Hi all, The short version: disable ZoneAlarm or any firewall software in guest Windows XP before attempting to upgrade Parallels desktop, unless you want to activate the WinXP via the telephone call. The long version: This is not so much a post about a problem, but of my solution. The premise is this: I have a Windows XP installed using Boot Camp, and am upgrading Parallels Desktop from 3 to 4. I now have a running and working guest machine, but I got stuck when I needed to activate Windows XP over the network. The thing is, at the time the upgrading of the virtual machine came to the point where the Parallels Desktop instructed me to log into the Windows, Windows would say that I needed to reactivate, or I would not be able to log in at all. So I chose to activate autmatically using the Internet. However, no matter which interface I chose in the Parallels, I would always get the 'could not contact the server' error. So I uninstalled Parallels 4, reinstalled Parallels 3, and used the backup of the virtual machine that Parallels 4 did during the upgrade to run Windows XP. Since Parallels Desktop preserved the activation info, I could normally log into my guest machine, disable ZoneAlarm (i.e., I told it not to load at the startup), then I shut down the guest machine, installed the Parallels 4 upgrade again, ran the new virtual machine, and the network activation worked. In case you are interested how I came to suspect ZoneAlarm, here's some more info. Normally, when hardware changes, you get a grace period of a few days during which you can still log into Windows XP, but it tells you you should activate soon or else. During the Parallels virtual machine upgrade, however, something seems to happen to make the guest machine locked up. The result is that you log in, and promptly get a dialog asking you whether you want to activate now or not. Clicking no logs you out, but clicking yes presents you with the activation wizard. There is nothing else you can do with your machine at this point. Well, people have come up with the way to wriggle past the lock-up by pressing Win+U to invoke the Narrator window, and click on the link, which opens the browser (on the Mac, the Win key is mapped to the Mac key, but you need to first go to the preferences of the Parallels Desktop and in the Keyboard & Mouse remove the mapping of the Cmd+U to Ctrl+U under Virtual Machine Shortcuts). From the browser you can use the Open File dialog to run programs, but Explorer dies within seconds, and cmd dies every minute or so. It was enough, however, that I saw that I can browse the web pages, but the activation still wouldn't work. This gave me the idea that the firewall might be blocking the activation wizard. If I was logged in normally, I would be prompted by ZoneAlarm, but since the ZoneAlarm client wasn't running (hm, perhaps it would if I run the exe? I may never know), I never got the message. I also found that, even though I could run mmc to get to services or regedit to view the registry, I couldn't change anything because it looks like locking the Windows up also means lowering the access rights. I guess it's not easy to fool software that holds tight to its hardware.
Thank you for feedback, I just want to add that Zone Alarm can also cause inability to switch to Coherence mode for Window Guest OSes. So it's better to use another internet security software with Parallels Desktop.
Actually, Parallels Desktop 3, as well as 4, include a one-year subscription to Kaspersky internet security program, which seems to be a security suite with everything. I didn't know I had one before, so I used ZoneAlarm instead. I switched now to see how the tool works.
