Well, I have a MacBook Pro Dual Core 2. I installed Paralles and XP. Everything has been just fine. However, suddenly, it looks like the hard disk image got full. I started getting some warning telling me to cancel and it would shut down Parallels. I went and deleted files from my local harddrive on the Mac. Nothing to do with the parallels files. Now, I get this error when I try to open the virtual machine: File /Users/carloscorzo/Library/Parallels/winxp/winxp.pvs seems to be not a valid Parallels virtual machine configuration file! When I look in the directory that was created for that virtual machine, I see unattended.fdd - 1.4M winxp.hdd - 7.47G winxp.pvs - 0K which I assume is my problem I don't want to do anything and jeapordize losing the data and the settings that I have been setting up on my parallels virtual machine. Did I lose everything or can someone suggest a way to get this back? Thanks.
Nope, All you need to do is create a New VM and when you get to the hard drive portion, you can set it to the .hdd file that is located in that directory. Basically, just the Parallels configuration file was lost that has your VM settings for how Parallels works (Shared folder settings, resolution, etc). Here's what you do. 1. Click File -> New 2. Select "Custom" 3. OS Type: Windows, Version: Windows XP 4. Set the amount of ram you want. 5. Next screen, choose "Use an existing hard disk image" 6. Select your .hdd file that was in your old directory 7. Choose your networking type 8. give a name to your new Virtual Machine 9. Choose the type of CDROM (this isn't important, just chose CDROM/DVD 10. Click Finish That should do it! You may have to edit some preferences if you changed anything in the parallels VM preferences from your original install. You will NOT have lost your WindowsXP install and your files on your XP disk.
If your pvs file is trashed (very strange) you can create a new VM, but don't install a guest. Edit the VM configuration so it points to your old .hdd file. This should allow you to start your VM. If you really are out of virtual HD space, you can use the image tool to expand your virtual HD then use one of the methods in the sticky thread near the top of the forum to expand the Windows partition within the hdd file.
I tried this and is said insert Windows XP CD so I got scared and broke off the creation of a new VM tried again but could not boot from the Windowss installation cd to repair the dameged image Hugh W
You don't need to insert the Windows CD. I know ti asks you but you should be able to cancel out of it. I've tried this myself on a seperate XP. I nuked my PVS file and followed my steps and was able to regain access to XP. Remember, it's not your XP image that's damaged. The data on it is fine, XP is fine, everything is fine. It's simply that the .pvs file (which has the settings parallels uses, like I mentioned in my original post) was corrupted. Corrupting a .pvs file does not corrupt your Windows XP install. Also, if you want to be on the safe side, just make a copy of your .hdd file and place it somewhere safe, that way, if something should happen later on, you can revert back to your original file.
