What can I say about VMware that I haven’t gushed about before. Yes, I am a VMware junkie about as much as I am an Apple freak, and now the twain shall meet. For years now VMware has provided tools and services for Windows and Linux platforms. Now, however, they offer Fusion, a VMware Workstation for Apple’s sublime Mac OS X. Why now and not earlier? In case you didn’t know, Apple moved from the PowerPC processor line (made by IBM, Motorola, and FreeScale) to Intel’s CPU line, mostly because the PowerPC wasn’t growing fast enough and Apple’s laptops were losing their edge.

Because of that change, all of a sudden Apple’s computers were running the same virtualization platform as Windows and Linux were, so all it took was re-writing their Workstation application to run on the The Jewel of Cupertino. That, however, took a while and in the meantime another product called Parallels had the opportunity to build a solid market lead. I will be reviewing Parallels 3 on The Dojo soon, but I have to say that after Fusion became available, it didn’t require a bachelor’s degree to figure out which one I would be using.

I’m not going to go into an in depth discussion about how Fusion works. Suffice it to say that its a way to run more than one operating system on your computer inside of Mac OS X. What that means is I can run Windows 2000 Professional inside of a window. This is unlike Boot Camp in that I don’t have to reboot the computer and select an OS to use for that session. This makes it really easy to use applications for which there is no available or convenient corollary on the Mac. In some cases its easier to use a Windows tool, like WireShark, as opposed to buying something for the Mac.

Fusion is also very capable at running a wide range of operating systems. Parallels is really just good at running Windows. Sure, Parallels has the super nice Coherence mode where Windows appears on the Mac desktop and SmartSelect where the Mac knows how to launch Windows applications for certain file types, but if you need solid support for systems like Linux, Solaris, FreeBSD, or Novell’s NetWare then VMware is your best bet. I’ve been using VMware Workstation since it was in early beta (yes, pre-1.0) and I’ve found it very stable for a long time. Fusion feels just as stable.

Besides, Fusion has Unity mode which is a lot like Coherence, but it works with Windows 2000. Coherence only does that with XP. But enough of the comparisons. The one thing I can’t tell you about is playing 3D accellerated games in Fusion. Based on my experience with VMware’s products, I can assume that 3D acceleration will likely be very good, if not initially within a few versions.

I have, however, been able to install a number of OSen, such as Windows 98 Second Edition, Windows 2000 Pro, Windows XP SP2, RedHat WS3, Ubuntu 6 and 7, SuSE 10, Solaris 7, and even DOS. The only OS I was unable to install was IBM’s OS/2 4.0 Warp. Later I found out that VMware doesn’t support OS/2 at all. Oddly enough, Parallels does, and I was easily able to install it in that VM.

I was a little disappointed about OS/2, but overall I really like Fusion and applaud VMware’s effort to make a Mac OS X version of their Workstation product for Windows. The interface isn’t as slick as the Windows version. In fact, its a lot like the interface of its nemesis, Parallels, a UI I’m far from fond of. One of the most frustrating elements is that you can create a VM launch icon when you create it, but you can’t create another one if you happen to delete the original.

Solidity and guest OS support is really key, though, and Fusion has it in spades. If you have the system resources, you can also run numerous OS at the same time. I have a MacBook Pro with 2GBs of RAM and I was easily able to run Ubuntu and Windows 2000 Pro at the same time. If you need that kind of support and reliability with a long, richly deserved history behind it, then pick Fusion. At US$79 a copy, its hard to beat, and certainly better priced and more reliable than Parallels.

written by Tyler Regas