VM fails to load after activation

I was using a trial version of Parallels 6 for the full trial period. Today I received my copy of Parallels 6 in the mail and promptly used the serial number to active the software.

Once activated, I have been unable to start my virtual machine at all. It was working perfectly until I activated!

Now, when I attempt to start my Windows 7 VM, I receive 3 error messages:

1. Your virtual machine may run slow because virtualization support is disabled on your Mac.

2. Your virtual machine will use only 1 CPU when running.

3. Unable to load the Parallels driver.

Now, I have done absolutely nothing else to my configuration before and after activation. No software / OS updates, no configuration or hardware changes, nothing. It was working perfectly for 14 days and once activated I now receive these messages.

I am running this on an early 2011 MacBook Pro 13-inch.

Anyone else run into this or have suggestions? I wasn't able to find a related support article and I've already tried restarting as per the instructions of the 3rd error message.

 

Same problem here. Is there a fix?

Running imac but with lion. I try to start the virtual machine and I get Unable to load driver. Please restart mac. After a restart still same issues.

 

Not sure of a fix yet.

I was working with support. Uninstalling doesn't work (the uninstaller just bounces for a split second and closes) so I can't try that yet.

They wanted me to go through the EFI steps to enable virtualization. The problem there is that VMWare Fusion still, correctly, says my processor supports virtualization and works as expected. I tried anyway but the loader doesn't seem to work on my Mac (perhaps it only worked on older ones?).

I am unsure what to do and support hasn't gotten back to me yet. Pretty bizarre that activation would cause this. I'm guessing their activation routine does some really funky stuff rather than flipping a bit somewhere.

 

I've gone through the knowledge base and manually uninstalled all of Parallel's components, restarted, reininstalled, restarted, re-activated and now I only get error messages #1 and #3. I guess that's an improvement.

On another note, even though Parallels says my system doesn't support virtualization, it's working very well on VMWare Fusion. I'd hate to waste my money on Parallels (since it never worked after activation I should be able to return the license) but so far VMWare Fusion might be the answer which is unfortunate.

FYI: A moderator edited my message before posting and removed all references to VMWare Fusion. I think it's KEY that I mention it because it actually works where as Parallels says it can't.

 

OS X Lion + Parallels 5 giving me the same error

Just installed the Lion OS on my newish 13" MacBook Pro and got the same error when trying to start Parallels v5.0.9376:

"Unable to load the Parallels driver. Restart your Mac and try again."

I restarted, no luck. Seems Parallels should have been on top of this one - what gives?

 

I had this problem with Lion, but just downloaded the latest build of v6 and the problem had fixed itself.

 

The issue I experienced was similar, but by Host OS and solution were different. Hopefully this helps someone else.
I was on the latest build 6.0.12106 running on OS X 10.5.8. I restarted my computer due to some other issues and started experiencing all three errors in the same sequence.
The solution that worked for me was to completely uninstall Parallels 6 using the instructions in Article ID: 9087, reboot, then reinstall 6.0.12106.