Parallels Alternative for macOS

[DrMacintosh]

Hello all, I have a 2019 16" MacBook Pro. I currently have Bootcamp installed for gaming purposes while on the go, however when it comes to productivity, macOS is my preferred operating system. Unfortunately, my job requires a program called BlueBeam which no longer has a macOS version, this forces me to use a VM when I need to look at the program. I tried the ever popular VirtualBox, however Windows 10 clients don't appear to have video drivers on macOS hosts leaving the Windows VM unusable. Needing a field computer quickly, I was forced to try out Parallels on a free trial and do an inspection with it, it went surprisingly well. The VM has a Travel Mode which saves on power consumption, something very important when a 16" MacBook Pro is using its Radeon graphics. Parallels also seems to have a great video driver for office work with perfect retina scaling. My only problem with Parallels is that its a costly subscription at $80/y. 

 

So my question is, are there any alternatives to VirtualBox and Parallels that are affordable/free with good video drives for office work. Thank you. 

[BondiBlue]

12 minutes ago, DrMacintosh said:

I tried the ever popular VirtualBox, however Windows 10 clients don't appear to have video drivers on macOS hosts leaving the Windows VM unusable.

You installed Guest Additions, right? VirtualBox does have a video driver for Windows 10 on macOS hosts.

[DrMacintosh]

1 minute ago, BondiBlue said:

You installed Guest Additions, right?

Yep, enabled every setting I could think of, but no matter what VirtualBox looks pixilated and can't even play back a YouTube video without completely locking up the VM. 

[BondiBlue]

3 minutes ago, DrMacintosh said:

Yep, enabled every setting I could think of, but no matter what VirtualBox looks pixilated and can't even play back a YouTube video without completely locking up the VM. 

What resolution and scaling percentage is Windows running at? I know it can be a bit annoying when running in a VM on Retina MacBook Pros. 

[OnePlane]

Should work fine with VirtualBox, VMWare Fusion and Parallels. For VirtualBox, you do need the Extension Pack and the Guest Additions (which you probably have), then also make sure that you change the DPI settings in VirtualBox and Windows accordingly. For maximum graphics performance you can set VirtualBox to 'prefer dedicated GPU'.

 

Most recent version of VirtualBox I used on an Intel Mac was 6.1.34 and using just Windows 10 (some older 19xx version) from the IE test VM from MS. This was windowed, and both on the built-in display and an external display connected via an eGPU via Thunderbolt (so yes, even that works).

[DrMacintosh]

5 minutes ago, BondiBlue said:

What resolution and scaling percentage is Windows running at? I know it can be a bit annoying when running in a VM on Retina MacBook Pros. 

I would have to crank the resolution to the highest available and put it around 200$% scaling to get anything usable out of VirtualBox. The scaling isn't the problem, its the performance. Even when allocating 4 processors, 6GB of memory, and cranking the video memory sliders and enabling 3D acceleration, the VM is still unusable. 

[Roswell]

Sorry for being a bit late, VMWare Fusion is actually free for personal use and is the only true alternative for Parallels when it comes to being accessible to consumers. It also shares pretty much the same feature set.

 

They bury this free personal version so far into obscurity on purpose, but it's fully functional and isn't a trial.

 

https://customerconnect.vmware.com/web/vmware/evalcenter?p=fusion-player-personal

 

I think the only real edge Parallels has anymore is its somewhat quicker device sharing from the menu bar, automated OS downloads and stuff like pressing spacebar for Mac preview in Windows. Their implementation of “coherence mode” is faster when dragging windows around compared to VMWare’s “unity mode” too.

 

On the other hand, VMWare is free and doesn’t restrict you in allocating resources like Parallels does with its non subscription version.