Parallels hits back at VMware with new beta

THOSE PARALLELS people might be getting a little tactical now that the run-Windows-on-Macs business is getting serious.

Vmware announced its Fusion for Mac desktop virtualisation product yesterday, saying it will upload code this coming Monday for downloaders, and have boxed product for disk huggers at the end of the month. Now, by strange coincidence, Parallels has sent its Desktop for Mac 3.0 update into beta.

The beta cycle is open to anybody with a copy of 3.0, even if it's only a trial version. What's new in the beta?

One: Windows, er, windows can be separated out with the strike of an F9 key.

Two: the image tool can be used to undo all settings, for example at the end of test sessions.

Three: there's Iphone support for XP and Vista for those wanting to link the shiny new devices to Outlook.

Parallels' Ben Rudolph says that the code is “pretty stable” though not intended for production environments and is not being supported by Parallels. You can get the beta now but you've had your cards marked so don't come crying to us if it all goes wrong.

By the way, this is a rolling beta that will add extra features later. The reason we said at the top that this might be a little tactical is that Ben didn't mention the beta when we talked Wednesday about the VMware news. But we could be wrong, of course. Either way, together with dual-boot and emulation programs, Windows on Mac is about to get very hot for geeks and even selected individuals in big business who have the sway to demand Apple hardware.

Virtualisation is turning out to be the topic of the summer. We still have the new Xen release to come this month and the multibillion-dollar bash that is the VMware float is also real soon now. µ