Corel still exists?! Good for them!
I just used my CompuServe internet account to look up this story.
Corel confirms it has acquired virtualization specialist Parallels
21–30 of 154 posts
Re: Corel confirms it has acquired virtualization specialist Parallels
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
These days it seems like basically acquire software companies. They own Winzip, Paintshop and Painter, for example.
It's been a long time since I've heard of an acquisition that was actually positive for the aquired/their users - can anyone working on any of these groups share such a story?
On the user side, Corel has been okay-ish with PaintShop Pro. I write Photoshop plugins and I still have lots of customers who are happy Paintshop Pro users, some 14 years after Corel acquired JASC.
That said, Corel added a kind of adware to PSP, where it will display promotions for upgrades to the new version of Paint Shop Pro even when you're not using the program. I really wish there was an easy way to disable it, but I'm sure their metrics show it is effective. Parallels are already doing a version of that (but only when you launch the program), and now even Apple itself is using notifications to advertise products & distribute discounts [1]. There's probably no avoiding it now.
[1] https://9to5mac.com/2018/12/18/apple-push-notifications-comp...
Re: Corel confirms it has acquired virtualization specialist Parallels
#23Re: Corel confirms it has acquired virtualization specialist Parallels
#24Corel still exists?! Good for them!
Amazing isn't it? I still prefer Corel Draw to the Inkscape or any of the Adobe products. I have their PowerDVD software on a laptop which is used as a portable DVD player for visiting nieces and nephews.
Re: Corel confirms it has acquired virtualization specialist Parallels
#25I just started using a Mac this year, and I need to run Linux and Windows for testing reasons. I'm starting to do more freelance work now, so I'll have some Windows-focused work as well. Right now I have separate machines for each OS, but I'd like to just use a Mac and get rid of my other machines. I've played with Virtualbox, but I haven't used Parallels or VMWare. Does this acquisition make Parallels any more or le…
I (used to?) own a student license for Parallels Desktop circa 2012, though it may have expired by now.
In my experience, I could see no major differences between their solution and, say, Virtualbox. There were some Mac-specific features like working well with Exposé when in Seamless mode and a few other UI niceties, but Parallels seems primarily geared towards supporting Windows. Linux Guest OS support of features like Seamless mode refused to work unless you had specific kernel versions and was always several versions behind in my experience. I'm sure the feature parity gap between Virtualbox and Parallels Desktop is even smaller today than it used to be.
The pricetag is usually less for Parallels products compared to the leading commercial competitor, FWIW.
Re: Corel confirms it has acquired virtualization specialist Parallels
#26I just started using a Mac this year, and I need to run Linux and Windows for testing reasons. I'm starting to do more freelance work now, so I'll have some Windows-focused work as well. Right now I have separate machines for each OS, but I'd like to just use a Mac and get rid of my other machines. I've played with Virtualbox, but I haven't used Parallels or VMWare. Does this acquisition make Parallels any more or le…
I've been using Parallels Desktop to develop & test Windows software from a Mac for the last decade. It's excellent, and I would definitely grab a perpetual copy of the current version while you can. VMware Fusion is the other contender, but consensus seems to be that Parallels is now dramatically faster than all the competition [1].
I just bought a Thinkpad and switched back to Windows, so I'm looking for VM software on the Windows side now. Hyper-V is just painfully slow compared to Parallels. If the Corel acquistion means Parallels is coming to Windows I'll be very happy, but I'd still like to know the best Windows VM software in the meantime.
[1] https://9to5mac.com/2018/09/02/a-long-time-vmware-fusion-use...
Re: Corel confirms it has acquired virtualization specialist Parallels
#27Corel still exists?! Good for them!
One of the first Linux distributions I tried (after the venerable Slackware) was the short-lived Corel Linux way back in 1999 or thereabouts.
The good old dot com days. I remember buying Corel stock at $6 and it popping to $32 in a few weeks (or was it a few months, I can't seem to find Corel listed as a public company now to check the price history) on the Linux hype, only to crash down soon after (got out at $8 :) ).
Re: Corel confirms it has acquired virtualization specialist Parallels
#28I just started using a Mac this year, and I need to run Linux and Windows for testing reasons. I'm starting to do more freelance work now, so I'll have some Windows-focused work as well. Right now I have separate machines for each OS, but I'd like to just use a Mac and get rid of my other machines. I've played with Virtualbox, but I haven't used Parallels or VMWare. Does this acquisition make Parallels any more or le…
I also use VMWare Fusion Pro for Mac. It's more professionally oriented, and its GUI performance is highest among the three.
People are also happy with Parallels and its remote access service, but VirtualBox on Mac is only good for headless virtualization it seems.
I wrote my Ph.D. thesis on a XFCE desktop on a Mac (via VMWare). It was basically seamless. I recommend it wholeheartedly.
Re: Corel confirms it has acquired virtualization specialist Parallels
#29I just started using a Mac this year, and I need to run Linux and Windows for testing reasons. I'm starting to do more freelance work now, so I'll have some Windows-focused work as well. Right now I have separate machines for each OS, but I'd like to just use a Mac and get rid of my other machines. I've played with Virtualbox, but I haven't used Parallels or VMWare. Does this acquisition make Parallels any more or le…
I have parallels installed.
I started using it at Parallels 6 and currently using Parallels 10. The latest version is Parallels 14.
Don’t expect much from customer support. I bought parallels 10 just about 30 days before Parallels 11 came out. I talked to customer support and they simply said no to letting me instead get Parallels 11 even though the time period was so short. I understand it doesn’t say anywhere on their website about that they would honor new free versions if the old versions were purchased within a certain amount of time. But customer service is a thing and they don’t seem to care about it. All I I got was a short: sorry can’t help you. And I haven’t bought a new version since. I probably would have if they had offered me a upgrade back then. I’m still running windows 7 and I don’t need all the new bells and whistles new version of parallels offers. So it doesn’t bother me that I’m running a 4 year old version.
Like another comment mentioned, they do use dark patterns. I can’t count how many times I’ve clicked on “Don’t show again” on the new version ad they show you when yours is outdated. Yet it still pops up to this day.
I’ve never used their recommended settings. I just pick one and go back into the settings and change it to whatever I usually default to.
All that said, their interface is a lot more polished than the other software. I’ve done research on VMware fusion, and I always read comments saying that Parallels is better. I haven’t tried fusion myself.
I also love the fact that I can simply copy the parallels file if I need to mess with it and not have to worry about messing up my original install. For this purpose, I always keep a fresh copy of windows on my computer. Whenever I feel like I’ve added too much junk to my windows image, I simply delete it and make a copy of the fresh install and I’m on my way again.
I’ve never used Parallels Access so I can’t comment on that.
Let me know if I can answer any other questions.