backing up windows partition and restoring

[edwardlotz]

My OS 10 mackbook has become unstable...and I want to reinstall....I would like to back up my parallels and then be able to just copy it into the new setup and have it work.

is there instructions on how to do this or do i need to just reinstall everything on the windows side as well?

Thanks

 

[joem]

My OS 10 mackbook has become unstable...and I want to reinstall....I would like to back up my parallels and then be able to just copy it into the new setup and have it work.

is there instructions on how to do this or do i need to just reinstall everything on the windows side as well?

Thanks

Back up your entire partition to an external drive, using a program such as SuperDuper. (If you don't have an external drive, now would be a good time to get one for backups). Then erase and install OSX. Tell the install you want to transfer accounts and data from another Mac, and point it at the external drive. This will copy accounts and all user data to the new installation.

Then reinstall Parallels. This will have no effect on your VMs, but will install the kernel extensions it needs to run. Install anything else that you installed with an installer. Run software update several times until it finds nothing to install, and if you haven't rebooted since your Parallels install (hard to imagine) reboot the Mac. You should be good to go.

Note that the transfer software will migrate user data and accounts, as well as applications, but not things installed outside the standard directories such as MySQL, or Unix stuff so you will have to reinstall that stuff if you had any.

Have fun.