Parallels has given up on Workstation

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There can be no other explanation for what is not happening with workstation.
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Not quite sure, that I understand, what do you mean by "give up".

 

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How many Desktop beta versions have come since Workstation 2112?

Nobody from Parallels ever speaks of Workstation any more, and certainly the visiblity of development differnces is glaring.

Why does Workstation not get beta versions like Desktop does?

Workstation users are being treated like second class citizens. And that's fine, if Parallels decides that is the most prudent business decision for them. As it is also fine, that former believers in Workstation, jump ship. And that has already happened, just look at the number of Workstation users who no longer participate on these forums, because they are now participating elsewhere.

I expect a firm denial of the second class citezen remark, but look at the participation rate here, and rightly or wrongly, that is definately the feeling Workstation users get.

Without evidence to the contrary, all the signs, or lack of, indicate that Workstation development has stoped. This may be far removed from the truth, but Parallels does nothing to dispell the theory.
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constant,
thank you for your interest anyway. I can't really speak for Company strategy and philosophy - I do my part as support team member.
One thing is for sure - we do not divide customers on any kind of classes - that is what you may call a "firm denial", and it is true.
Support team replies to all tickets for all products we have on market.
It is also true, that we have much more Customers who prefer Mac computers rather then PC, that is why PD support forums are much more busy then workstation. That is why developers are putting their greatest efforts to Desktop development.

 

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Thanks Tom.
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Tom... How can you say this!? There are numerous entries on this forum form people that have paid, submitted support tickets and gotten zip.

So far I'm a happy camper with Desktop for Mac. It has simply worked. But when there is a problem I have gotten to the point where I don't believe Parallels will provide support. I hope I never need it because I sure see many stories of unanswered problems here.

I once suggested you guys take some of the regular, knowledgable using and provide them with common fixes, known bugs, and allow them to be an extension of your support team.

Borland (makers of Delphi, C++ and other development tools) did this very effectively for many years. They called this group "TeamB". All the TeamB people got for their time and effort were free copies of the product they helped to support.

Seeing that Parallels costs $79 it seems a cheap way for Parallels to extend their support. Pick 5 or 6 people in each Parallels platform. Keep them up to date on known bugs, work arounds and let these people help to answer the main flow of questions.

Allow these "TeamB" people to provide detailed feedback on complex problems. IE "I've seen ## of this particular problem and found that yyy would resolve it or provide a work around."

It worked well for Borland and perhaps it would work well here. Microsoft does something similar with their MVPs. I don't think it's quite the same but it's on the same concept.

Mark

 

This is a perfect example of what I mean:

http://forum.parallels.com/thread10042.html

Get a few people give them some inside knowledge and the help will happen.

 

Not a true statement

Quote from Tom Riddle's reply above: "Support team replies to all tickets for all products we have on market."

I have to disagree with Tom's statement. I opened a tech support request, and received their automated reply that stated I would be contacted by a tech within three work days. That was almost two weeks ago. No one from Parallels has contacted me. So, I have to give a to his claim.

 

@Tom,

as a frequent reader of this forum, at least not posting much content here, I must note that those forums have a high level of absence of their support personnel.

I always thought, however, that those forums will provide some basic help to people who come here and seek for help - but this was not true for at least the last few months.

From time to time sbdy of Parallels threw in some mollifying sentences and that's all. I'm mainly speaking of Parallels Workstation, as I'm a registered user of this product.

Your registration date shows me that you are relatively new to this forums and I guess in the Parallels team, too, right? So I guess you did not read all lines in those forum regarding the not existing support to both products Workstation and Desktop. In this case I speak of those postings here and the non answered support tickets.

Your comments or better your presence gives at least some fresh breeze here but again you speak in riddles, too:

I don't think that Parallels Workstation has got a future as your customers already speak out what's already happening or will happen in the near future. They will simply search for alternate products namely Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 (runs perfectly on my XP parallel to Parallels ;-) and VMWare 6.0. The next bang is the already announced Mac support of VMWare.

