Install On OS X Lion Server

P

Peter-Marc

Bit poster
Has any one installed Parallels on OS X Lion Server

I did - it worked fine for 2 weeks and then fell over - can't reinstall even after completely removing from system.

Support tells me it doesn't work on OS X Server

Any info/tips??
 
Two very different platforms.

To make a very long technical story short,

They are two very different internal architectures with a fair number of differences….and yes they can be made to sorta work, but……..they only really appear to work, as some of their internal functionalities get messed up.

They are designed NOT to work reliably if installed in the incorrect MAC OS environment (Parallels Workstation on Mac Server vs. Parallels Server on Mac non server workstation)

The reason being that they are designed, created and coded, to work very reliably for two very different use cases.

For the Server Edition…..

For example, if you have a windows server, as in people inside a company are depending on a windows server for a specific function, typically something like the multi-user terminal server edition of QuickBooks Pro Enterprise which alone costs $5,000. Note QuickBooks Pro Enterprise (Windows Terminal Server Only) is now typically one of the largest use cases in the small - midsize business world, which is why, for many years many organizations could not consider the MAC platform.

Thanks to the Parallels Server Product, QuickBooks Pro Enterprise + Windows Server is now one of the largest small - midsize company uses of Parallels Server for Mac Min edition.

So anyway, you have virtualized the windows server and then placed it on a Mac Mini Server, that Server MUST be up at all times to provide the windows server services to support accounting, in this example, on that combination windows and accounting platform.

To accomplish that end, the Parallels Server for the Mac Mini loads as a service, along with all manner of additional server support interfaces / services rather early (Mac Workstation edition does not), along with multi virtual server management tools / interface (very different than workstation edition), in the booting process.

Thus even if the Mac Mini Server comes up and no one is logged into it at the console or remotely, as a traditional Apple centric MAC user, Parallels is already up, the tools have loaded the slightly modified windows server, and then the virtual MS Windows server is up and ready and loaded so it can be multi user accessed over the network independently of the MAC OS environment on that mini server.

Also note that the server edition is designed to deal with the hardware and software resource contention of running two fully simultaneous server grade OS virtual machines, fully functioning, at all times, while also allowing access to the Mac Min Server full Mac server OS (more features than the MAC workstation) and processes functionality.

For the Workstation Edition……

The use case for the workstation, is that you will boot up your mac, log into it, then launch your Parallels Workstation to load your windows or linux "PC"….and the internal infrastructure to support multiple simultaneous users and resource contention at the server scale is just not there.

Note that you can run server grade OS as guests inside workstation on a workstation, but it will "Choke up" rather quickly under any significant true multi-user load.

Also note that there are plenty of differences to support all the internal plumbing for real - time multiple simultaneous user access through the Mac Min Server into the virtualized server (supports at least two) living inside the Parallels Server for the Mac Mini.

You might want to consider…..

If you are new to virtualization, and are in IT, as a career, and you are not fully familiar with server grade virtualization, spending the additional money to buy the Parallels server version may be the "gateway" for you into professionally growing into the real world of virtualization and cloud computing.

Getting the experience with the management tools, as well as the ability to run and manage all manner of server OS virtual applications, as a server virtualization administrator, and not a workstation user, will help you start to learn the basics of data center scale server grade virtualization. It is a great foundation that then you can extend into the larger universe of Parallels Hosting Virtualization Products, and or competing platforms like Xen, Microsoft or VMware based virtualization / cloud technologies.

We are Parallels Partners and Cloud Architects, so our suggestion is taken from the experience of teaching associates.
 
Solution?

I just want to run a windows based UPnP server on the server - that means parallels does not need to be available to any other users at all.

Can I just install it to run in the administrator account?

(I have had it running - its just that its now suddenly stopped working and I do no know why)

Thanks

Peter-Marc
 
Quick question….if you want to use windows for UPnP services, that usually means streaming media.

Possible answer, that gets right to delivering the UPnP NOW, with figuring out the issues of Windows on Parallels Workstation on top of Mac Server. for later.

Did you check out the various non MS Windows open / closed source UPnP media servers that will run on the MAC platform?

Decent list is in WikiPedia Article " Comparison of UPnP AV Media Servers."

Note I do realize that you might want some of the features that only Windows UPnP provides and though some flavors of open source UPnP servers are pretty good, they may not provide all that you want.

Great example is the LINUX with UPnP on something like a Western Digital Corp "World Book II" networked NAS Drive which is pretty good with UPnP, but never the less, it is not exactly windows Media Server.
 
Why wouldn't this work?

I haven't tried this myself so I have no personal experiences to refer to. However, naively, I don't see why this shouldn't work. 'Mac OS X Lion 10.7' is listed as an acceptable host OS. It seems like if they mean to exclude Lion Server, they should explicitly state this fact. I was under the impression that Lion Server is an add-on feature-set which augments an existing non-server Lion OS instance. Is this not the case? If this is the case, then I don't see any huge technical hurdles which would be caused by adding the Server package to Lion. Although the Lion Server components are low-level pieces of OS technology and Parallels interacts with the OS in a low-level fashion, I don't see why these components couldn't peacefully coexist.

