Parallels Desktop is brilliant

You’re taking this completely out of context — and honestly, that’s a bad-faith jab if I’ve ever seen one. My comment wasn’t about bragging or hardware cost; it was about isolating variables to figure out why some people experience audio stuttering in Parallels and others don’t. Another user with a 32-gig M1 setup — a system that costs about the same and was mentioned well before I even commented — reported the same issue. So clearly, this isn’t a “$4000 computer” thing. It happens across both cheaper and more expensive Macs.

The context is the comment that I replied to in my first comment to this thread, I did not bring it up this time, only commented on what happened the last time I did it.

The point I was making is that it mite, per what other users are saying about using natural voices; come down to voice processing,or possibly how Parallels 26 handles newly created VMs, or something of the sort but Hardware cost has zero relevance to that. You’re twisting a technical discussion into a moral or economic one, which doesn’t make sense in this context.

I'm being sarcastic, just in case that went over your head, because as I said earlier, and explained why, this whole thread is comedy in the making.

And let’s be real — you didn’t say a word when someone else mentioned their $4000 setup, but the moment I chime in, suddenly it turns into a lecture about “blind people defending inaccessible software.” That says a lot about intent. You even dragged this into another thread previously, claiming you’d been “personally attacked” for bringing it up which, let’s be clear, didn’t happen. But if twisting that narrative helps you sleep at night, that’s on you, not me; and yeah that was clearly meant to be a jab at me, don't think I didn't notice it.

My first comment actually happened before you mentioned your setup, and as for personal attacks on the other thread, if you don't think that your comment regarding my credibility, independence, and attitude, whose personal nature I called out right away aren't personal attacks, then don't let me distract you away from your delusions!

Maybe next time, read what people are actually saying before throwing around sarcastic comments. I’m trying to troubleshoot based on observed behavior and system variables, because there has to be a reason why some get it and others don’t — maybe a particular setting, like being in coherence mode versus not, for example. But the whole “oh yeah, you have to buy a $4000 Mac to not have these problems!” take? That completely misses the point of the discussion. Big difference.

I did read the whole thread actually, and the conclusion that I reached, is that the brilliant software that people are totally willing to pay a yearly subscription for apparently has a lot of problems that extend beyond accessibility. Your attempts to debug it also add to the amusement since I've never actually read anyone put that much effort into addressing their perceived problems with any of the other competing yet free and accessible solutions.

Editing because I accidentally pressed Return on the Subject field, causing the form to be submitted long before I was done composing and switching to Markdown for the quotes.

Sadly, the MacOs software side, with VoiceOver, as we all know is less than ideal. Depending on what you do, it just isn't sufficient in several cases.

Not sure what cases you are referring to, so until we can debate those, I will just assume that you did not research any alternatives, because I've never had any trouble doing anything on macOS. VoiceOver does have problems and so does the accessibility infrastructure, however that doesn't make either of them insufficient for anything. I can somewhat accept arguments about productivity applications like office suites, but not completely given that there are perfectly viable and accessible professional alternatives like Markdown, LaTeX, and Typest, that you can use to produce properly formatted documents with pandoc, or database management options like PostgreSQL that you can and should use in place of spreadsheets. Both of these solutions are significantly more reasonable workarounds than having to resort to computer vision to work around the inaccessibility of a paid virtualization software solution just so you can run an also paid operating system, because as it stands, this is shaping up to be a perfect example of the classic XY problem.

Regarding supporting inaccessible software, similar argument could be made against MacOs and VoiceOver, where apple has brought nearly zero meaningful updates to the screen reader in years. interestingly, people keep buying macs and using VoiceOver.

I think that you are confusing accessibility with usability. To my knowledge the level of accessibility of all first-party Apple software is close to 100%, and that includes the whole boot process which is totally inaccessible on other platforms, so while there are many cases in which VoiceOver doesn't behave as well as it should even with first-party software, I don't think that there are any examples of accessibility hurdles that would definitely require vision to overcome on a Mac. By vision here I also include computer vision in the form of machine learning models or more classical optical character recognition heuristics, which from what I gather, are absolutely required to use the apparently totally inaccessible virtualization solution that people are praising on this thread.

If you have to use a computer vision solution to use some software because it doesn't convey enough information through the accessibility infrastructure to be usable with standard screen-reader interactions, then that software is inaccessible, and this distinction is the main reason why I actually use a Mac as my daily driver. I know that with a Mac I am never left in a situation requiring vision with Apple software, which is especially important to me since I live alone.

