3 ms·

I'm not a dev, but for my particular use case this is my current observation: Running Windows or Linux as a VM in macOS has terrible performance in VirtualBox

I'm not a dev, but for my particular use case this is my current observation: Running Windows or Linux as a VM in macOS has terrible performance in VirtualBox right now (people are discussing it at length in VirtualBox forums). The expensive software Parallels is the only way for it to be usable. VMware is maybe OK, I don't use it much and only briefly tried it the other day. It seems if you want to run Windows or Linux as a guest VM, it's better to make Linux your host OS than Mac. I also increasingly prefer open-source software, so VirtualBox at the very least is desirable. On macOS, that solution is not adequate right now.

_ph_ 6y ago
I only had good experiences with VMware on the Mac. You should give it a try. I prefer it to Parallels for the listed reasons.
- sgerenser 6y ago
  I’ve been using VMWare Fusion since version 3 or so for work running Linux dev environments. It has generally worked great, which is more than I can say for VirtualBox. I do hope there will be a way to run x86 Linux VMs on Apple Silicon but not holding my breath.
  - jagger27 6y ago
    Fusion Pro doesn’t have to be expensive either. It’s easy to find $5 gray market keys on eBay.
    - sgerenser 6y ago
      Wouldn’t know about that since I have no reason to pirate professional software, my company pays for the tools I need to do my job.
wil421 6y ago
Virtual box has always been a sub par experience on both Mac and Windows. Parallels is the best. I stopped doing VMs and just ssh or Remote Desktop to my Linux and Windows boxes. For a little while I was running a small ESXI server.
jiripospisil 6y ago
> Running Windows or Linux as a VM in macOS has terrible performance in VirtualBox right now (people are discussing it at length in VirtualBox forums). That's my experience as well. Running macOS VM is even worse. My understanding is that it's because all of these rely heavily on 3D acceleration for the GUI and VirtualBox's acceleration support has not worked properly for a few years now. It's slightly better if you run VirtualBox in the low resolution mode but still not ideal (and of course the graphics are... low resolution). It's quite obvious that macOS hosts are not a priority for Oracle, I mean, a few VirtualBox releases couldn't even be installed (missing notarizations and one other occasion I cannot remember right now) and Oracle noticed only after people started complaining on the forums... These says I use VirtualBox but in the headless mode and I connect to it via SSH and VS Code's SSH remote extension.
overcast 6y ago
Virtualbox is shit, agreed. Try Fusion, specifically the Technical Previews. They are free, and run like a dream(you can turn off debugging). https://blogs.vmware.com/teamfusion/2020/07/fusion-big-sur-tech-preview.html https://blogs.vmware.com/teamfusion/2020/07/fusion-big-sur-t...

_ph_ 6y ago

I only had good experiences with VMware on the Mac. You should give it a try. I prefer it to Parallels for the listed reasons.

sgerenser 6y ago
I’ve been using VMWare Fusion since version 3 or so for work running Linux dev environments. It has generally worked great, which is more than I can say for VirtualBox. I do hope there will be a way to run x86 Linux VMs on Apple Silicon but not holding my breath.
- jagger27 6y ago
  Fusion Pro doesn’t have to be expensive either. It’s easy to find $5 gray market keys on eBay.
  - sgerenser 6y ago
    Wouldn’t know about that since I have no reason to pirate professional software, my company pays for the tools I need to do my job.

wil421 6y ago

Virtual box has always been a sub par experience on both Mac and Windows. Parallels is the best. I stopped doing VMs and just ssh or Remote Desktop to my Linux and Windows boxes. For a little while I was running a small ESXI server.

jiripospisil 6y ago

> Running Windows or Linux as a VM in macOS has terrible performance in VirtualBox right now (people are discussing it at length in VirtualBox forums). That's my experience as well. Running macOS VM is even worse. My understanding is that it's because all of these rely heavily on 3D acceleration for the GUI and VirtualBox's acceleration support has not worked properly for a few years now. It's slightly better if you run VirtualBox in the low resolution mode but still not ideal (and of course the graphics are... low resolution). It's quite obvious that macOS hosts are not a priority for Oracle, I mean, a few VirtualBox releases couldn't even be installed (missing notarizations and one other occasion I cannot remember right now) and Oracle noticed only after people started complaining on the forums... These says I use VirtualBox but in the headless mode and I connect to it via SSH and VS Code's SSH remote extension.

overcast 6y ago

Virtualbox is shit, agreed. Try Fusion, specifically the Technical Previews. They are free, and run like a dream(you can turn off debugging). https://blogs.vmware.com/teamfusion/2020/07/fusion-big-sur-tech-preview.html https://blogs.vmware.com/teamfusion/2020/07/fusion-big-sur-t...