The only reason I'm adding to the thread without offering any value is that I'm curious about doing this myself. Since Lion Server is such an inexpensive add-on, I have been toying with the idea that I'd convert all my engineering Mac machines from Lion to Lion Server. If this would prevent me from running Parallels Desktop, that would be a major problem. Like Peter-Marc, I'd like to run Lion Server for some of the advanced server config features it provides (I wouldn't even intend for this Lion Server to act as a "server" for other users). Also, in that Lion Server environment, I'd like to be able to use Parallels Desktop to run Linux guest instances for my own personal usage ... I don't need to handle heavy client load.

If this is not possible, I would request that Parallels add a comment to their Parallels Desktop system requirements to explicitly exclude Lion Server and give us a brief explanation behind their rationale.

Thanks for your input since I'm very curious about running this exact same configuration!
 
Here is a non technical answer as to "why?" it is not easy to just and reliability run Parallels Workstation on the MAC server…and it is something we run into in large scale cloud environments.

It is because that is the way the manufacturer (Parallels) wanted it to be.

But, please don't go wild with thoughts of Parallels engaging in corporate conspiracies, or being an evil corporation just dying to "stick it" to all of us with $300 for the server vs under $75 for the Workstation.

Though you or I or any software engineer is fully capable of tweaking nearly any piece of software to make it work in almost any environment, that is not the way a business that makes software products, that are sold to the "general public," looks at it.

In the business of creating, manufacturing selling and then supporting of software products, such as Parallels for MAC workstations and for Parallels for MAC servers, there are a number of factors to consider in the product design, functionality, software components, final pricing and then providing the support on the individual product(s).

So when a firm in the software industry creates a product and prices it, beyond the technical product aspects, they actually model the costs to create it and the additional lifetime costs to ultimately support it on a "what's the risk" of losing the necessary (if they want to stay in business) profit and return of capital because the product demands a huge support customer support commitment.

So the manufacturer limits those potential support costs by smart product functionality design, and smart coding to strongly limit what the user could do with the product by taking use of the product beyond what was specifically designed and offered by the manufacturer, and thus avoiding causing a tsunami of costly support calls.

Note about the support calls, not all of them are caused by bad products, many are caused by the inability of any software manufacturer to account for the almost infinity of machine software configurations in the universe of its customers, that can cause operational or stability issues.

So the answer, whether it is Parallels, or Symantec, or VMware, or Microsoft, or anyone else that wants to stay in the software business, is that all of them create very specifically configured products that will only operate in certain, very specific ways, and strongly limit the ability of users to make the software go outside those parameters.

I do agree that perhaps Parallels, like many other software companies, could be perhaps more explicit as to the differences in its Mac Platform Server Products.

But as is typical in the industry, if there is a workstation and a server version, it is "short hand" or assumed that perhaps or is generally understood that they are two different products for two different markets within the industry, and are configured accordingly and should be operated only in the actually very different markets (Server vs workstation) accordingly.

Otherwise you are on your own.

A great example of this outside the software industry is with cars. A while back, I "Kitbashed" (Modeler's term) a Volvo "Brick like" model 745 designed for family use on paved roads station wagon. I turned it into jacked up, big wheeled, great off road vehicle for the non paved roads of the Colorado Rockies. I used mostly bolt on swapped out mechanical components (the parts of autos are more interchangeable than most individuals assume).

But then I had a warranty issue with the non modified parts of the car. Volvo took the position, and in the end I had to agree, that I had so modified the car and taken it so far beyond the original design, that they could not warrant that the non modified parts would even survive use in such a totally modified configuration.

To an extent, though is is not as obvious with software as it is with mechanical components, Parallels is doing the same thing, in order to stay in the business of providing products tailored for specific product niches, and to make sufficient money from them in order to keep making even better future products.
 
Hi Cloud_Architect,

I completely understand and agree with almost everything in your most previous post. I still only have the one unanswered question of whether or not Parallels considers Lion Server supported or not as a host for Parallels desktop. I completely understand the nature of the support footprint of a product. In fact, I generally don't run software outside of supported configurations. That's why I wanted more explicit clarification about whether or not the Lion Server/Parallels Desktop config is in fact unsupported. I certainly wouldn't consider it a bad business practice for Parallels to decide not to support that config. However, it could help a consumer trying to make a purchase decision to have it spelled out on the system requirements page.

In a previous job, I ran several production Snow Leopard Server build servers guest VMs running in Snow Leopard Server host running VMware Fusion on a Mac Mini. That worked without a problem. I didn't even bother actually looking at the sys reqs to see if that config was supported or not. It just worked. I wasn't running virtual servers expecting them to get hit hard with client traffic. I understood the hardware/software demands and that configuration handled it ok.

