With all the benchmark tests done, it’s time to revisit our original question.
Do the three major players in virtualization on the Mac (Parallels Desktop for Mac, VMWare Fusion, and Sun VirtualBox) live up to the promise of near-native performance?
The answer is a mixed bag. None of the virtualization candidates in our GeekBench tests were able to measure up to the performance of the host Mac Pro. The best result was recorded by Fusion, which was able to achieve nearly 68.5% of the host’s performance. Parallels was close behind at 66.7%. Bringing up the rear was VirtualBox, at 57.4%.
When we looked at the results of CineBench, which uses a more real-world test for rendering images, they were very close to the host’s score. Once again, Fusion was at the top of the rendering tests, achieving 94.9% of the host’s performance. Parallels followed at 92.1%. VirtualBox couldn’t reliably complete the rendering test, knocking it out of contention. In one iteration of the rendering test, VirtualBox reported that it performed 127.4% better than the host, while in others, it was unable to start or finish.
The shading test, which looks at how well the graphics card performs using OpenGL, fared the worst among all of the virtual environments. The best performer was Parallels, which reached 42.3% of the capabilities of the host. VirtualBox was second at 31.5%; Fusion came in third at 25.4%.
Picking an overall winner is something we will leave to the end user. Each product has its pluses and minuses, and in many cases, the benchmark numbers are so close that repeating the tests could change the standings.
What the benchmark test scores do show is that universally, the ability to make use of the native graphics card is what holds the virtual environment back from being a full replacement for a dedicated PC. That being said, a more modern graphics card than we have here could produce higher performance figures in the shading test, especially for Fusion, whose developer suggests higher performance graphics cards for best results.
You will notice that some test combinations (virtual environment, Windows version, and benchmark test) displayed problems, either unrealistic results or failure to complete a test. These types of results should not be used as indicators of problems with a virtual environment. Benchmark tests are unusual applications to try to run in a virtual environment. They are designed to measure the performance of physical devices, which the virtual environment may not allow them to access. This is not a failure of the virtual environment, and in real-world use, we have not experienced problems with the vast majority of Windows applications running under a virtual system.
All of the virtual environments we tested (Parallels Desktop for Mac 5.0, VMWare Fusion 3.0, and Sun VirtualBox 3.0) provide good performance and stability in daily use, and should be able to serve as your primary Windows environment for most day-to-day applications.
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