Zardon

Parallels has long been in the arsenal of many a Macintosh user and the newest version has just been released. I can report it is wickedly fast and I was able to run Windows 7, Windows Vista and OSX all at the same time with excellent performance on my Macbook Gen 5 with 8GB of ram and a 3GHZ CPU.

Version 5 is up to 300 percent faster than Version 4 and 3dmark 2006 Professional test scores perform up to 7 times better for 3d graphics and performance, which was always an issue with V3 and V4.

"As the OS battles rage between Microsoft, Apple and Linux, we provide a completely customizable solution that enables people to use the applications they need with the fastest performance available, regardless of the operating system," said Serguei Beloussov, CEO of Parallels. "Parallels continues to build on its proven track record of innovation, responding to our customers by providing the fastest, smartest and most powerful Windows-on-Mac experience available."

The latest version of Parallels Desktop features more than 70 new features, including a new "Crystal view" mode, which can make Windows completely disappear. The new software also allows users to enable Apple multitouch trackpad gestures, such as pinch, swipe, and rotate, within Windows.

There is now even full Aero support for Windows 7 and Vista through the WDDM drive, including Aero Flip 3D support. Linux gets improved performance from KVM paravirtualization.

Mac Virtual Machines and Virtual PC. Automation and Virtualization Software for Desktops, Servers, Hosting, SaaS - Parallels

Allan Campbell: Heaven Media

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ET3D

Does the 3D speed improvement make gaming practical? Not that I have a Mac, but I'm interested in gaming on virtual machines. My tests with VirtualBox have not proved successful on the compatibility level, so I don't really have an idea of its performance.

Zardon

Its not as good as running windows via bootcamp, but you can game on it yes. You could already run PC games natively in OSX though with apps like Crossover - played half life 2 etc and a few others with it, works well.