If I use a software product like a web browser, text editor, IDE, etc., the software sys reqs usually don't differentiate between server and workstation OS. It is assumed that general purpose software would work in both server and workstation OS environments. In the exception cases, software vendors often post those notes in the sys reqs. I completely agree with you that OS virtualization software is in a different camp than general purpose software. OS virtualization software is obviously much more closely tied to the underlying OS. This means that I shouldn't just assume that it will work. That's why I thought it would be useful for Parallels to clarify their support position for Lion Server, rather than just assume that it isn't supported.

By the way, the Volvo sounds AWESOME!

-ewh
 
Parallels Server

Thanks Cloud_Architect

So are you saying that Parallels Server for Mac will work and do what i want to do?

Peter-Marc
 
Last edited:
Peter-Marc…..Quite Possibly

First in answer to post on the use of Parallels Mac Server for UPnP.

Most likely it would.

If parallels is monitoring the forum, they can provide the answer instantly.

And before you spend your $300, check out the various open source UPnP applications for the MAC Server platform, so at least you might learn something that you might really need to know, so if they don't work well enough, then you might be able to make better use of the combination of the Parallels Server plus Windows UPnP.

But otherwise I can't test that configuration, and give you a definitive answer, right now……….

I would like to give you an answer before late next week, but…..

Because right now, for a client requirement, the two early 2012 MAC mini servers with duplexed hard drives in our test lab (All current hard ware and software virtualization and cloud platforms) are running VMware vSphere 5, (Can be done) that we installed "bare metal" on new hard drives, after pulling the existing MAC formatted Lion server OS hard drives in those two MAC minis..

But otherwise we find that the MAC mini Server OS (Lion) plus Parallels server for the Mac Mini, is extremely robust and flexible, perhaps more than anybody outside of the large scale enterprise community really understands.

Earlier this year, we had a project where, because of the complexity of managing Active Directory, and the fact that Lion was sort of intermittently buggy with its LDAP authentication, and its connector to Active Directory; the client had us install the current version of Novell Open Enterprise Server (Possibly the best LDAP authentication implementation of any Server OS) on a pair of Mac Minis Lion Servers inside of Parallels Server. (Configuration was each Mini machine has fully virtualized Windows 2008 Multipoint Server for management plus a fully virtualized Netware OES Server)

We created a virtual Novell machine cluster configuration across both minis to support the directory management of all of the objects in a very large Federal Agency that had an assortment of MS Active Directory, UNIX, LINIX, and proprietary OS, all needing to ultimately relate to and to interchange information with a large directory of objects tree for the entire enterprise.

So from my experience, I would say, based on the robustness of the Parallels server product, go there.

But I don't haves a handle on your financial or experience circumstances, so I would recommend that you first test the concept of UPnP on the Mac Mini Servers with what you can secure inexpensively, with the various other MAC centric UPNP products, then spend your money for Parallels Server for the Mac Mini.

A key and very important side issue here, is that if you want to advance yourself professionally, as in make a very good, challenging, highly paid living (great for the addition of a wife and kids in the future) you can never ever not take every opportunity, to think and act like a researcher to advance your skill set.

So taking what might seem to be a detour in checking out the various UPnP products for the Mac Mini, will add to your personal Intellectual Property KnowledgeBase, and that and lots of other similar "research additions," over the life time of your profession is how you make more the typical non IT worker in most industrialized countries of the world.
 
-ewh VMware Fusion is a different Architecture

Vmware Fusion, when compared to Parallels is a different approach to virtualization on the MAC anything.

Sort of like front engine rear wheel drive car vs front engine, front wheel drive car vs engine in from connected to an all wheel drive car.

For what ever reason, VMware, and I know this as we are one of their Professional Partners, as we are with Parallels, and I just checked this on VMware Partner Net tech support line, created the product to install on anything Lion.

But then Fusion "gave up" the capability to be as tightly integrated with the Server OS as Parallels Server is and Parallels MAC workstation is not.

Also, Fusion did not provide the richer management console and utilities that Parallels Server has.

Thus for example, in certain Lion Server OS configurations, Fusion, installed on a Server, does not reliability launch on boot, then launch the virtual machines WITHOUT you having to log into the server from the console first, then make sue it is launched.

And Fusion does not support a Mac Mini workstation (actually MAC anything) to manage mac mini servers running Parallels server as is normally done with the Parallels Server management tools that "come in the box" and you can install on Mac anything.

This is a very valuable tool so that Mac Minis can then be run in a "headless" configuration and managed from the other side of the world.

Also, in some configurations, running two Fusion instances at the same time, can cause problems, but note that this is not completely sorted out yet, so it is unclear where the issuers really are..

What Parallels did, was create two clearly defined and focused products, one for workstations and one for server, as that is how they are being different than VMware or even Virtual Box for the MAC from Oracle, which also takes the VMware Fusion approach.

And I will agree that perhaps the documentation should include some sort of technical discussion as to the differences between both Parallels Mac products so the consumer is better informed.
 
Hello guys,

please be advised that Parallels Desktop 7 officially supports Mac OS server as a host: http://kb.parallels.com/en/114474
If you have any issues i suppose there is something wrong with your local system and it needs to be investigated. I suggest you reopen the ticket at Parallels Support and point them to this KB - it is a new one and they should escalate the case to the next support level straight away.
 
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