Anniversary Update Need More Disk Space

[WestC]

I have a MBA with a 128 SSD without enough free space to expand the W10 VM to allow me to update W10 to the anniversary update (Updater error message says I need 20GB free). The W10 VM has 30GB with 8GB free. Has anyone found a solution to this? I thought I could use external storage, like a USB drive or SD card, but the Windows Updater must want space on the primary drive.

 

[Raj@Parallels]

I have a MBA with a 128 SSD without enough free space to expand the W10 VM to allow me to update W10 to the anniversary update (Updater error message says I need 20GB free). The W10 VM has 30GB with 8GB free. Has anyone found a solution to this? I thought I could use external storage, like a USB drive or SD card, but the Windows Updater must want space on the primary drive.View attachment 11497

Please empty Recycle Bin and also clear temporary files from your Windows virtual machine steps followed:
1. To delete temporary files:
Search for Disk cleanup from the taskbar and select it from the list of results.
Under Files to delete, select the file types to get rid of. To get a description of the file type, select it.
Select OK.
2. If you need to free up more space, you can also delete system files:
In Disk cleanup, select Clean up system files.
Select the file types to get rid of. To get a description of the file type, select it.
Select OK.

 

[WestC]

Please empty Recycle Bin and also clear temporary files from your Windows virtual machine steps followed:
1. To delete temporary files:
Search for Disk cleanup from the taskbar and select it from the list of results.
Under Files to delete, select the file types to get rid of. To get a description of the file type, select it.
Select OK.
2. If you need to free up more space, you can also delete system files:
In Disk cleanup, select Clean up system files.
Select the file types to get rid of. To get a description of the file type, select it.
Select OK.

I have done all of these items. I need 12GB more of storage. I was thinking that there may be a way to combine an external drive and primary drive so that Windows saw these as one drive.

 

[Parallels User]

You cannot combine external disk space and make it look like a bigger partition to Windows.

You can try to temporally make your vm disk bigger by expanding it, you need to have those extra 12 gb of free space on your SSD (look in kb.parallels.com on how to do this). And then shrink it back.

If you don't have enough free space. You can, however, move the entire VM to an external drive temporarily, by copying the .pvm package, then increase the size of the drive (look in kb.parallels.com on how to do this), install the update. Then run 'disk cleanup' to remove Windows update files, de fragment the drive then reduce the size of the drive back in 'disk management' and then finally, shut down, reclaim disk space, shrink the drive back, make sure it runs ok. Then finally, replace the pvm on your internal disk.

This is the only way to do it if you don't have enough space on the virtual and internal disk. Be sure to research your steps in the kb before doing it.

 

[WestC]

You cannot combine external disk space and make it look like a bigger partition to Windows.

You can try to temporally make your vm disk bigger by expanding it, you need to have those extra 12 gb of free space on your SSD (look in kb.parallels.com on how to do this). And then shrink it back.

If you don't have enough free space. You can, however, move the entire VM to an external drive temporarily, by copying the .pvm package, then increase the size of the drive (look in kb.parallels.com on how to do this), install the update. Then run 'disk cleanup' to remove Windows update files, de fragment the drive then reduce the size of the drive back in 'disk management' and then finally, shut down, reclaim disk space, shrink the drive back, make sure it runs ok. Then finally, replace the pvm on your internal disk.

This is the only way to do it if you don't have enough space on the virtual and internal disk. Be sure to research your steps in the kb before doing it.

Excellent instructions. I will try within the next few days and post the results. Thank you.

 

[Parallels User]

Excellent instructions. I will try within the next few days and post the results. Thank you.

Remember, to increase the size you have to first Expand the disk in Parallels and then expand the partition in Windows' Disk Management to make the new free space usable. And to decrease the size you have to do this in reverse, shrink the partition first and then shrink the disk.

 

[WestC]

Remember, to increase the size you have to first Expand the disk in Parallels and then expand the partition in Windows' Disk Management to make the new free space usable. And to decrease the size you have to do this in reverse, shrink the partition first and then shrink the disk.

Thanks again. I have ordered a SSD enclosure for an extra SSD I have and will use that as my external drive.

 

[WestC]

Remember, to increase the size you have to first Expand the disk in Parallels and then expand the partition in Windows' Disk Management to make the new free space usable. And to decrease the size you have to do this in reverse, shrink the partition first and then shrink the disk.

It worked. I was able to copy the W10 VM to the external SSD, expand size to 64GB, install Anniversary Update, shrink VM disk back to 35GB, move back to primary MBA drive, and everything is working perfectly. Only glitch was that I had to use a partition manager to move the Unallocated disk space partition to the right (or end of VM disk) of the small Recovery partition Windows had set up during the initial installation (I think). Parallels would not let me shrink the disk with the Unallocated partition sandwiched between the System/Boot/Main partition and this small Recovery Partition. I used the general directions found here http://kb.parallels.com/en/120250. Thanks again for the help.