Recommend Parallels size?

[crazycat]

I want to use parallels but dont want to take to much space, i was wondring if something like 10 GB's would be enough. I will just download small files, word docs and other stuff. I will also have bootcamp for gaming but i need somethign light for small quick stuff.

 

[ITASOR]

I don't even think I set a Parallels disk size. I was under the impression that it just grows and shrinks as it needs to.

You know you can use Bootcamp and Parallels from the same Windows installation, right?

 

[atmenterprises]

Mine is 8GB and that is with Windows XP SP2, MS Office 2003 and VS.Net 2005 installed.

 

[SmashingPumpkin]

I just went to add like 13GB of aerial photos for my Windows USphotoMaps program. Transfer of those files stoped about halfway through with a pop up about the disc not being large enough. Parallels wouldn't automatically expand past it's preset 8GB----even though it's called an expanding disc.

I followed these instructions----> http://forum.parallels.com/showthread.php?t=1481&expand

Follow post 1 with help from post 2 & 13. Worked like a charm and now I'm out to 40GB.

 

[Maxwell Smart]

Huh, interesting. I guess you basically put a limit and then it expands up until that point.

 

[aristobrat]

I want to use parallels but dont want to take to much space, i was wondring if something like 10 GB's would be enough.

Huh, interesting. I guess you basically put a limit and then it expands up until that point.

Yup.

I just used the current beta to do an "Express" installation of XP, and Parallels set the virtual drive "maximum" size to 32GB, although after installation, the size of the drive was only 1.83GB total.

I don't see any harm into setting it to something huge. Like SmashingPumpkin ran into, if you initially set the drive to something smaller, it's a pain to manually grow the drive later after it's maxed out.

 

[crazycat]

Big thanks guys.

 

[firefoxnx]

Boot Camp Option greyed out

You know you can use Bootcamp and Parallels from the same Windows installation, right?

I tried setting up parllels to boot from my boot camp partition that but the option is greyed out??

 

[Westside guy]

Huh, interesting. I guess you basically put a limit and then it expands up until that point.

Yeah - I forget what the default was, but I set my disk size to 16GB and it should be plenty for my needs.

 

[FredAkbar]

It should be noted that expanding disks with Parallels give slightly worse disk performance than static disks. If disk space isn't much of an issue for you, or you don't think you'll be needing much, then I'd create a static disk. Using BootCamp is better yet though, IMO, as it also provides an easy way to transfer files between your two partitions. Other than using the Internet or an external HD/etc., I didn't know of a way to do that before Parallels.

 

[aristobrat]

If disk space isn't much of an issue for you, or you don't think you'll be needing much, then I'd create a static disk.

Just make sure you size the static disk correctly -- it's a huge PITA if you outgrow one!

FWIW, I'm using a dynamic disk in Parallels that's been thru the Parallels Compressor (reducing its size in OS X by 40%) and haven't noticed it to be noticeably slower, but I'm not using that VM for anything disk intensive.

Using BootCamp is better yet though, IMO, as it also provides an easy way to transfer files between your two partitions. Other than using the Internet or an external HD/etc., I didn't know of a way to do that before Parallels.

With Parallels now (at least with XP and Vista), you can drag 'n drop files from Parallels to OS X and vice-versa.

That, you can "share" OS X folders that the guest OS can browse to (just like a mapped network drive).

 

[FredAkbar]

That's true, the drag 'n' drop is even better than what I was thinking of (and what I do), which is turning on Windows Sharing (do I still need to do that for drag 'n' drop?) and going to Start-->Run-->\\192.168.0.1\fred which brings up my OS X home folder in Windows.

Before I used the Boot Camp partition for Parallels, I had to use my external HD if I wanted to transfer stuff over.

 

[plinden]

Just make sure you size the static disk correctly -- it's a huge PITA if you outgrow one!

Not really. You can create and attach up to four virtual hard drives to your VM. It's not difficult to access these within Windows.

 

[aristobrat]

Not really. You can create and attach up to four virtual hard drives to your VM. It's not difficult to access these within Windows.

I guess it depends on how you like your Windows setup.

Personally, I wouldn't enjoy dealing with C:\Program Files, D:\Program Files and E:\Program Files just because I ran out of room on a static C: drive.