Until now my experience with Parallels has been very positive. No problems with any previous updates.

This one has been a nightmare. After installing the new version of Tools the re-booting Win instance hung, crashing the Mac as well and requiring a hard re-boot. This happened over a dozen times. I have now got things working again following a complete clean install of Win on Boot Camp and numerous Safe Mode restarts of Win XP Pro under Parallels. I have no idea what finally allowed it to update Parallels Tools correctly, apart from sheer bloody-mindedness. I have had to re-activate Windows several times in the last week, explaining the problem over the phone because the automated facility unsurprisingly kicked me out after so many visits in a short time.

Reading the Parallels support forums, this appears to have been a problem with some earlier versions, so it is very disappointing that something so damaging has still not been fixed.

When it works it is very good, and it runs some fussy software very well. Updates are clearly not routinely successful, however.

Cannot recommend this at present.