie

macrumors 6502a
Nov 29, 2005
890
2
Red Sox Nation
I like Fusion better, I have tried both. A nice thing is Fusion sandboxes your windows apps from your OS X stuff much more effectively. That gives me some piece of mind. Their tech support is excellent and friendly. I have not heard one good thing about Parallels' "support".
 
pastrychef

pastrychef

macrumors 601
Sep 15, 2006
4,754
1,453
New York City, NY
jturn00 said:
Ok. I am about to purchase a new MBP and I will be installing bootcamp. Two applications I am looking to run are Quicken and software for my online backup (idrive.com) to backup my NAS. For idrive to work and not have to backup everything again, it needs to see the mapped drive exactly the same as before. U:\Data\

Which application would be better in this instance? While I am sure that this can be done under bootcamp, I want to one of these software tools as I might want to have the backup occuring in the background while working on other apple tasks.

Jeff
Click to expand...

Bootcamp, Parallels, and Fusion should all be able to do what you need them to.
 
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