Parallels today announced the availability of version 4.0 of Parallels Desktop for Mac, its market-leading product that currently enables more than 1.5 million users to run Windows, Linux and other operating systems side-by-side with Mac OS X. This new version of the award-winning Parallels Desktop for Mac improves OS integration, performs up to 50% faster and incorporates a range of security, backup and power saving features to give Mac users a truly easy, fast and powerful desktop computing solution.
Parallels Desktop 4.0 for Mac introduces support for DirectX 9, DirectX Pixel Shader 2.0 and OpenGL 2.0, providing fast video performance, while the Adaptive Hypervisor dynamically allocates resources to meet user needs. The responsiveness to all applications is further enhanced as the virtualization engine has been optimized to consume 15-30% less resources than previous versions.
“Parallels is committed to continuing the innovation that has resulted in Parallels Desktop for Mac winning more than 30 major awards and being a premier Windows-on-Mac virtualization product,” said Serguei Beloussov, CEO of Parallels, in the press release. “With version 4.0, we’re delivering an advanced solution that is easy, fast and powerful — with industry-leading tools and utilities included at no extra cost.”
Parallels Desktop 4.0 for Mac addresses two other primary user concerns: security and backup. The software offers users peace of mind through Parallels Internet Security powered by Kaspersky for anti-virus, firewall, scanner, recovery, filtering and identity protection as well as Acronis True Image Home backup and restore and Acronis Disk Director Suite. These three additions to Parallels Desktop represent $175 in extra value along with a more complete user experience.
“Mac OS X is the world’s most advanced operating system and its ability to run Windows on a Mac is yet another reason users are switching to the Mac at a rapid rate,” said Ron Okamoto, Apple’s vice president of Worldwide Developer Relations, in the press release. “This rapid adoption is supported by applications like Parallels Desktop for Mac, which enables users to get the most from their hardware.”
Parallels Desktop 4.0 offers a computing experience that is:
• Easy — Get easy access to all your applications and data while enjoying the full Mac experience with Improved Windows and Mac integration, True Drag & Drop and Copy & Paste, SmartX Technologies and Built-in Installation and Migration Tools.
• Fast — Experience the fastest speed for all applications with Adaptive Hypervisor, FastLane Architecture, up to 8 way SMP and 8 GB RAM plus 64-bit support for each VM, HyperBus and support for DirectX 9.0, DirectX Pixel Shader 2.0, and OpenGL 2.0.
• Powerful — Get a complete suite of essentials for Internet security, data protection and disk management with Parallels Internet Security powered by Kaspersky, Acronis True Image Home backup and restore, SmartGuard, PowerSaver, Full-hardware ACPI support and Acronis Disk Director Suite disk management.
• Developer and Enterprise Ready — Additional features specifically for Developers and IT administrators include Mac OS X Leopard Server and Windows Server OS support, VM Directory, CLI and Scripting support, SDK and API, remote control from iPhone, PXE Boot, improved networking and VM Templates.
With more than 50 new features, additional highlights include a redesigned user interface with quick access to all VMs, additional Screenview modes, Clips for screenshots, Speech Recognition, Security Manager, Safe Mode, Shut Down Mode and Over 45 Supported Guest OSs.
“The growth, in both performance and ease of use, of desktop virtualization software is making it easier for Windows users to adopt Macintosh computers. The availability of this technology is one of many factors driving growth in the adoption of Mac desktops and notebooks, for which shipments have grown 46.6% between the first half of 2007 and the first half of 2008, according to our data,” said Michael Rose, Industry Analyst at the research firm, IDC, in the press release. “Those users leveraging virtualization software on their Macintosh hardware will find that many of the new capabilities in Parallels Desktop 4.0 represent another step forward.”
Parallels Desktop 4.0 for Mac is available in English and localized versions will soon be available in Chinese, Czech, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, Polish and Russian.
The standard retail price of Parallels Desktop 4.0 for Mac is US$79.99. New users can test a free, fully-functional copy for 15 days. Current Parallels Desktop users can upgrade their existing software for only $39.99 — a 50% off promotional price available until November 30, 2008. Users that purchased version 3.0 on or after September 1, 2008, qualify for a free upgrade to version 4.0.
In-depth information on Parallels Desktop 4.0’s new features and major improvements, as well as videos and screenshots of key features in action, are available here.
Source: Parallels
Another $40 to upgrade to features that they made it sound like would be available in the previous version. Scam?
Upgrading right now. Looks like a LOT of new improvements. I continue to be impressed with this product (but not the OS that it allows me to run out of necessity).
Meh, I think I’ll stick with Fusion and Boot Camp.
one word: VirtualBox
Free, easy to use and very very good. Try it today!
Much better performance with Version 4. Finally, Windows runs with speed, and without hogging system resources,
I would prefer they didn’t include applications. I don’t want either of those products. They suck. This is making Parallels more like a real PC. Now you have to sit there uninstalling apps. Hoepfully installation is optional and they don’t force it on you.
