The only “new” Parallels Desktop 12 feature is the standalone Toolbox application, which consolidates 20 Mac utilities into a single menu bar icon. Having celebrated its tenth anniversary for Desktop earlier this year, Parallels encouraged engineers to come up with at least one unique new feature to justify the upgrade to version 12, although the company’s usual relentless innovation produced a mixed bag this time around. VMware marked the occasion by launching Fusion 8.5, a maintenance update with no new features. Last year, both companies delivered ambitious new versions to capitalize on back-to-back debuts of Windows 10 and OS X El Capitan, but the 2016 editions are somewhat more subdued by comparison. In what has now become an annual ritual, VMware and Parallels have updated their respective Fusion and Desktop products to coincide with the recent release of macOS Sierra.
Mac users are fortunate to have not one, but two excellent commercial virtualization software packages to choose from, not to mention less-polished free alternatives like Virtual Box.
