Installation of Vista Ultimate on my MacBook went very well. After the install I noticed a couple of things I would’ve liked to see. I did lose some functionality, but that’s expected when you’re in a virtualized environment. Or is it? I would think that by now Microsoft and Parallels would have driver issues ironed out. Installing Parallels Tools was simple and it provides the feel that I’m going for. I like how you don’t have to press CTRL + ALT to release the mouse from the virtual machine. I also like the auto display setting when I resize the Parallels window. Other than that I didn’t notice much else that Parallels Tools helped me with, but there may be some under the hood changes. So, let’s begin discussing the bugs.
The first bug I noticed (and it’s small) was that the Windows Experience Index calculator wouldn’t work. This is not really a functionality, nor does it hinder my ability to process, but it’s still something I’d like to know.
The second bug is a little more severe. Somehow, I can only use the “Shared Networking” option in order to connect to my network in Vista. Maybe it’s just me, but I’ve tried several settings. My MacBook is connected to a wireless router using DHCP. One would think that connecting Parallels to the Airport would allow Vista to pick up an IP, but no dice. It may be that I have to play around with it more.
The third bug is the sound. Windows sounds are good, but when I try to play any of my mp3s or movies, it gets choppy. This is upsetting especially when I’m trying to really test out Media Center and Media Player.
I know that if I wanted everything to work fine I would have to install Vista Ultimate on its own machine. I’m torn here and have yet to find the heart to put a lot of money into a Vista workstation yet. I know that eventually I’ll have to, but until then I’ll probably just deal with these flaws in a virtualized environment. Anyways, it’s a good OS so far and i think it does have some real potential. I mean, what else is there for businesses, really? Don’t say the *nix word because I’m not quite sure that businesses are really ready to adopt linux for their workstations just yet. That’s another topic I’ll touch on at a later date. For now, let’s end with Windows Vista is not all that bad on a virtualized environment and has great potential as the next generation business workstation.
2 Comments
Hi there, I work for Parallels and saw your blog post. Vista Ultimate is not supported as a guest operating system, which I think is why you are having trouble. As far as I know it’s a Microsoft licensing thing, but Media Center is difficult for a VM to handle, at least for now.
If you want to reach out to us, we have a support team that can troubleshoot some of these bugs with you.
Finally, keep in mind that if a business was looking to run Vista in a VM, it would likely *not* be Ultimate.
Thanks for using Parallels!
Thanks for posting Chad.
I really like using Parallels and you’re correct about running Vista Ultimate in a business. It probably wouldn’t be virtualized. I mention this in the last paragraph. For me its just a toy until I decide to put up the cash for another workstation. Parallels Desktop has allowed me to install the OS in an environment where I can familiarize myself with it and do some basic analysis of its capabilities. It looks like down the road I’m going to be moving it to a workstation in order to really open it up and get down to serious analytics.