Parallels 12 - WinXP -- Must recover data after boot disk failure

Discussion in 'Windows Virtual Machine' started by DocPixel, Oct 22, 2025 at 9:47 AM.

  1. DocPixel

    DocPixel Bit poster

    Messages:
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    First, I know that this is an "edge case' these days, using old software, on an old Mac. However, I would still like to try everything possible to recover my client's accounting data, after having tried just about every trick I know, as well as using all of the suggestions by ChatGPT.

    1. On 15. August we experienced the first difficulty with the Parallels 12.2.2 PVM/Winxp on a 2013 iMac that we have kept running only for this one piece of accounting software. I was able to recover a "Boot disk not found" with a backup after Windows became unresponsive.
    2. Everything was working correctly until last Friday (15.Oct), when we experienced again, a Windows hang, and when restarting, the dreaded "Boot disk not found" dialog. I've managed to boot the disk many times from assorted backups, even the same backup that was used the first time to recover, but unfortunately, the data files recovered are always those from the first install of the PVM in 2016. All current data is missing.
    3. I've tried merging the .hds and snapshot files using prl_disk_tool as well as "check --hdd", which always work, but return the wrong 2016 data. Repair --.hdd along with Snapshot list or repair is not present in this version of PDT. So I've tried manually to clean the list without any better results.
    4. I've also tried the reinstall of WINXP trick that some have mentioned helps. Once again, recovering the PVM/boot drive to a working state is not the problem, but the actual up-to-date or nearer than 2016 data is our problem.

    My main question is if there's anything we can do to recover a snapshot or 2, or maybe a more modern PDT that we can try to repair the disk?

    NOTE: all of the Windows XP-0.hdd that we have backups of, include 1 or more .hds files. Each time I'm able to recover the boot drive from a TimeMachine backup, it only pulls in the smallest .hds (ca. 3 GB) and leaves the other .hds (ca. 160 GB) untouched. This is configured as an auto extending HDD and we have 700+ GB free on the Mac hard drive. When merging the 2 .hds drives, I get a ~164 GB drive, but still only the data from 2016. Also if it helps, the software in question is from SAGE, GSWIN accounting.

    Last note: this iMac and the PVM were rarely if ever shut down over the last 9 years, and a Time Machine backup was scheduled daily between 0:00 and 01:00. Some backups are complete (ca. 170 GB), while others are partial (anywhere between 250 - 850 mb)

    I would be most thankful if anyone knows of a trick to recover the snapshots and/or .mem dumps(?) where the data possible could be.

    Thank you in advance for your help(!!!!!)
     

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