VM2Go - A Utility for Parallels Desktop for Mac - BETA

Discussion in 'Parallels Desktop for Mac' started by Clalron, Nov 27, 2006.

  1. Clalron

    Clalron Member

    Messages:
    22
    Greetings,

    I have been hard at work for some months now on a utility for Parallels Desktop for the Macintosh. This utility is called VM2Go and provides the following functions:

    - Lists all of the virtual machines on your Mac
    - Shows the actual disk space used per machine
    - Allows the transfer of a Virtual Machine and the associated virtual hard disks to an iPod or other removable media.
    - On transfer of machines it will adjust the hard drive references so that the VM will load and run regardless of location as an optional feature.
    - It will delete a virtual machine and its referenced virtual hard drives. Be careful with this as it does NOT put it in the trashcan.
    - It will backup to DVD-R or CD-R your virtual machine and the related virtual hard disks. Sadly this version does not span DVDs so if your machine is greater than 9GB you'll need to compress via the Parallels Compressor or wait until I one day in the very distant future add disk spanning. Actually the idea here is to backup a machine after a Guest OS is installed so you can restore a fresh machine in the future.
    - It will restore from DVD to a folder of your choosing.

    There is a very preliminary user guide with this release. The program icon is temporary and so is the website that is hosting it. Help is not in this version yet either.

    Please let me know your thoughts. You can send feedback to vm2go@mac.com. This beta will expire on 12/31/06.

    Here is the current URL:
    http://homepage.mac.com/markmanes/FileSharing3.html

    Please feel free to mirror this file if you like.

    Please do not contact Parallels Support about this application. They are not responsible for any damage (not that I know of any problems) that you may cause using this application. You're on your own--though if you find a bug or would like to suggest a feature I am happy to listen!

    -mark=
     
  2. ajay

    ajay Hunter

    Messages:
    153
    That sounds like a great idea for many. Question for you. You state your software cannot handle installations greater than 9 gb. In my instance, I have an expanding hd set for 20 gb, but I have only used approximately 4gb. Would this arrangement work or not.

    thanks,
     
  3. Clalron

    Clalron Member

    Messages:
    22
    Ah....it would work just fine. What doesn't work is a VM machine that actually uses more than 9GB of real physical disk space. Don't worry--it'll tell you if it can not fit.

    I suspect for most people it will work just fine as they don't really use a lot of big disk space applications.

    -mark=
     
  4. joem

    joem Forum Maven

    Messages:
    1,247
    Toast 7 handles spanning just fine and is what I use to back up my VMs.

    And that 9gb limit applies to a double layer DVD, right?
     
  5. Clalron

    Clalron Member

    Messages:
    22
    The question is--do the people who are switching to the Mac who are also buying Parallels--do they know what files to copy using Toast?

    Yes, the limit is 9GB caused by what can be stored on a double layer DVD.

    -mark=
     
  6. joem

    joem Forum Maven

    Messages:
    1,247
    Ummm... That's a hard one since I don't know them. Backing up the ~/parallels directory will back up all the VMs, and backing the ~parallels/foo directory (for any value of foo) will back up the "foo" VM. Not so hard IMNSHO.

    This is not to say that a dedicated utility isn't handy, of course. I'm happy with toast though.
     
  7. dimsal

    dimsal Junior Member

    Messages:
    10
    And, how do I do it, if my VM image is on the external drive? When I try to copy it to a different place my Mac just doesn't see any files on the external drive...


     
  8. Clalron

    Clalron Member

    Messages:
    22

Share This Page