Way to go Parallels – I just completed the upgrade and on first impressions I like the new features and have noticed an improvement on XP with version 4.0
Still a better product then VMWares Fusion!
@ Jamie
Wow, thanks for the tip! Have you tried the NetFlix player with VirtualBox?
I haven’t tried it yet… doubt I will I’m not a big watcher of TV.
I have Ubuntu (Feisty and Intrepid), Mandriva, XP, Vista (urgh) and Dream Linux all running just fine using VirtualBox. It really is an amazing bit of software.
Did I mention it’s also FREE!?!
Just upgraded to Parallels 4.0 with nary a hitch. Upgraded two VMs, one with a 3D app, and it is *noticeably* faster.
Highly recommended.
Wait… Why is Acronis Backup bundled with this thing? (I know, I know… money…)
I use VMware Fusion (which has a lot of features of Parallels 4.0 quite a bit longer, with the release of version 2 a few months ago
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@OBIII-Wan Kenobi,
You know that Netflix now offers a player for Mac OS X. OK, you have to install the MS crap named Silverlight, but it beats running the full-blown Windows…
The Netflix:Mac player, despite being beta, runs quite well, albeit a bit choppy on my MacBook (but Virtual Win is not better
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Hmmm… VMware Fusion 2.0 was a free upgrade for 1.x customers. I’ve never used Parallels, but I’ve been happy with VMware Fusion since version 1.x, especially since it let me import my old Virtual PC Windows XP virtual machine directly (with no reinstallation).
Plus I got a $20 rebate bringing the price down to about $40. My total cost for running VMWare Fusion so far has been the same as the upgrade price for Parallels Desktop 4.0
I’ve been running XP, and older Me installation, the latest Ubuntu Linux, and even got Open Solaris 10 going now. Parallels may be a fine product, but WMware Fusion is tough to beat.
For an Extra $6.99 “However, this does not entitle you to download updates.”
There is a dark side to Parallels 4.0 – upgraded from Parallels 3, and everything seemed to work ok, installed Parallel tools etc. Shut down the vm – today it refuses to recognize the vm/HDD attached to the vm – absolutely stuck dead in the water on this.
On the Parallels forum, there are many people with problems with this. I’ve now got to uninstall 4.0 and reinstall 3.0 with a backup of my vm/HDD.
@ elgarak (and anyone else who wants to chime in)
yeah, i know about the beta player but i gotta admit that i’m not thrilled about silverlight. however, in your experience, does the mac beta outperform the win player in a vm? i used the netflix player in parallels for the trial period and it worked pretty well, not great, but good. not well enough, however, for me to purchase parallels. at that price i’d rather buy the roku box. but if it works well enough in virtualbox and i don’t have to install silverlight then i’d be happy…i guess it boils down to performance…any thoughts?
Here are my notes about Unity vs Coherence.
Coherence:
– In Coherence dragging windows in noticeably **more** choppy than VMWare
– Coherence displays the Windows task bar at the bottom of your display by default. But you can turn it off (I did immediately b/c it’s ugly as sin!). Applications Menu -> Hide windows task bar.
– Coherence puts the Start button in your dock. I cannot begin to describe how useful this is! I’m always putting Unity into Windowed mode just to get some arcane app in the Start menu of my VM.
– Coherence takes the sys-tray icons in your windows VM and puts them in the corresponding area on your Mac (task bar at the top). They are colored unlike OS X icons but I like it b/c it helps me differentiate between OS-X vs. Windows utilities.
– Coherence running REMOTE DESKTOP inside of a VMWARE is MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH better than Unity. In Unity I loose cmd-x as cut and cmd-c as copy etc.. I have to resort to ctrl-c, ctrl-x etc… In Unity there’s tremendous lag when using remote desktop. I use remote desktop about 50,000,000 times a day so for me this is by *far* the biggest reason I’m switching to parallels.
Unity
– VMware Unity often brings all windows to the foreground when cmd-tabing between applications. For example, say you have IE in Unity and you cmd-tab to it, often (but not always) Unity will also bring *other* virtual windows to the foreground. This is a real pain when you want an OS X window next to a Virtual Window’s window.
– Unity doesn’t redraw the windows correctly when using expose. If you have unity on and several virtualized windows open (firefox, outlook etc…), they will appear overlapped and not drawn correctly. This makes expose (which I use *a lot*) pretty much useless for virtualized Windows.
Overall if you can stomach the jittery Coherence window dragging I think it’s better. To give you my background I’m a life long Windows user, converted to OS X a year ago. I’m a software engineer at microsoft so I use their products every day. It’s vital that my virtualization engine be as seamless and unobtrusive as possible. Parallels 4.0 makes that possible. So far it is > than Unity in that one aspect. I run Visual Studio 2008, remote desktop, sql server 2008 etc etc every day and I can say without a doubt coherence beats out unity if you’re a hardcore developer.
ALL of my testing is done on Windows XP Pro x68. My host machine is an 8-core Mac Pro w/ 4 Gigs of ram. No Vista b/c in my experience Vista runs like a pig in real life and that equally translates into running inside a VM.