Bootcamp is nice, but Virtualization is better. This is what almost everyone in the mac user community have been waiting for.
Parallels is already selling a virtualization product for Intel based Macs for last few months and has an edge over VMware in the world. But VMware’s large user base from the windows and linux community, can disturb Parallels’ lead in this market segment almost overnight.
VMware had been the defacto standard in PC-virtualization for few years until Microsoft came along. Recently it came out with a free version of its product called VMware Player which could “play” virtual machines created by its non-free products. While its possible that VMware may not release VMware Player for free in the Mac world, it might price itself low enough to compete with Parallels.
VMware’s latest move kind of confirms what Parallels has been betting on for all this while, that the Mac running on Intel will lead to more Windows users to buy and experiment with Apple products. Infact Steve Jobs has a lot to gloat about during tomorrows Keynote address, since VMware’s this move wouldn’t have been possible without the switch from PowerPC to Intel.
“The research report looks at significant OS X threats including local, remote and kernel vulnerabilities and discusses overall system design weaknesses that contribute to insecurities on the Mac platform. The document also reviews the current state of malicious code, discussing the presence of several viruses and worms and the existence of three known rootkits for OS X.”
