VMware Fusion 2 Beta 2

[Kaido]

Was reading the Macworld entry on the new VMware Fusion beta:

http://www.macworld.com/articl...65/2008/07/vmware.html

Caught this juicy little tidbit:

"Other changes in Fusion 2 beta 2 include the ability to run up to four virtual CPUs on a VM, the ability to run Mac OS X Server in a virtual machine, and support for VMrun command line scripting."

:Q


That's some excellent news! Big features:

+ Run OS X Server in a VM
+ Up to 4 virtual CPUs in a VM (Hackintosh anyone?)
+ 1080p support (XP & Vista)
+ Improved 3D support & Full-screen mode for gaming
+ VMDKMounter for mounting powered-off Windows virtual machines (access files without booting the VM)
+ Optimizations for running in the background
+ Automatic snapshots (up to every 30 minutes)
+ Cut and Paste up to 4MB between OS's, including styled text
+ Corresponding folders now match up (Desktop, Documents, Music, Pictures)

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

What about Gaming?

 

[manly]

Multiple snapshots and continued work on 3D acceleration.

Personally, I'm going to wait until RTM before installing Fusion 2.

 

[AnthroAndStargate]

Originally posted by: ChAoTiCpInOy
What about Gaming?

QFT. WTF. Does VMWare realize how much I would pay for the ability to play games WELL in OS X. Hell I'd pay 300 bucks.

 

[randomlinh]

Running OS X Server in a VM... only on OS X Server though, correct?

 

[slugg]

Can someone explain to me the point of running OS X server in a VM?

 

[Nothinman]

Can someone explain to me the point of running OS X server in a VM?

For the same reasons that you'd run any server in a VM...

 

[slugg]

So what, companies are going to offer virtualized Xserves? I'm not saying it's useless, I'm just saying that I don't understand why this is being done... could you please explain?

 

[Kmax82]

If you run the server in a VM, you can have multiple servers on one machine. A lot of shared environments do this so that under powered hosting can be done a a 1/4 of the cost of running multiple machines.

 

[Kmax82]

Ok.. installed this earlier today, and I'm really liking the new features. Now it's your turn Parallels! Poke, prod... fight!!

 

[slugg]

Originally posted by: AnthroAndStargate

Originally posted by: ChAoTiCpInOy
What about Gaming?

QFT. WTF. Does VMWare realize how much I would pay for the ability to play games WELL in OS X. Hell I'd pay 300 bucks.

I'm hoping for Crossover Games to have more success in this department. Not having the overhead of running two operating systems at the same time is more appealing to me when it comes to gaming.

 

[timswim78]

That's a good move in the right direction. Hopefully, we'll be able to run regular old OS X in a VM one day. I like being able to test software in a VM before installing it on my machine.

Right now, the only way that I can safely test software is to install OS X to an external drive and reboot. It's kind of a slow and tedious process.

 

[AnthroAndStargate]

Originally posted by: slugg

Originally posted by: AnthroAndStargate

Originally posted by: ChAoTiCpInOy
What about Gaming?

QFT. WTF. Does VMWare realize how much I would pay for the ability to play games WELL in OS X. Hell I'd pay 300 bucks.

I'm hoping for Crossover Games to have more success in this department. Not having the overhead of running two operating systems at the same time is more appealing to me when it comes to gaming.

I agree but playing games in Crossover right now is an exercise in madness.

The graphics are so horrible on TF2 that its not even funny. I hate booting into Windows (wastes times, makes me close down important work in OS X) but I'd rather do that then play a game in low settings that is still buggy haha.

 

[Kaido]

Originally posted by: timswim78
That's a good move in the right direction. Hopefully, we'll be able to run regular old OS X in a VM one day. I like being able to test software in a VM before installing it on my machine.

