Can't get guest full screen to show on external monitor

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GerbenW

Member
I have a Windows Guest OS on Parallels 11 on a Macbook Pro. I've just attached a second screen and I want to have Windows on that second screen. But whatever I do, as soon as I go into full screen mode, the full screen appears on a separate desktop on the Macbook itself.

I can get it on the second screen, but only when I drag the menu there in System Preferences Displays. And that is what I don't want. I want the Mac to remain the main system, while the Windows WM uses the external monitor. But how?
 
GerbenW said:
I have a Windows Guest OS on Parallels 11 on a Macbook Pro. I've just attached a second screen and I want to have Windows on that second screen. But whatever I do, as soon as I go into full screen mode, the full screen appears on a separate desktop on the Macbook itself.

I can get it on the second screen, but only when I drag the menu there in System Preferences Displays. And that is what I don't want. I want the Mac to remain the main system, while the Windows WM uses the external monitor. But how?
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Hi @GerbenW, go to your virtual machine Configurations -> Options-> Full Screen -> uncheck " Activating virtual machine shows all its space" under the option "Use all displays in full screen" and let us know how it works.
 
This is what the blog says:
    • Switch your VM to Window Mode
    • Drag it to the secondary screen
    • Click on the Parallels Desktop logo in the top Mac menubar and select View -> Full Screen.
If you don't drag and drop your VM to the external display, it will open in Full Screen mode on the primary display.​

So, I drag the Windowed Windows 10 to my secondary display. On the secondary display, I choose menu item View->Enter Full Screen. The full screen opens in a space on the primary display. Which is the problem I'm trying to solve. It just does not work as it is supposed to and I have no idea why.

Somehow, Full Screen uses a Space on my primary display, even if the Windowed display is located on the secondary display. I think this is connected with Spaces.

(I tried to publish this text with formatting, but the site complained it wasn't English.... Turns out it was the arrow that came from the blog in copy/paste)
 
I noticed another issue. Parallels setting for the VM is 'Retina' but the external monitor isn't. The effect was that in a 2555x1361 window on the external monitor, Windows was running at double that resolution (4x the pixels) with a scaling factor of 200%. Some apps didn't take kindly to that. With a scaling factor of 100% everything became unreadable of course. But with the 'scaled' setting for the VM, Windows is now using 2555x1361 in the window on the external monitor and 100% scaling.

Sadly, the 'no full screen on external monitor' remains a problem. Try to go full screen and Parallels still goes full screen on the retina display (which then of course is unreadable at 100% scaling). With Windows scaling back to 200% it is again usable. Exit full screen and I get my big window on the external monitor again, with 200% scaling (automatically). Anyway, still no full screen on external monitor.
 
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