Recent user activities on VMware Fusion
- ByteRanger doesn't think VMware Workstation Player is an alternative to VMware FusionDoes not run on MacOS. VMware has released Fusion Player as the MacOS equivalent of Workstation Player.
- ByteRanger doesn't think VirtualBox is an alternative to VMware FusionWhile VirtualBox has never failed me on a Linux host, I have never been able to get VirtualBox working reliably on MacOS. The free/opensource part of VirtualBox doesn't even hold a candle to VMware feature wise. The added extensions module that makes it more comparable to VMware is only free for personal use, and the commercial license is priced like VMware's server offerings, many times more expensive than VMware Fusion Pro.
- ByteRanger disagreed on a comment on VirtualBox as an alternative to VMware FusionVirtualBox is almost always the better option compared to VMWare. Open source and free, works on Windows, Mac and Linux. Vital and important software for running virtual machines, testing other operating systems, etc.
On VMWare Fusion 4 and Parallels Desktop 7, running Mac OS X within a virtual machine is now officially supported. You were previously able to do this with Virtualbox (sort of), but there was no official support for it, so the process was really complicated and didn't work too well. On the other hand, installing OS X on VMWare Fusion 4 is totally pain-free. All I needed to do to install Lion with VMWare was select InstallESD.dmg at the new virtual machine prompt. (InstallESD.dmg is a disk image of Lion that can be found by right-clicking the Mac OS X Lion installer app, clicking "Show Package Contents", and going to Contents->SharedSupport.) That was all there was to it. The Lion installer booted without a hitch, sound worked by default, and there are even VMWare tools available for OS X that increase the screen resolution. If only setting up a Hackintosh was this easy.
Parallels Desktop was far less compliant than VMWare. When I tried to install OS X, it told me that only the server version of Lion is supported. Lame...
I find it pretty cool that apps like VMWare Fusion and Parallels Desktop let you run your Windows partition inside a virtual machine on your Mac. I guess it's a pretty standard feature, but I definitely didn't expect it.
The user interface of VMWare Fusion is far slicker than VMWare Workstation. Fusion is simpler and more intuitive, and it's good on the eyes, too. There should be Windows and Linux versions of this.