Importing a VHD into Parallels Desktop 6 on the Mac

Question

I've looked everywhere for this but can't find an answer, so:

I have a VHD image created for me by a client -- he installed Win7 on a machine and then used a tool from SysInternals to create a VHD which he shared with me and a colleague.

I can mount the VHD on my Mac using Parallels Mounter and see the contents, but I can't for the life of me see how to import the VHD to create a new Parallels VM from the VHD file. Parallels Transporter seems to want to create a VM from a live Windows box, which this isn't.

My colleague is able to use VirtualBox to create a VM from the VHD and I want to do the same using Parallels Desktop 6.

Any ideas?

Rimini

more context: I can use VirtualBox on the mac and open the VHD, and it works, but I'd prefer to use Parallels with 256Mb VRAM -- VB seems to limit to 128Mb VRAM so can't use > 1600 x 1200 resolution. – Rimini

I favourited this question, even though it should probably be over on SU. :) – Patric

Answer 1

Parallels is designed to import virtual machines rather than virtual hard disks. A VHD is just the hard disk, and doesn't specify anything about the machine.

So the answer is that you need to create a simple virtual machine that uses the VHD; Parallels can then import that (for Parallels 7 see ftt's answer below). To do that, create a simple UTF-8 text file with an extension .vmc containing the following:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<preferences>
<version type="string">2.0</version>
<hardware>
<pci_bus>
<ide_adapter>
<ide_controller id="0">
<location id="0">
<drive_type type="integer">1</drive_type>
<pathname>
<absolute type="string">/Users/Shared/VirtualPC/BaseDrive.vhd</absolute>
<relative type="string">BaseDrive.vhd</relative>
</pathname>
</location>
</ide_controller>
</ide_adapter>
</pci_bus>
</hardware>
</preferences>    

Make sure you change the .vhd references above to the actual location of your VHD file.

The above code is from a recommendation by a Parallels team member on Parallels forum.

Mycobacterium

This worked for me, only thing is that Parallels expects the configuration file to have the extension .vmc (not .mvc) – Quadrature

Oh right, that's fixed now. I suppose it's because I use Spring MVC every day that I naturally typed mvc instead of vmc! – Mycobacterium

Answer 2

For Parallels 7, try this:

$ /Library/Parallels/Parallels\ Service.app/Contents/PlugIns/Parallels\ VM\ Converter.app/Contents/MacOS/prl_convert your_disk_image.vhd

Found here. The original post was about Parallels 6, so it should work there, too.

Radke

For Parallels 8: /Applications/Parallels\ Desktop.app/Contents/MacOS/prl_convert your_disk_image.vhd – Nosedive

Answer 3

You need to convert the HDD into an ISO - this can easily be done if you have a spare Win machine to run the conversion process. You will need software named GImageX.

Check out this video and also you can read this if you like.

Good Luck, and please post your results.

Kokura

Answer 4

This works for me:

Testing Internet Explorer on Mac with Microsoft VHD and Parallels 6

Download desired Win/IE combo from: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=11575

For extracting *.exe files on Mac use http://www.unrarx.com/

cd Download

/Library/Parallels//Parallels\ Service.app/Contents/PlugIns/Parallels\ VM\ Converter.app/Contents/MacOS/prl_convert "Windows 7.vhd"

Run Parallels. Login with password: Password1

http://www.ericmichaelstone.com/?p=5962

Homemaking

The key here is to unzip the exe file, NOT to run the exe file (which also extracts it) – Amylum

Answer 5

Check out http://www.modern.ie/en-us/virtualization-tools#downloads. There are parallels-specific downloads, along with many other formats.

Manzanilla