VMware Fusion 2 Release Candidate 1: Looking Better!

VMware Fusion version 2 was a Beta 2 release when I summarized my experience with it a month ago. Release Candidate 1 became available a few days ago on August 29. So, I've been taking RC1 for a spin for the past couple of days. Here's an update on things I've noticed since updating from Beta 2 to RC1. I'm again using an iMac with 2GB RAM to do this testing. Generally speaking, I don't need to run two Guest OSes at once. So, 2GB is enough for my needs.

Windows Vista

I had Fusion allocate 512MB RAM to Microsoft Windows Vista Home Edition. Most people would consider this to be too little for it. However, I tend use only one app at a time when using Vista as a virtualized Guest OS. That is generally the whole point of virtualization Windows on Mac IMHO: You just need that one thing that can't be done on your Mac.

Vista started up fine. So, I updated VMware Tools on it and also elected to turn on the experimental 3D graphics accelleration even though I don't really need it. I've turned if off since that initial configuration.

When using Vista, VMware immediately recommends that you install and run the McAfee Anti-Virus that it provides as part of Fusion 2. This McAfee package includes a 12-month virus database update subscription. This is a good deal if you are comfortable with McAfee. However, I have long felt that both McAfee and Symantec's Norton Anti-Virus (both leaders in the Windows anti-virus field) are far too heavy for the lightweight virtual environment I run Windows in. So, when I'm working at home, I generally choose to install the Avast! 4 Free Edition as my anti-virus tool. You should, of course, use your enterprise-wide standard anti-virus tool in a commercial environment.

The only real annoyance I ran into was this request for a driver you see in this screen shot. A quick search didn't turn up anything. So, I turned off the warning since everything seemed to be working fine despite this so-called missing driver.

For some reason, I've preferred to run Windows applications inside of a virtual machine window instead of using Parallels Coherence or VMware Fusion Unity modes. But, for the sake of my tests, I tested RC1's Unity mode. That's the new Google Chrome web browser you see behind the VMware Fusion Library window and on top of my OS X's second LCD display background. Although the Unity applicaction view mode works, the focused application window seems to handle very very slowly. For example, grabbing the window and moving it around the screen feels heavy, slow, and ponderous.

I should note that like my previous tests with Fusion Beta 2, Windows Vista's Aero effects are completely turned off. This is not an implied criticism of Fusion. I even turn off Aero and Aero Glass features when I use Windows Vista natively on relatively fast PCs like the Dell Core 2 Duo based notebook I used in my old day-job. Windows Vista just feels like it is running much faster with Aero or Aero Glass effects turned off. And, since those visual effects don't add functionality, turning them off doesn't lose anything.

Fedora 8 Linux

I have Fedora 8 configured with 512MB memory too. Unlike Windows Vista, this is plenty of RAM for most single person work with a graphically based Linux. I've run MySQL database server test systems on similarly configured virtual machines with no issues.

Fedora 8 Linux looks stable running under Fusion 2.0 RC1. I have not seen the Gnome X11 windows manager spontaneously reset so far. It seemed to have a problem detecting network drivers the first time I started Fedora under RC1. But, I have not seen that problem recur. I ran the yum package manager to give the network interface and Fedora in general a good little workout. No errors occured during this exercise. So, I continued on using Fedora as a Guest OS under Fusion 2.0 RC1. It looks very stable so far. In fact, I would say that everything looks pretty fast when working with windowed applications using Fedora's Gnome windows manager.

I am much happier with VMware Fusion 2 RC1 than I was with Beta 2 as you might expect. RC1 looks like a good release candidate with a little bit of tweaking still needed for Unity performance and that odd device driver problem I encountered. Thumbs up for this release. I'm looking forward to the production release in the near future.