Right now, the only way that I can safely test software is to install OS X to an external drive and reboot. It's kind of a slow and tedious process.

http://forum.insanelymac.com/index.php?showtopic=96277

 

[Kaido]

Originally posted by: AnthroAndStargate

Originally posted by: slugg

Originally posted by: AnthroAndStargate

Originally posted by: ChAoTiCpInOy
What about Gaming?

QFT. WTF. Does VMWare realize how much I would pay for the ability to play games WELL in OS X. Hell I'd pay 300 bucks.

I'm hoping for Crossover Games to have more success in this department. Not having the overhead of running two operating systems at the same time is more appealing to me when it comes to gaming.

I agree but playing games in Crossover right now is an exercise in madness.

The graphics are so horrible on TF2 that its not even funny. I hate booting into Windows (wastes times, makes me close down important work in OS X) but I'd rather do that then play a game in low settings that is still buggy haha.

I don't really know how they're ever going to do better on current hardware. Really they'd need a dual-core video card or even dual video cards so that they can take over one directly, while leaving the other to OS X. The rest of the stuff makes sense...partial cores on a multi-core CPU, partial ram, virtual hard drive file or bare metal on a secondary drive...but with video cards, the best you can really do is emulate one, unless they can figure out how to take over the primary card.

 

[manly]

Originally posted by: Kaido

Originally posted by: AnthroAndStargate

Originally posted by: slugg

Originally posted by: AnthroAndStargate

Originally posted by: ChAoTiCpInOy
What about Gaming?

QFT. WTF. Does VMWare realize how much I would pay for the ability to play games WELL in OS X. Hell I'd pay 300 bucks.

I'm hoping for Crossover Games to have more success in this department. Not having the overhead of running two operating systems at the same time is more appealing to me when it comes to gaming.

I agree but playing games in Crossover right now is an exercise in madness.

The graphics are so horrible on TF2 that its not even funny. I hate booting into Windows (wastes times, makes me close down important work in OS X) but I'd rather do that then play a game in low settings that is still buggy haha.

I don't really know how they're ever going to do better on current hardware. Really they'd need a dual-core video card or even dual video cards so that they can take over one directly, while leaving the other to OS X. The rest of the stuff makes sense...partial cores on a multi-core CPU, partial ram, virtual hard drive file or bare metal on a secondary drive...but with video cards, the best you can really do is emulate one, unless they can figure out how to take over the primary card.

Not really, Wine and WineX/Cedega have run numerous games on Linux for years now. Sure, they can only play catch-up with DirectX but it doesn't require excessive hardware. It's easy to throw hardware at a problem but it's a PITA to re-implement APIs.

 

[K6IIIFan]

Should I be using VMware Fusion over parallels? I do not use coherence in parallels.

 

[Kaido]

Originally posted by: K6IIIFan
Should I be using VMware Fusion over parallels? I do not use coherence in parallels.

VMware is faster and hasn't crashed on me yet (I'm still using 1.1 or something tho).

 

[HomerSapien]

Grrr. I installed beta 2 last night. After installing the VMtools, it killed the activation of winxp and stated there were too many changes to the hardware and I will need to call MS to re-activate it. I had previously installed boot camp earlier in the day and had no problems with activating it on a mac book. Fusion was virtualizing the boot camp installation.

Sigh...

Fusion works smoothly so far. I have not tried unity yet as I have not installed many apps

 

[K6IIIFan]

Does VMware show icons of apps opened in windows on the dock?

 

[Kmax82]

In Unity mode, yes.

 

[Parasitic]

Mmmm,3D support? I hope that means Direct3D.

By the way does Fusion 1.x license provide upgrade to Version 2? I just found out that Fusion is $35 a copy at my university store and it'd be nice to get one if it works out fine.

 

[Kmax82]

Yes, they are giving 2 away free to existing 1.x users.

 

[manly]

Release Candidate is out so RTM should be pretty soon.

 

[Kmax82]

Thanks for the heads up manly. Fusion 2 just keeps getting more and more stable for me, and little nuances that used to annoy me about it are quietly being fixed. I'm glad I spent the money on this app.