I suggest we don't rise to his comments, as tempting as it may be. He's made his views clear and is obviously upset that others do not share them. It's trolling. Engaging directly will only derail the purpose of this conversation.

I suggest we don't rise to his comments, as tempting as it may be. He's made his views clear and is obviously upset that others do not share them. It's trolling. Engaging directly will only derail the purpose of this conversation.

When arguments falter, attack the poster! The reason why I decided to finally comment here was to point out the insane level of absurdity in this thread, and since tackling the subject in a respectful manner did not work in the previous thread, I decided to use sarcasm to expose the irrationality this time. You are perfectly free to just ignore my comments if you don't understand them and for some reason feel bad about asking for clarification, but I think that attacking me instead of my arguments and attempting to rally other users against me is over the line.

So going back to the basics, who here has even tried NVDA's remote access to talk to either cheap hardware that is also perfectly capable of running non-Pro versions of Windows 11, or at least an existing free alternative virtualization solution, before deciding to pay for a subscription to inaccessible software and a Windows license? To those who did try NVDA remote, why did it not work for you? To those who did not try NVDA remote, why did you not research that option first? The issue here is that it sounds like that people are jumping on the paid inaccessible option without considering anything else because someone has been consistently spreading misinformation about its actual value, and then those people ended up spending just more time trying to make the paid solution work for them than they ever spent with any of the free alternatives, and that's when that the free alternatives were even considered.

Dude, with all due respect, what are you talking about? Like I literally do not understand the question you're asking. NVDA Remote requires Windows.

So I'm supposed to run Windows to connect to another Windows machine? Why? I'm already running Windows. I feel like you're saying we don't need Parallels on Mac because NVDA Remote, and I am just confused about how this makes any sense whatsoever. Maybe you're talking about some *other* supposedly inaccessible software, I dunno. But I am clearly missing something here.

As I understand it, NVDA remote is used to control another Windows machine through one's own Windows installation. In no way is it going to act as a solution for someone who wants to use Windows without actually running it either natively or via VM. I've only ever seen it used to troubleshoot computer issues, so maybe I'm missing something. in any case NVDA remote, and the analogous feature on Jaws, isn't for that kind of use case. Better to just get a windows PC or install a VM. Also, I think this debate about blind people who support causes you don't agree with isn't really helping. Not that I necessarily disagree, and one should try to put one's money where one's mouth is But at the end of the day we all use what works, and even principles have to bow to necessity sometimes. I hope this isn't taken as a personal attack. Arguably, I don't have any stake in this; I use VMWare and it mostly works ... for now. but at some point, probably when VMWare fusion becomes quite unusable I may be forced to move to another VM, so I keep an eye on this thread.

Dude, with all due respect, what are you talking about? Like I literally do not understand the question you're asking. NVDA Remote requires Windows.

I'm talking about an earlier comment to this thread, in which I pointed out the ridiculousness of potentially needing a $4000 computer with a $60 inaccessible software yearly subscription to run a $200 operating system, and all this just to get remotely close to the experience of using a $120 computer that already ships with everything. It's clear to me that your lack of understanding stems from replying without contextualizing yourself with the thread.

So I'm supposed to run Windows to connect to another Windows machine? Why? I'm already running Windows. I feel like you're saying we don't need Parallels on Mac because NVDA Remote, and I am just confused about how this makes any sense whatsoever. Maybe you're talking about some other supposedly inaccessible software, I dunno. But I am clearly missing something here.

No, there are several unofficial NVDA Remote Access clients available to choose from for all kinds of platforms. I've never used them so I'm not claiming that they actually work, but apparently so has no one else on this thread, because from what I gather paying to debug inaccessible proprietary software makes a lot more sense than looking for viable alternatives.

Hi all,

Let's please try and get this thread back to supporting users of Parallels. While Parallels obviously is not the solution for everyone wanting or needing to run Windows on a Mac, it does have a user base in our community who has gotten it to work to their satisfaction. Whether or not to support the company given their seeming uninterest in accessibility is a worthy debate... For its own dedicated thread, and anyone who wishes to continue this debate is welcome to create such a topic.

The topic of this thread is the display of praise for an inaccessible proprietary paid virtualization solution that apparently is also broken in some cases, so my apologies for tackling it head on!