MobileMe is not at all bad. On rare occasions the web interface doesn't show emails, but the desktop and iPhone clients work really well (pushing all that stuff around). Besides, its not just about email. I love how my bookmarks are pushed across all my computers. I can check something on the PC, and if I bookmark it and walk across to my Mac, its there!
I'm also an extensive iDisk/Photos/Contacts user, and it has served me well in those areas.
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As for VirtualBox, I haven't tried it yet. I will however (maybe) do a review of it and see how it works. However, I have read reports of it working for people just as well as Parallels or Fusion, so it should be cool.