The VMware Fusion 3 desktop virtualization tool is a solid performer but offers very few ‘firsts’ in its competitive space.

By Cameron Sturdevant

VMware Fusion 3 looks for existing virtualization products, including Boot Camp partitions and pre-existing virtual machines. Here you see the menu options to install Windows or other operating systems in a new virtual machine; to migrate an exisiting PC to a virtual machine on the Mac; or to download a trial virtual machine from VMware.

VMware Fusion 3’s migration process is similar to that of Parallels Desktop Switch to Mac Edition. (See my review here.)

After installing VMware Fusion on my test MacBook Pro, I installed the PC migration agent on the PC.

I installed the VMware Fusion 3 migration agent on the PC that was to be made into a virtual machine on the Mac.

By default, the Fusion migration agent can use Apple Bonjour.

The PC migration client generated a code for connection to the Mac.

I entered the code in the migration wizard on the Mac. Both the Mac and PC were connected to the same network.

The migration agent used the PC credentials to authorize the connection between the two physical systems.

Here, I specified where the saved PC should be stored.

After entering the administrator credentials on my Mac system, the transfer process took about 20 minutes.

Here is my Windows virtual machine, including the operating system and all applications and files.

I created a Windows 7 system to see how well the default settings for creating Windows virtual machines worked for my Mac.

VMware Fusion offers the choice of more seamless or more integrated operation of the Windows 7 virtual machine.

At the end of the mostly automated process of installing a new Windows 7 Ultimate virtual machine, VMware Fusion installed the VMware tools that are needed for easier keyboard, display and mouse operations, as well as for integrated file sharing between the physical and virtual system.

Here, I’m getting ready to lose a game of Solitaire in the Unity view.