Apple recently released an update for 2012 Macs, labeled “MacBook Air and MacBook Pro Update 2.0” in Software Update. VMware Fusion users should refrain from applying this update. We are investigating reports that it can cause virtual machines to stop working when certain 3D applications are used.
Users who have already applied this update and are affected by this issue can work-around it by disabling the “Accelerate 3D Graphics” option under Virtual Machine > Settings > Display.
Well, friends. The results are in and VMware Fusion 3 took the top spot in this year's About.com Readers' Choice Awards. In the category of "Best Applications for Running Windows" VMware crossed the finish line with 52% of the vote in a category with four additional players!
Just wanted to share the good news and thank the Fusion community for your votes and ongoing support.
I am pleased to announce that VMware Fusion 3.0.1 is now available.
The team has been working hard since we released VMware Fusion 3 at the end of October to add some a few new features, improve performance, and fix over 50 bugs.
For long time VMware Fusion users, VMware Fusion 3.0.1 is the first opportunity to take advantage of the new automatic updates feature in VMware Fusion 3, which we hope you enjoy!
Some highlights on new features include:
In addition to the new and improved features, VMware Fusion 3.0.1 fixes over 50 bugs. Some highlights include:
Click here for a detailed list of bug fixes in VMware Fusion 3.0.1.
Updating to VMware Fusion 3.0.1
VMware Fusion 3.0 will offer to automatically download your update to VMware Fusion 3.0.1 the next time you launch or you can select Check for Updates in the VMware Fusion menu to check for updates immediately. Click on Download and Install and VMware Fusion will download and install VMware Fusion 3.0.1.
After the VMware Fusion 3.0.1 update has been installed, you will need to upgrade VMware Tools in each of your virtual machines to the latest version shipping with VMware Fusion 3.0.1 to see the improvements with Unity, Aero, Shared Folders, and much more.
See below on updating the VMware Tools in your Windows virtual machines:
If you don’t wish to use automatic updates or need to get a new installer for deployment, click here to separately download VMware Fusion 3.0.1.
Thanks for your continued support and we hope that you enjoy VMware Fusion 3.0.1!
Apple just released the Mac OS X 10.5.8 Update and we want to let all our customers know that VMware Fusion 2 works great with Mac OS X 10.5.8, including 3D graphics on ATI systems.
We’ve been testing VMware Fusion 2 with the pre-release seeds of 10.5.8, and we’re happy to recommend that VMware Fusion customers upgrade to Mac OS X 10.5.8.
ATI Graphics Controllers Work with VMware Fusion 2 and Mac OS X 10.5.8
Apple and ATI worked hard to make sure the Mac OS X 10.5.8 update includes updated 3D drivers that resolve the core compatibility issues we previously reported. VMware Fusion 2 and ATI graphics controllers work together once again in Mac OS X 10.5.8.
To protect your virtual machines, VMware Fusion 2.0.5 temporarily disabled 3D for ATI systems using the older drivers (which came with 10.5.7, as well as the early 2009 ATI Mac Pros running 10.5.6).
As soon as you upgrade to Mac OS X 10.5.8, VMware Fusion 2.0.5 will automatically detect the new ATI drivers, and it will no longer disable 3D. You don’t need to make any changes (unless you manually turned off 3D in your virtual machine’s settings—in which case you should turn 3D on again in your virtual machine’s settings).
Thanks to Apple and ATI
We can’t thank Apple and ATI enough for all their hard work in addressing this issue in Mac OS X 10.5.8.
The Beginning
This time last year, we had just shipped our first public beta of VMware for the Mac, codenamed "Fusion" and I had just joined VMware and the Mac team right before Macworld. VMware had its first Macworld booth ever and the Mac team talked to thousands of Mac users looking for a way to run Windows on their Mac (or maybe they talked to us get the free t-shirt that we gave away! 
)
The Mac team came away from Macworld pumped and got back to work making VMware for the Mac even better. We added DirectX 8.1 accelerated 3D graphics , the first hardware acclerated 3D graphics in the Mac virtualization market when released in beta 2 in February 2007. In April, we announced we had a name for our Mac product: VMware Fusion (TM). In June, with beta 4 we introduced Unity , the most seamless way to run Windows applications like Mac applications. In the end, there were over 250,000 beta downloads of VMware Fusion before we launched VMware Fusion 1.0.
The Launch
On August 6, 2007 we launched VMware Fusion 1.0 and brought the following exclusive features to the Mac platform that still aren’t shipping today in other products including a Cocoa-native user interface with customizable toolbars, support for 2-way Virtual SMP for multiple processors in a virtual machine, ability to run both 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems in a virtual machine, and no limits on the number of virtual machines runnings at a time, you are limited only by available memory.
The Dot Release
In November 2007, we released VMware Fusion 1.1 which added experimental support for DirectX 9.0 (without shaders) 3D graphics, full support for Mac OS X Leopard, and simultanously shipped a single installer for English, French, German, and Japanese. In addition, we also released beta 1 of VMware Importer , which allows you to easily migrate your Parallels Desktop for Mac virtual machines to VMware Fusion.
Virtual Machine Importation with Ease
Earlier this week, we released beta 2 of VMware Importer which adds support for importing Virtual PC 7.0 for Mac virtual machines in addition to improving support for importing Parallels Desktop for Mac virtual machines. I recommended checking out VMware Importer , it is great tool to get you up and running in VMware Fusion quickly.
It was been an incredibly busy year and I can’t be prouder of being part of the Mac team at VMware. The Mac team is building products that we as Mac users want to use and are happy our users love. The acceptance of the VMware Fusion to date has been incredible. Thank you to the Mac community for your support so far.
Awards and Reviews
VMware Fusion received many great reviews including three I want to call out:
Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal said "Fusion has a much smaller impact on the Mac’s overall performance"
Rob Griffiths at Macworld said "I currently prefer Fusion for its low impact on other OS X applications, support for multiple virtual CPUs, and huge library of virtual appliances."
Daniel Begun at CNET Crave said "From a pure performance perspective, Fusion proves to be a faster performing platform than Parallels. Additionally, in our anecdotal hands-on testing we found Fusion to be somewhat more stable than Parallels"
In addition to the many great reviews, VMware Fusion has won eight awards to date including the 2007 Macworld Eddy! See below for the list of awards won so far:
2007 Macworld Editor’s Choice Award
2007 Pogie (David Pogue of New York Times Technology Award)
PC Pro Recommended (PC Pro UK)
Lifehacker Top 10 New and Improved Apps of 2007
Redmond Magazine Editor’s Choice Award – Biggest \\\\\\"Wow\\" in an IT product
We can’t thank the Mac community enough for how you have embraced VMware Fusion and we look forward to making 2008 an even better year for Mac users.
Please come by our Macworld booth to meet me, Pete, and other members of the Mac team, we are in booth #2717 .
Pat