I know this is still expensive, so feel free to vote cold, but considering VMware rarely has discounts for this, I thought I'd post this for the few people who would be interested.
Their Facebook page suggests that the offer ends on 9 March at 11:59PST, which - I *think* - is 19:59 on Thursday, UK time, but the countdown timer on the ordering page suggets that it will end at 8am Thursday, so there's not very long left, sorry!
Their previous Black Friday offer was 40% off, so if you can wait 8 months then perhaps they might do that again...
Latest comments (30)
Roger_Irrelevant
9 Mar 17#30
Yeh I eventually figured out how to install it but it made no difference. Prefer Remote Desktop anyway as you can put a shortcut to it on your desktop.
haileris
9 Mar 17#29
But if you are using Windows 10 then you probably have the option of running them straight on Hyper-V? Just an option.
haileris
9 Mar 17#28
I get pretty regular emails on VMware reductions so I'm not convinced the rare discounts message is necessarily true.
cantonbean
9 Mar 17#27
Yeah I prefer fusion out of all the OS but still prefer parallels overall
cantonbean
9 Mar 17#24
To throw another option in I actually prefer Parallels on Mac. However, as I am using Linux and Windows more and more I have switched to VMware only now. Having used Virtualbox I really think VMware and Parallels are a different class to that. I also have had much more difficulty migrating VMs between Virtualbox and the other two but it is so easy with VMware or Parallels. If you are Mac only get Parallels as it is cheaper and better in my opinion but VMware by far the best cross platform.
Also really not sure why people are recommending cloud or server based solutions as that is a totally different area and use case. Good luck running those on a plane or train without wifi!
fishmaster to cantonbean
9 Mar 17#26
I prefer VM Fusion on OSX/MacOS, I like how the Mac is able to swipe between operating systems, just so slick.
Gkains
9 Mar 17#25
Being baked-in is the problem. Sure it's nice that you can remote desktop into your machines after restarting Windows without manually having to start them, but since it's baked-in it is always running and you can't run any other hypervisor. Had to remove it from my Windows 10 as I had VirtualBox VMs I needed to run.
tickedon
9 Mar 172#23
You're comparing apples and oranges. VMWare Workstation is used for local VMs. Azure would provide you with a VM in the cloud. Very different use cases (and cost structures) for both.
edgeone
9 Mar 17#22
If I have to answer that for you, you really shouldn't be near a computer
edgeone
9 Mar 17#19
Just use Azure and be done with it.
edanfalls to edgeone
9 Mar 17#20
What on earth has Azure got to do with VMWare?
tech3475 to edgeone
9 Mar 17#21
I think it's expired.
That's different to this, Hyper-V would be a closer comparison.
BogBeast
9 Mar 17#18
Thanks for the heads up OP
plap
9 Mar 171#17
I played around with Xen, VirtualBox (and VMWare years ago) on a desktops and laptops with plentyu of RAM.
Nowadays I prefer MS Hyper-V, because that is baked into Pro and Enterprise versions of Windows - is the only virtualisation solution AFAIK which supports TPM which I need for the software I gotta run.
But that is Windows software, the IT guys at work told me they are using Hyper-V on Server 2012 to virtualize FreeBSD as well and that ity is as stable as their old VMWare environment. So if you have Win Pro or Enterprise check out Hyper-V as well
qinyanggl
8 Mar 17#3
What's wrong with VirtualBox?
Gkains to qinyanggl
8 Mar 171#4
Nothing. That's what I use.
But VMware Workstation does have far better virtual networking options AFAIK. Also, never got any of my VirtualBox VMs to successfully export into ESXi the last time I tried (but then again the ones I made in VMWare Player didn't import either).
Think hardware support is a lot better too with the 3D graphics actually working (but who wants to play old WinDOS games on a VM?), and USB being better too.
tech3475 to qinyanggl
9 Mar 17#13
I've never found it as good as vmware, at least for the OSs I tried.
androoski to qinyanggl
9 Mar 171#16
1. Oracle
2. Its virtual network adapters can be intrusive and in my case they interferes with VPNs and have to be disabled,, even if VirtualBox is not in use, before I can use the VPNs. (VPNs for Citrix Anyconnect, Cisco VPN and Citrix that I use for homeworking). .
I use VMWare Player, it has no such problems. There is even a workaround to do snapshotting (which you would get anyway with 12.5 Pro)
roycom
8 Mar 171#6
I've had nothing but trouble with VirtualBox for the last few years, every time I open it something seems to break or go wrong. In contrast, VMWare just "works". My license expires in July so this deal is something to think about.
