How do I back up my virtual machine?

tempestblayze · Jun 15, 2007

Hello all,

I am new to parallels and I want to make a back up image of my virtual machine in case something happens in windows or I want to try and updated version.

I have tried searching through FAQ's and have come up short.

Thanks for the help!

John Purins · Jun 15, 2007

tempestblayze said:
Hello all,

I am new to parallels and I want to make a back up image of my virtual machine in case something happens in windows or I want to try and updated version.

I have tried searching through FAQ's and have come up short.

Thanks for the help!

The Parallels virtual machines are in ~/Documents/Parallels.

Each Parallels vm that you set up will have a folder in there. Just copy the entire vm folder to your backup location.

Purplish · Jun 15, 2007

In my case the VM files are in <my name>/library/parallels/<vm name>

They will probably be there unless you put them in a shared folder so other users could use it.

John Purins · Jun 15, 2007

Purplish said:
In my case the VM files are in <my name>/library/parallels/<vm name>

They will probably be there unless you put them in a shared folder so other users could use it.

They could be in either location. The early versions of Parallels stored the vms where yours are and the location didn't change when a newer version of Parallels was installed.

Later versions of Parallels store the vms in the Documents folder so it depends upon how long you've been using Parallels.

David5000 · Jun 15, 2007

John Purins said:
They could be in either location. The early versions of Parallels stored the vms where yours are and the location didn't change when a newer version of Parallels was installed.

Later versions of Parallels store the vms in the Documents folder so it depends upon how long you've been using Parallels.

Is there any functional difference between the two locations? Can a VM just be moved from one to the other?

Thank you,

David

John Purins · Jun 15, 2007

David5000 said:
Is there any functional difference between the two locations? Can a VM just be moved from one to the other?

Thank you,

David

Interesting question... it shouldn't matter from an operational viewpoint as to where the vm is actually located.

My guess is that Parallels changed the location in order to conform to Apple's guidelines as to where this type of file should be stored.

One way to find out would be to backup a particular vm and then copy it to the new location. Start Parallels Desktop for Mac, delete the original vm and then File > Open > Choose the vm from the new location. If it doesn't work, you can use the backup to place the vm back into its original folder.