Finally! We can run Windows/Linux VMs on top of OS X! Free 45 Day trial! Check out this video.

Parallels Workstation 2.1 Beta for Mac OS X offers users a number of important features, including:

• Broad OS Support - Use any version of Windows (3.1, 3.11, 95, 98, Me, 2000, NT, XP, 2003), any Linux distribution, FreeBSD, Solaris, OS/2, eComStation, or MS-DOS in secure virtual machines running alongside Mac OS X.
• Great Performance - Driven by full support for dual-core processors and Intel Virtualization Technology (included in almost every new Intel-powered Mac), virtual machines created using Parallels Workstation 2.1 Beta offer near-native performance and rock-solid stability.
• Unmatched Ease of Use - Download the program and install it with a single click. Build a virtual machine in seconds using helpful wizards. Configure virtual machines using a simple web-inspired interface.
• Works on any Intel-powered Mac - Any Intel Powered Macintosh running OS X 10.4.4 or higher is compatible with Parallels Workstation 2.1.

In related news, PC World has first impressions of what it's like to run Windows with Boot Camp, the recently announced official dual-boot software for the Intel Macs.

Back in Windows, I got right down to business and installed a few games to put the graphics and sound support to the test. The quick and dirty verdict on performance? Most impressive. Doom 3 and Far Cry both ran smoothly with high-end graphics options turned on. In both cases, I had to tweak visual settings manually, since the games automatically set themselves to very low settings. Far Cry, for example, autodetected very low settings, but it ran without a hitch when I bumped the resolution up to 1280 by 720, with all visual quality options set to "High."

Our 20-inch iMac came with a 2.0-GHz Core Duo processor, 1GB of RAM, and an ATI Radeon X1600 graphics card with 128MB of GDDR3 memory. That's roughly equivalent to a high-end laptop machine, and anecdotally the performance I obtained was about what I'd have expected from that type of PC.