I'm not exactly sure how to classify my issue but I seem to be stuck in some sort of snapshot/disk space error loop. It started with deleting snapshots. I was able to cleanly delete one old snapshot (the oldest). I then wanted to delete another (the now oldest) - that one did not delete cleanly - there was an error, though the snapshot eventually disappeared from the list in the the snapshot manager. However, I don't think it removed itself cleanly. Now I cannot start my virtual machine, it says I need X amount more disk space despite there being plenty of available disk space. If I remove X amount anyway, it continues to error. I thought I would just give my virtual machine more hard disk, but it says I must delete all snapshots. If I try to delete the last snapshot, I get an error "the previous operation needs to be completed before you can perform any actions on your snapshots. This operation will be completed automatically." I've seen in other threads guidance to merge snapshots via the command line - if I do that I get an error "unable to merge snapshots". How do I get my virtual machine working again? Windows 11 vm Parallels 20.3.1
I left it overnight, and I think in that time whatever Parallels snapshot operation was slow/stuck finally cleared. The size of the .hdd file eventually dropped to a more reasonable amount. The disk space issues were because Time Machine had local snapshots of the oversized Parallels package. I deleted an older local snapshot and then was able to start the virtual machine. I think now that the Parallels package size has dropped to a reasonable size, I won't have the issue with the local snapshots taking all my purgeable space.
