When comparing Better Window Manager vs Parallels Desktop, the Slant community recommends Parallels Desktop for most people. In the question“What are the best power user tools for macOS?” Parallels Desktop is ranked 59th while Better Window Manager is ranked 74th. The most important reason people chose Parallels Desktop is:
Compared to other VMs, Parallels has the best gaming performance. Still, a good framerate can only be achieved with games that have very low resource requirements. A much better option for resource intensive games is dual booting Windows (via [Boot Camp](https://www.apple.com/support/bootcamp)).
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Pros
Pro FinderMinder support
FinderMinder allows you to specify where (position) and what size you want newly opened Finder windows to appear. The default Finder behavior is to remember the last position and size for every window, but this can be frustrating if you already know where you want every window to appear (for example, centered at 800x600). FinderMinder must be running for window reposition and resize to take place.
FinderMinder must continue running in the background for window reposition and resize to take place, so click the "Hide" button to dismiss the preferences and keep FinderMinder running. Simply re-launch FinderMinder to access the preferences again or to quit the app.
Pro Cheap and has a free trial
The app costs just $3 and offers a free trial for testing it out before buying.
Pro Has almost all the features needed in a window manager app
I've tried almost every app on this list. I thought it was amazing how many there were out there by the time I finally stopped experimenting and searching for the one I liked most. I chose Optimal Layout mostly because it was sufficiently extendable and felt lighter to use than the others. There were lighter ones, but those were very limited in their features and customizability.
Pro It's free! Which is fair as it manages only windows for Finder.
The price is right! It comes from a great source of developers who already have window manager apps on this page's list. I am not sure what they plan to do with this app in the future, whether to keep it light and by itself and work in conjunction with their other window managers, or add this feature solely to one of their other fully featured window manager apps.
Pro Best-in-class gaming performance
Compared to other VMs, Parallels has the best gaming performance. Still, a good framerate can only be achieved with games that have very low resource requirements. A much better option for resource intensive games is dual booting Windows (via Boot Camp).
Pro Easy to use
Parallels has an easy to learn and use UI. All important features are wizard based. It requires only a few clicks for the wizard to download and set up the latest Chrome OS, Windows or Linux build.
Pro Can run Windows apps as native OS X apps
Parallels has a "Coherence View" mode that allows running Windows applications as if they were native OS X apps. In this mode Windows is virtualized in background and Windows features like Jump Lists, Taskbar, Start Menu, etc can be embedded directly within OS X.
Pro Best integration ever
Cons
Con Very expensive
Parallels upgrades are very expensive. Even if I bough several versions of Parallels I will switch back to free VirtualBox as they even "invented" the Pro version - mainly doubled the price you have to pay each year to have the software updated.
Con Can't import OVA files
OVA files are useful because they include all of its supporting files. Unfortunately, Parallels doesn't support these useful files.
Con Requires buying a new version of the software with each new OS X release
Chances are that the same version of Parallels won't work with different OS X releases, requiring a separate purchase of Parallels for each OS X version.
Con Home edition doesn't work with Vagrant or Docker Machine
Make sure you purchase the Pro edition (the subscription) if you need command-line access to the hypervisor.
Con Can't export OVA files
One you use parallel you get trapped into a proprietary format.
Can't share disk blocks on two unrelated virtual machines (KSM for disk) too.