22GB free space but won't resize

Hello,

My XP VM is currently 31GB. I removed programs and deleted files, and the Windows VM now shows 22GB free, only about 9GB used.

I've used the Image tool to compact the VM several times now. Each time, it works for about an hour, but there is no change in the size of my .hdd file.

One thing I do notice -- inside my XP.hdd file (along with other files) are two more .hdd files -- one is zero KB. The other is the full 31GB size -- but instead of just ".hdd," the extension is .hdd with curly brackets around a long string of alphanum characters, like this: XP.hdd{ahk7slekhro--etc}

What can I do to get this resized? Any help is much appreciated!

B