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VMware Fusion for Apple Silicon Public Tech Preview Now Available

blogs.vmware.com

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Re: VMware Fusion for Apple Silicon Public Tech Preview Now Available

#11

Post by azalemeth »

protomyth wrote: post #7
stefan_ wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems like a bold move. I would have expected that 90% wanted a Fusion exclusively to be able to run x86 operating systems .

That would be the only reason I would continue to pay for the product. Prepping a VM on my desktop to move into VSphere or running an older Mac OS to run 32-bit software are my use cases.

Exactly. I have a lot of dev toolchains that are basically VMs -- the fact that I can't use them on the M1 is the thing keeping from jumping ship to the M1. I can't be the only person for whom this is true. I'm really surprised that nobody has done this yet, even if it's slow.

Re: VMware Fusion for Apple Silicon Public Tech Preview Now Available

#12

Post by 72deluxe »

656565656565 wrote: post #6

What is Fusion providing that Parallels doesn’t already?

Support for disk formats other than Parallels own format. VDMK and VDI and other formats are actually usable on VMWare and VirtualBox but you're out of luck with Parallels.

Re: VMware Fusion for Apple Silicon Public Tech Preview Now Available

#13

Post by robostac »

azalemeth wrote: post #11
protomyth wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would be the only reason I would continue to pay for the product. Prepping a VM on my desktop to move into VSphere or running an older Mac OS to run 32-bit software are my use cases.

Exactly. I have a lot of dev toolchains that are basically VMs -- the fact that I can't use them on the M1 is the thing keeping from jumping ship to the M1. I can't be the only person for whom this is true. I'm really surprised that nobody has done this yet, even if it's slow.

QEMU does do x86 emulation (and UTM provides a nice frontend) but it's not something I'd want to use often as the speed is horrendous.

Re: VMware Fusion for Apple Silicon Public Tech Preview Now Available

#14

Post by donatj »

stefan_ wrote: post #5
protomyth wrote: post #4

We don’t plan to support installing or running x86 VMs on Macs with Apple silicon. What about x86 emulation? We get asked regularly about running x86 VMs on M1 Macs. It makes total sense… If Apple can emulate x86 with Rosetta 2, surely VMware can do something too, right? Well, the short answer is that there isn’t exactly much business value relative to the engineering effort that is required, at least for the time be…

That seems like a bold move. I would have expected that 90% wanted a Fusion exclusively to be able to run x86 operating systems .

I feel like 95% of the use case for UI’d virtualization is running Windows, and being unable to do so I suspect they will lose most of their business?

I could very well be wrong here, but I don’t think running Desktop Linux in a VM is a very large market, and I would just use Docker to run CLI tools. There aren’t really any Killer X Windows Apps that won’t run natively on macOS?

Re: VMware Fusion for Apple Silicon Public Tech Preview Now Available

#15

Post by kattkunskap »

656565656565 wrote: post #6

What is Fusion providing that Parallels doesn’t already?

I just tried both recently. Been using VirtualBox for work and X11 is super slow. With Parallels, X11 ran fine but I couldn't get OpenGL to work with Parallels Tools installed (actually nothing that used OpenGL would work).

With VMware Fusion, OpenGL worked out of the box and Extreme Tux Racer and ShaderToy ran fine.

Also, in VMware Fusion I could disable all MacOS-shortcuts (like Spotlight and switching spaces) while the VM is in full screen... With Parallels I would always switch spaces by accident because I couldn't find a way to disable everything...

Re: VMware Fusion for Apple Silicon Public Tech Preview Now Available

#16

Post by shawnz »

donatj wrote: post #14
stefan_ wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems like a bold move. I would have expected that 90% wanted a Fusion exclusively to be able to run x86 operating systems .

I feel like 95% of the use case for UI’d virtualization is running Windows, and being unable to do so I suspect they will lose most of their business? I could very well be wrong here, but I don’t think running Desktop Linux in a VM is a very large market, and I would just use Docker to run CLI tools. There aren’t really any Killer X Windows Apps that won’t run natively on macOS?

Windows is available for ARM, and it supports emulation of x86 apps just like Rosetta. I am using it right now on Parallels and it works fine for me.

I suspect they just don't want to publicly commit to Windows compatibility due to licensing issues.

Re: VMware Fusion for Apple Silicon Public Tech Preview Now Available

#17

Post by nottorp »

I wonder if Apple realizes where this is going for developers that don't only do web stuff.

No x86 VMs from either virtualization product means I also need a x86 box around. What does that lead to? I'm no longer a Mac Pro customer, just a Mac Mini customer. And I'll be running Linux as the main OS on the x86 box, which I haven't done in ages.

Are they trying to push Linux/x86 adoption? :)

Edit: at least they were honest enough to announce the transition early. I would have bought a new Mac Pro last year otherwise.

Re: VMware Fusion for Apple Silicon Public Tech Preview Now Available

#18

Post by nottorp »

frank_sausage wrote: post #8
656565656565 wrote: post #6

What is Fusion providing that Parallels doesn’t already?

Better UI, no scammy "buy our other product" buttons in the app UI, no misleading pricing. I always found Parallels to be quite shady.

I once bought a vmware fusion professional license. It came with threatening emails from vmware marketing to renew my 12 months of support contract (which I never used).

So now I just don't buy the professional version any more. And I'm saying both companies are shady as f*k.

Re: VMware Fusion for Apple Silicon Public Tech Preview Now Available

#19

Post by nicoburns »

nottorp wrote: post #17

I wonder if Apple realizes where this is going for developers that don't only do web stuff. No x86 VMs from either virtualization product means I also need a x86 box around. What does that lead to? I'm no longer a Mac Pro customer, just a Mac Mini customer. And I'll be running Linux as the main OS on the x86 box, which I haven't done in ages. Are they trying to push Linux/x86 adoption? :) Edit: at least they were hon…

Developers are quite a small segment of Apple's customer base. They're simply trying to improve the experience of their devices for consumer use cases. As long as you have a mac of some sort and are developing for their platform then that's all they need.
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