So you will have to hurry up and react on those comments very quickly to not loose your current customers.

 

Please respond "Tom"

Tom Riddle from the Harry Potter Novels? He seemed like a nice guy too. In the end we learn he was a liar and the personification of satan. Are there any similarities here?

If Tom Riddle is your real name, you have my sympathy. Either way, care to respond to those questioning your honesty and/or knowledge? You can find my diatribes in other threads on this forum, I won't repeat them here. The bottom line is that I own 3 copies of parallels and the company has never responded to my emails OR this forum. Sorry if I seem a little sour, but I also feel... unsupported. Ripped off might be a more accurate phrase.

 

"Support team replies to all tickets for all products we have on market."

Year, right. I have, like other, put in support requests and received an automated reply, but no follow up. As far as I am concerned, Parallels has no support at all.

Art

 

Gents,

Again, I thank you all for your participation.. Appreciate it anyway.
Let me try to answer to each of you.

1.MarkHolbrook

Misunderstanding
It looks, that I used inaccurate expression, by saying "Support team replies to all tickets for all products we have on market." Let me fix it :
Support team takes problem tickets for all Parallels software. We do not have separate support for Workstation or Desktop/Transporter/Compressor etc. It is one team, and this team replies to tickets regardless host/guest OS or product used by Customer. Hope that clears the matter now.

TeamB
We do not have this teamB officially, but we do have a number of Customers, who provide help whenever it is possible - We owe them a lot - it is true.

2.Snowhog
I am very sorry, that it happened to you. If your issue is still existing - please let me know via sending me your ticket number by private message here.We will work it out.

3.Roaster
Yes, you are correct. I am a recent joiner. So I don't really speak in riddles, despite my name I do not know who exactly will announce new event.
Thank you for your care.. we will try to work harder.

4.kelobro
I do not read novels for juniors really - a bit out of that age unfortunately
As for your missed support.. Please, read my answer to mr.Snowhog

5. afore
Automated repply is a part of support process.I am sure you know that.
Please, look to my reply for mr. Snowhog as well.

 

Tom Riddle

My ticket # is 88802. Cannot find the others, guess I deleted the emails. This is the most important anyhow as it is not yet solved and is a PITA. Anyhow, the date on the email was 22 Jan, 2007, which is still a long ways from 3 days.

Art

 

Wish i would have read these before dropping $50 on this. So far it works well with windows vista host and xp guest, but aftr reading here i'm wondering why i didnt research things more.

Oh well at least its only $50...

 

In defense of Parallels I'm point out that Parallels/Win works pretty well. I depend on it daily for several things (I keep some tasks isolated from each other using VMs for security).

As stated, the effort has been going into the Macintosh version because that's where the sales are. Also, the competitive situation in the market made it important that they get Coherence etc out on the Mac quickly.

Assuming that there is still some reasonable prospect of a market for VMs under Windows I expect Parallels will do a major release there for USB 2 support, CDR, etc. Indeed now that the major Macintosh upgrade is released I'd look for at least an interim Windows release soon.

 

Well, it is what I figured. No reply from Tom Riddles just like it is no reply from Parallels support. Really, Parallels support sucks.

Art

 

Did you send the info in a Private message like he asked ? or just post it to this thread ?

Don't want to get into a flame war, but I'm sure others would ask the same question...

 

I can't say that I'm happy with this thread -- I, for one, am happy enough as it is with Parallels Workstation for Linux. There's too much clamour for change here just for the kick of a change. Leave well enough alone, is my take on it. My EUR 0.02 worth.

 

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Pass through USB support, and 3d support, in my opinion, is not too much to ask for.
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And some of us did read the forums before spending $50. The lack of forward progress in the linux/Windows Dekstop version seems to have reared its ugly head since November, give or take a few weeks.

The biggest thing that drives me nuts is the speed of USB. Apparently they've licked it in the Mac version. PLEASE get that working in linux/Windows. It blows having to access a multi-gig video file from an external drive.