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I posted a news item yesterday about VMware's upcoming Fusion 3 hypervisor software for Mac OS X, and one complaint I had was the fact that while Mac users have such an excellent virtual machine option from the company, PC users get the short end of the stick and have one that's just too pricey. It'd be hard to argue that if the Mac OS X version cost the same, but that's not the case. Rather, Fusion 3 can be had for $80, compared to $200 for what PC users would need, Workstation.
I checked in with the company to ask why Fusion 3 offers some sweet features and Workstation doesn't, and I was quickly given a link to a blog post made by the company just the other day, announcing Workstation 7. Whoops... there's one blog I should really add to my RSS feed! Sure enough, like Fusion 3, Workstation 7 will offer full Windows 7 support, along with support for DirectX 9.0c and OpenGL.
Still, even with Workstation 7, my earlier complaints can't just disappear. Fusion 3 costs Mac users $80, while Workstation 7, upon release, is likely to retail for the same as the current release, at $200. What's a PC user to do? You could say, "go to a competitor", but that's tough, since no one currently does VM as well as VMware does (in my experience), at least from the end-consumer perspective. Servers and real workstations may be totally different, I don't know.
I followed-up with the company to ask why desktop users don't have a more affordable choice, and I hope to receive a response soon. Onto the good stuff. What does Workstation 7 bring to the table? For Linux users, of which I am included, there is better support for choosing an audio card, ODD and other things, and let me say, "yes!". Without getting into details, I'll just say that WS7 should be even easier to deal with for Linux users.
Other features include Windows 7 support, along with the ability to run Aero, support for new operating systems (Windows Server 2008, Debian 5, ESX), running VM's with up to four cores and/or processors (limited to 4 threads per CPU), 256-bit AES encryption for your VMs, improved drag and drop support, more efficient VM pausing and more. In my quick tests, the 3D graphics support IS much better (most quirks I had before are gone), but I found performance overall to be worse. I am just using the beta, though, so I'd be pretty confident in saying that the release version won't have such issues. Let's hope.
Today, VMware has posted the Workstation 7.0 Release Candidate. It is publically available for all of our customers and loyal fans to download and try out! New versions of VMware ACE and VMware Player are also available (Player has a new twist that we are very excited about!!!!) We can’t share our targeted release date (so please don’t ask) and we don’t have any pricing or upgrade information available yet, but we don’t anticipate a radical change from what we have today! But we will keep you posted.
Source: VMware Workstation Zealot Blog
I checked in with the company to ask why Fusion 3 offers some sweet features and Workstation doesn't, and I was quickly given a link to a blog post made by the company just the other day, announcing Workstation 7. Whoops... there's one blog I should really add to my RSS feed! Sure enough, like Fusion 3, Workstation 7 will offer full Windows 7 support, along with support for DirectX 9.0c and OpenGL.
Still, even with Workstation 7, my earlier complaints can't just disappear. Fusion 3 costs Mac users $80, while Workstation 7, upon release, is likely to retail for the same as the current release, at $200. What's a PC user to do? You could say, "go to a competitor", but that's tough, since no one currently does VM as well as VMware does (in my experience), at least from the end-consumer perspective. Servers and real workstations may be totally different, I don't know.
I followed-up with the company to ask why desktop users don't have a more affordable choice, and I hope to receive a response soon. Onto the good stuff. What does Workstation 7 bring to the table? For Linux users, of which I am included, there is better support for choosing an audio card, ODD and other things, and let me say, "yes!". Without getting into details, I'll just say that WS7 should be even easier to deal with for Linux users.
Other features include Windows 7 support, along with the ability to run Aero, support for new operating systems (Windows Server 2008, Debian 5, ESX), running VM's with up to four cores and/or processors (limited to 4 threads per CPU), 256-bit AES encryption for your VMs, improved drag and drop support, more efficient VM pausing and more. In my quick tests, the 3D graphics support IS much better (most quirks I had before are gone), but I found performance overall to be worse. I am just using the beta, though, so I'd be pretty confident in saying that the release version won't have such issues. Let's hope.
Today, VMware has posted the Workstation 7.0 Release Candidate. It is publically available for all of our customers and loyal fans to download and try out! New versions of VMware ACE and VMware Player are also available (Player has a new twist that we are very excited about!!!!) We can’t share our targeted release date (so please don’t ask) and we don’t have any pricing or upgrade information available yet, but we don’t anticipate a radical change from what we have today! But we will keep you posted.
Source: VMware Workstation Zealot Blog
