Complete Parallels crash - help!

Hi there,

I've been running Parallels on my Mac (under Tiger primarily, and latterly Leopard) for about 18 months now with no significant problems. In fact, I've been delighted. I've installed and run Windows XP exclusively.

Today, I fired up Parallels (now running under Leopard, after I upgraded about 3 weeks ago), and it crashed spectacularly. And what I mean by that is, not only did Parallels crash, but it took the entire OS - Leopard (yeah, new, shiny, crash-proof Leopard) - with it.

Even worse, when I then re-started the OS, and fired up Parallels again, I was prompted to re-install XP because - apparently - the virtual OS (i.e. XP) had completely disappeared!!

I'm now stuck at work, needing to be productive, and entirely unable to be so.

I've investigated, and the Windows XP virtual HD appears to be intact, but the VM configuration file is totally corrupt. Parallels is now useless - until I re-install XP (and nightmare scenario, takes all the data on the existing virtual HD with it?)

Has anyone else experienced anything similar? Is this a known problem?

And any advice on how to not lose the data on the virtual HD when I re-install XP would be much appreciated!

Best wishes,

 

I'm not running Leopard yet, and thusly can't provide aid.

Yet, you will probably want to give the people the specs on your machine so they can effectively help you (type of Mac, RAM, Processor, Parallels Build, etc.)

 

Hello,

Stuart451, could you send me the crash log for we could find out the reason for the crash?

To save your virtual HD data, you should find it using Mac Finder (type .hdd).
You'd better make backups of your hdd file from time to time and keep them on a data storage.

Create a new VM and browse for the old hdd file (Configuration Editor-Hard Disk).

Best regards,
Xenos