BrianM to roycom
9 Mar 17#15
To me VMWare seemed over-complicated bloatware last time I used it (a few years ago!) and Virtualbox has worked perfectly for me (professionally!)
I typically have 2 or (or more) Linux Virtualbox instances running concurrently under Windows 10.
jaydeeuk1
9 Mar 171#14
Xenserver is free, and imo pretty damn good.
slimy31
9 Mar 17#12
By the way, if anyone wants to look at VMWare, their workstation 12 player is free for non-commercial use. It doesn't have some of the extra frills for the pro, but for spinning up new virtual machines it's fine.
You can also get development instances of Windows that have a complete configured environment that will boot in VMWare;
They only have a few months lifetime, but you can just download another when it expires. They're great if there's something you want to try out and then bin when you're done.
eaxlns
9 Mar 17#9
Anyone able to advise if it's possible to have my VMware in the cloud so it's possible to access from any device?
slimy31 to eaxlns
9 Mar 17#11
You can, but it would be redundant. Most cloud offerings are just virtual machines anyway, so you'd have VMWare running on VMWare (or similar). If you want a host to access from anywhere, just rent an AWS instance or similar.
Roger_Irrelevant
9 Mar 17#7
I use VMware but had issues where the mouse movement within the VM was sluggish to the point it was unusable. However if I enabled Remote Desktop in the VM then just use mstsc.exe to connect from the host it's all fine.
maui to Roger_Irrelevant
9 Mar 171#8
Did you have the VMware Tools installed? That would affect the mouse performance.
slimy31 to Roger_Irrelevant
9 Mar 17#10
I only ever do that anyway. I find some software doesn't like running within the VM window, but RDP into the VM works fine.
twomoons
8 Mar 17#5
I much prefer Virtualbox and use it as home and at work.
jasee
8 Mar 171#1
Yes it seems expensive but it supports both Linux and Windows systems, the last version I bought supported either one or the other (some years ago!) The timer says only about 10 hours to go (at about 10 pm (uk time))
![Fresh Breakfast Meat Box (Using code) @ Campbells Meat [Haggis / Lorne Sausage / Bacon / Black Pudding & More]](/images/topics/208684_1.jpg)
![[Xbox One] Q. u. b. e: Director's Cut on Deals with Gold](/images/topics/208716_1.jpg)
Opening post
Their Facebook page suggests that the offer ends on 9 March at 11:59PST, which - I *think* - is 19:59 on Thursday, UK time, but the countdown timer on the ordering page suggets that it will end at 8am Thursday, so there's not very long left, sorry!
Their previous Black Friday offer was 40% off, so if you can wait 8 months then perhaps they might do that again...
Latest comments (30)
Also really not sure why people are recommending cloud or server based solutions as that is a totally different area and use case. Good luck running those on a plane or train without wifi!
That's different to this, Hyper-V would be a closer comparison.
Nowadays I prefer MS Hyper-V, because that is baked into Pro and Enterprise versions of Windows - is the only virtualisation solution AFAIK which supports TPM which I need for the software I gotta run.
But that is Windows software, the IT guys at work told me they are using Hyper-V on Server 2012 to virtualize FreeBSD as well and that ity is as stable as their old VMWare environment. So if you have Win Pro or Enterprise check out Hyper-V as well
But VMware Workstation does have far better virtual networking options AFAIK. Also, never got any of my VirtualBox VMs to successfully export into ESXi the last time I tried (but then again the ones I made in VMWare Player didn't import either).
Think hardware support is a lot better too with the 3D graphics actually working (but who wants to play old WinDOS games on a VM?), and USB being better too.
2. Its virtual network adapters can be intrusive and in my case they interferes with VPNs and have to be disabled,, even if VirtualBox is not in use, before I can use the VPNs. (VPNs for Citrix Anyconnect, Cisco VPN and Citrix that I use for homeworking). .
I use VMWare Player, it has no such problems. There is even a workaround to do snapshotting (which you would get anyway with 12.5 Pro)
I typically have 2 or (or more) Linux Virtualbox instances running concurrently under Windows 10.
You can also get development instances of Windows that have a complete configured environment that will boot in VMWare;
https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/downloads/virtual-machines
They only have a few months lifetime, but you can just download another when it expires. They're great if there's something you want to try out and then bin when you're done.