Parallels, Vmware or Virtualbox - what is your vote?

[kudukudu]

I know the issue of what virtualization package is best on the mac has been debated endlessly, but the only thing I have been able to conclude is that some people have great experiences with each package and some people have horrible experiences with each package. I'm interested in some numbers and figure this place is a better forum for collecting this data than, say, the apple store.

 

[ravenvii]

VirtualBox because it's open source.

 

[MrSt0nEd]

on the same boat ur on,,,
Im new to the Mac world, and my Macbook have Bootcamp installed in it, but I dont want to restart every time i switch,, i will be needing to install Sop cast on windows to watch me some live NFL, since No Mac version yet, and will probably get either Parallels or Vmware, those two have most of the positive feedbacks iv been reading here n there..

but which shall i go with ??

 

[fhall1]

Actually the poll needs another choice..."either Parallels or Fusion work fine"....since that's my experience. I have Fusion on my Mini and Parallels on my iMac and neither have given me problems. I just wish they'd figure out how to run Aero within the virtual machine.

 

[mathcolo]

I would have to say Parallels 4. I believe that they were the ones that pioneered the virtualization industry on Intel Macs, and they deserve the credit for it.

But, in reality, either of the three virtualization products would work just fine.

 

[themoonisdown09]

I use Parallels 4 with my Boot Camp partition and it works great. I've never used VMware or Virtualbox, so I can't comment on how they work.

 

[ElijahPost]

I use VMWare Fusion for Windows 98, XP, 7

I use VirtualBox for everything else. (Mac OS Tiger, Ubantu, Open Solaris)

Either one is great, but I'd go for VirtualBox, because it works just fine, and it's free.

 

[RS232]

I'm using Parallels in my IT Department - it works like a dream. Used Virtualbox in the past but it was a real pain to get 'shared folders' to work... got it working but was flakey. Might give it a go again with the newer version of VB but I'll stick with Parallels which I'm very happy with... shared folders works beautifully!

Tonight I'm downloading Windows 7 Professional 64 Bit from my MSDN Account to replace the Vista Business I've got at the mo... I'm hoping for even slicker performance! And it's Snow Leopard upgrade tomorrow... a weekend with new operating systems! Mmmmm... Heaven or hell?

 

[krayziekray]

VirtualBox .... Why? Because it's open source

KrayzieKray

 

[VulchR]

I use Parallels and with one exception it has worked great. I have experienced only one problem when a disk image was corrupted, but that was in the last version and I have had no problems since (other than the ones inherent in Windows XP). Certainly I would say that Parallels make the Mac one of the best machines to run Windows for day-to-day tasks - backing up Windows in its entirety is possible, programs run reasonable fast, and I have not noted incompatibility issues (even the esoteric statistical and scientific software packages I use are OK).

I have not used the other packages - Parallels works fine, so I haven't had the need.

 

[wrldwzrd89]

I am a VirtualBox user. I use it mostly because its Linux support FAR outdoes that of Parallels (have never tried VMWare Fusion).