Am I missing something, how do I migrate a windows vista OS, to parallels on a mac?

Hello,

Ok, so I'm having some difficulties. I've installed parallels transporter on both the mac and pc, and both a networked and running. But is there a really simple, step by step instructions of how to migrate my PC to Parallels on my Mac?

I think I'm missing something real simple, but to be honest after spending hours on this I want to put my head through a wall, and Parallels phone support are less help than asking my mother who is 67 and has never used a computer...

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I have installed transporter on the vista machine, and networked the two computers, but when I run transporter (from the mac), and pick all or selected volumes, I get this message:


Parallels: no active volume is selected or no operating system is installed on the specified volumes. The selected volumes will be migrated to Parallels virtual data disks

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PS> I've tried to follow the instructions on the docs supplied, but they are missing steps / screens which I encounter, and are not clear which machine I should be running things on.

Help would be very much appreciated.

Cheers.//

 

Probably you have OEM version of Windows, which has hidden partition
For example Dell and HP have such kind of partitions
You cannot migrate OEM versions of Windows

 

Yes, you're correct. Here is some more info from the Parallels team

Please check if the partition your windows is installed is active. To do this, click the Start button in Vista, then right-click "My computer" and choose "Manage". In the computer management console choose Storage -> Disk management. Check if the partition Vista installed on had the word "Active" among others.
Parallels Transporter might work incorrectly on some laptops (like Dell laptops) that have hidden partitions.

As a workaround, please try to migrate the volumes as data disks and then create a virtual machine based on the disks (create "Custom installation" and when it asks you to choose a hard disk, point to the migrated hard disk image. More details can be found in the manual: http://www.parallels.com/download/file/desktop/v4/docs/en/Parallels_Desktop_Users_Guide.pdf under "Custom Windows Installation" (page 70)).