Vista hangs in Parallels 6

M

michael_aos@mac.com

Member
I purchased Parallels back Sept 2006. Upgraded through versions 2.5, 3, 4, 5, and now 6.

I've generally been very happy with it.

I upgraded to Parallels Desktop 6 for Mac yesterday though, and I've already had Vista hang on me 3 times.

I get the little Windows spinning circle and it won't respond. Mac Activity monitor shows pri_vm_app sucking up a bunch of CPU, but I can't get it to do anything. Won't restart. Won't shutdown.

I wind up having to reset the VM and it's been more and more unhappy after each reset.

Any known-issues or anyone seeing something similar?
 
What's the virtual machine RAM amount set to? How much RAM do you have in your Mac? Lower the virtual machine RAM.
 
10GB RAM total. 2816MB devoted to the 32-bit Vista VM.

With the VM running (GB)
Free: 1.19
Wired: 4.06
Active: 2.03
Inactive: 2.72
Used: 8.81

Windows Task Manager says (MB):
Total - 2814
Cached - 1154
Free - 816
 
I did recently move several old VM's off to NAS, but I'm not running them anymore. Shouldn't be related to this issue.

The one I'm using is on local RAID-10.
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I reread your first post. You said Windows spinning circle which means a problem in Windows. If it were a Mac spinning circle then it could be the Mac's RAM. A 2.8 GB VM is very reasonable for a 10 GB Mac. This issue is something else. Does the Windows Task Manager say which Windows process is using the most CPU?
 
Same Problem with Wnndows 7.0 VM

I am experiencing the same problem with a W 7 VM, I have had no lock ups under Version 5.0 in 3 months and 10 lockups in 2 days in version 6.0 this is running a VM with 4G Virtual Ram on a mac pro with 16G
 
Left a Vista VM running over the weekend. Wasn't really doing much with it, but it was running (not hung).

Rebooted it this morning. Reconnected the VPN. Hung within a minute or so.

Still consuming a fair amount of CPU (~175%) but it's completely unresponsive. I'm going to have to reset / power-off.

:-(
 
Had exactly the same problem with Vista Ultimate. System froze as soon as a windows update was attempted.

Removed Parallels internet security and installed the new version of Kaspersky 2011 and all is now OK. The old version is not compatible with version 6.
 
I have posted over on the installation forum-- a thread about lockups on my Mac Pro. Vm works fine on the iMac, but I cant go more than 120 secs without lockup on Mac Pro 2006. Using 3 cores, 2GB ram on 8G machine (and four 2.66 cores).

Submitted multiple problem IDs, but nobody responds. Same VM worked great in PD5 on both the iMac and the Mac Pro.


Lockup with PD6

Running W7x32 on a VM with 3 processors and 2GB of Ram on a four core 2.66 Mac Pro (2006) with 8GB ram.

I cannot use the VM for more than about 2 min before it locks up and I must forcibly restart. I have two submitted problem reports-- PID 6673727 and PID 6677992.

This VM was taken from my office iMac (2008) and copied to my Mac Pro. I copied the v5 virtual machine from the office to the Mac Pro at home, and let PD6 (on Mac Pro) do whatever conversion process is necessary. This VM appears to work fine in the office iMac after conversion from v5 to v6.

Perhaps there is a problem with Mac Pro 2006 and PD6? Running OS 10.6.4. Everything is up to date. Just reinstalled O
S about 4 weeks ago.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

Jon
Click to expand...
 
Yes Jon, I have read the whole thread and I just replied that I had very similar symptoms on a mac pro with a 3 GB VM on a 10 GB machine. The domain worked perfectly well under PD5 but crashed very easily under PD6.

The one thing that would trigger the problem instantly was a windows update.

Somewhere I found an article that says Parallels Internet Security is not compatible with PD6 (it is supposed to be) so I removed it, installed Kaspersky 2011 that is shipped with PD6 and my system freezes disappeared. Unfortunately the Kaspersky 2011 is only a 90 day trial so I uninstalled that and am now running MSE. Everything is running fine and, as I type this, I have a large Access database application running on my Vista Ultimate partition and it is running perfectly.

I am nothing to do with Parallels but, on the few occasions that I have had to open a ticket, they have always responded in the end.

Anyway, the anti-virus thing fixed my problem and I thought it might help you.
 
Jon Donshik said:
I cant go more than 120 secs without lockup on Mac Pro 2006. Using 3 cores, 2GB ram on 8G machine (and four 2.66 cores).

Submitted multiple problem IDs, but nobody responds. Same VM worked great in PD5 on both the iMac and the Mac Pro.
Click to expand...

Interestingly, I'm also using 3-cores on my Mac Pro 2006 1,1.

I'm not using the antivirus provided by Parallels.

I'll try it again with 1 & 2 cores.
 
Also worth mentioning -- I moved to the Apple bluetooth keyboard, Apple Magic Mouse (bluetooth) and Apple Magic Trackpad (bluetooth) right about the same time I upgraded to Parallels 6.

My Mac Pro 2006 (1,1) didn't ship with bluetooth, so I'm using an IOGEAR GBU421 USB Micro Adapter. I've also used a Targus USB adapter.

I haven't installed any corresponding software in Vista.
 
I dropped to 2 CPU's AND went back to my Apple USB keyboard & Apple Magic Trackpad (bluetooth). No mouse currently connected.

Been running Windows Vista 32-bit for ~4hrs so far. No issues.
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I've been having the same issue since upgrading to Parallels 6. My Vista VM that ran fine under version 5 now completely freezes intermittently requiring me to kill the VM and restart it. There is no repeatable task being performed that initiates the freeze either, its completely random.
 
thanks kindly for the tip to remove Parallels Internet Security. This was the reason for the issue. I could no longer use Parallels on my Mac.. EVERYTHING ran like molasses. Now, speed is lightning quick! Thank YOU!
 
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