I'm currently running version build 1922 RC2 on a MacBook 2GHz with 2GB RAM. When my Windows XP VM starts it runs fine but after a few minutes the virtual CPU shows 100% and in Activity Monitor in OS X it shows Parallels using 106% CPU! Any ideas on what could be causing this?
This means something in XP is maxing the processor. The 106% CPU on the Mac side just means that the program is using 100% of one core and 6% of the other one. The 6% overhead is probably just the virtual machine overhead. Open the task manager in XP and see what is using all your CPU.
In the task manager it's a bunch of different processes like internet explorer and task manager that are taking big junks of CPU time. The processes that are hogging CPU time are changing every second so it isn't just one process that is causing the 100% CPU.
I found the problem with Parallels using so much CPU. When I originally installed Parallels I had only 512MB of RAM. I later upgraded to 2GB of RAM but I didn't realize there is a perferences setting for how much RAM Parellels can use for the VMs. Once I set it to the max available Parallels has been running very fast!
