Parallels Desktop 5 Ups the Ante and Beats Fusion
Amazing, just days after VMware ships their brand new version of Fusion which includes full support for Windows 7 Aero out of nowhere comes Parallels Desktop 5. At first I was skeptical. How can the company that owns the server virtualization crown with ESX sever possible be beat by upstart Parallels? Well, Parallels has one it. Speed, performance, memory usage, it is all better in Parallels Desktop 5.
Don’t believe me? Give them both a try in a head to head battle.

Parallels running Windows 7 with full Aero Glass.

The list of Parallels virtual machines.

Parallels settings. Notice the nice touches like Gestures and Apple remote settings.
Vmware Fusion 3.0 (Full Aero Support with Windows 7)
Just grabbed the release of VMWare Fusion 3.0 which was released today at Midnight.
Full 64 Bit support under Snow Leopard, and full support for Aero Graphics with Windows 7.

NOTE: If you are wondering how to turn Aero on for an existing VM? Make sure you change the VM type to Windows 7 from Server 2008 or Vista. Install the new VMWare Tools to update the drivers. After a reboot make sure you go into the computer properties and update the windows experience rating. This will take a few seconds and when it is done you will have all the Aero goodness.
Ballmer misses huge chance to claim tablet win… news at 11.
Interesting that when asked Ballmer blew off any kind of opportunity to claim a thought share win on the tablet computing front…
When asked about the rumored Courier tablet book, Ballmer claims to have never seen the video and to only have heard details of the rumor. He does, however, hint at possible inside knowledge of the dual-screen, multi-touch device.
“I hope somebody does stuff like that,” he says.
[From Ballmer: Win Mobile 7 will bring Zune features | Electronista]
I suspect that when Ballmer says “somebody” everyone reads Apple… but that may just be me
10 Years of Virtual Machine Performance (Semi) Demystified | Engine Yard Blog
First, a solid statement: virtualization has always levied a CPU “tax.” Early on, this was very high, recently not so much. Probably the most comprehensive recent non-vendor benchmark of performance vs. native is AnandTech’s, which recently showed anywhere from a 2% to a 7% CPU tax on a fully loaded system running mixed workload 4-CPU virtual machines on recent hardware.
This blog post from Engine Yard shows the evolution of x86 virtualization technology and tackles the CPU tax imposed by Virtualization technologies over time. A must read if you are implementing big virtualization projects.
Collaborative Business Process Design using Google Wave
Salesforce.com show how to connect Google Wave with Force.com’s Service Cloud
Think next generation chat services with any type of incident management or service request management system. Wave will create the types of hybrid solutions we could only dream of creating before by mashing up Instant Messaging and Email. Amazing!
Apple, how about allowing iPhone Apps to run on the Mac?
Dear Apple,
With all those great applications (and games) out there why not let the mac run them as well? How about letting us use our laptop touchpads as a controller? Think instant apps expansion for your platform!!! Thanks, Shawn
