Trying to expand a virtual disk

J

Justin Harlow

Bit poster
I am running an admittedly ancient version of Parallels Desktop on a Mac. Here are the particulars:

Parallels version: 2
macBook Pro 15" 2.16 GHz
OSX 10.4.11
Guest OS: WinXP SP 3

I created an 8 Gb virtual disk when I first started using Parallels, but I have not used it much. Recently I have run into one of those situations where you simply have to use Windows because of a proprietary software package, and have run into a problem. The virtual disk is too small to install necessary software. This is identified by Parallels as an expanding volume, but the guest OS refuses to let me install some important software because the disk is out of space. I tried to use Image Tool to expand it, but it tells me that you can't do that with an expanding volume.

I know, I know, go spend 50 bucks for an upgrade and everything will be fine, but I don't have the 50 bucks right now, and just want to solve this problem. Anyone got any ideas?

Thanks

Justin H
 
Justin Harlow said:
I tried to use Image Tool to expand it, but it tells me that you can't do that with an expanding volume.
Click to expand...
I would like to see that error message. The definition of an expanding volume is that you can resize it, isn't it? Did you properly shutdown the virtual machine?

http://kb.parallels.com/5010
 
I think the VM was improperly shut down. I reopened it and shut it down correctly, and was able to expand the disk. Thanks for your help on that.

Maybe you can now help me with the new problem... I am trying to install MS Office from a CD, and it gets to the point where it is ready to install, and reports that the C: disk is not big enough. Parallels now reports it as an 11 gig drive, but in My Computer, it is still an 8 gig disk. Clearly MS does not know that it is on an expandable disk, but what am I overlooking here?

Thanks

JEH
 
Did you use the Resize File System option when you expanded the disk? You can right click "My Computer" and select Manage, then select Disk Management to see how your virtual hard disk is partitioned. It's probably got an 8 GB Windows partition (drive C) and 3 GB of unused space because the Parallels Disk Tool did not expand the file system to fill the new disk size.
 
Thanks very much. I did not know about that option, but I did read up on the disk expansion process in the knowledge base, and discovered exactly what you describe. I got a copy of Easus Partition Magic and expanded the 8 gb partition into the new free space, and now everything is working great. I appreciate your help very much.

JEH
 
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