Windows 10 freezes for 30+ minutes in Parallels 15 on macOS Catalina

Ditto here. I've been plagued with random & unpredictable freezing for over a year. Behavior is same as described throughout this thread including the CPU and memory status observations before things go south. Parallels VM is the most unreliable software product I've ever encountered. Have not upgraded to Catalina yet.

Bill
 
Disabling TRIM seemed to work. VM completely frozen after upgrading to Parallels 16 and trying to install the Parallels Tools. According to the own VM, it was using 100% CPU, according to the Activity Monitor nothing was going on, the VM was just frozen without any response to mouse or keyboard or actions from the menu bar.
Stopping the VM several times forced a recovery start, enabled safe mode, then safe mode with network, then normal start.
 
MiguelA13 said:
Disabling TRIM seemed to work. VM completely frozen after upgrading to Parallels 16 and trying to install the Parallels Tools. According to the own VM, it was using 100% CPU, according to the Activity Monitor nothing was going on, the VM was just frozen without any response to mouse or keyboard or actions from the menu bar.
Stopping the VM several times forced a recovery start, enabled safe mode, then safe mode with network, then normal start.
Click to expand...
Hi, do you still have an issue with your VM?
 
BillC11 said:
Ditto here. I've been plagued with random & unpredictable freezing for over a year. Behavior is same as described throughout this thread including the CPU and memory status observations before things go south. Parallels VM is the most unreliable software product I've ever encountered. Have not upgraded to Catalina yet.
Bill
Click to expand...
Hello, could you please provide us with a bit more details please? What is your Parallels Desktop version? What is your VM OS version? What is your macOS version?
Did you try to perform any steps in order to resolve the performance issue?
Looking forward to your reply.
 
Hi. I am having the same issues as everyone else. I am running MacOS 10.15.6, and Parallels Version 16.0.1 (48919) - Standard ed. In addition to the issues I have with windows explorer, I am also having issues with Adobe Acrobat. In my version of Parallels, there is no button to disable TRIM.
 
I get this problem everytime when having a Teams call in Windows 10, using my Parallels 16 VM using the FaceTime camera from my iMac. The call is OK for a few minutes, then freezes a couple of times, then the VM crashes completely for a few minutes being completely unresponsive, and the iMac restarts. I then have to reset the VM to get it to restart as the resume fails. This is starting to make Parallels un-usable for me, as I spend most of my day on Teams and in Teams calls now. I have MacOS 10.15.6, and Parallels Version 16.0.1 (48919). I have tried diabling TRIM and it makes no difference.
 
This issue was resolved for me when I set the Hypervisor to Parallels instead of Mac. I think the configuration must have changed on an automatic update since I have not touched this section for years and I almost never restart my computer to notice this issue but it killed 2 working days for me to find it.
 
I have been using Parallels for years, and WAS quite happy, HOWEVER, in recent months I am constantly freezing, and the only resolve is a Windows reset or a power down. For a while I was thinking maybe it only happened if I left windows running overnight, but such is not the case. It sometimes happens after only running for 30 minutes or so.

I'm using a MacBook Pro 15-inch 2017, 2.9 Ghz Quad-Core i7, 16GB 2133Mhz LPDDR3, 512GB eDrive with 34GB of free space
 
DanielO5 said:
Dear All!
I have been having exactly the same problem as described by @jamesS339 above. It has been driving me absolutely nuts for many months and have practically made my Parallels installation completely useless.!! BUT since last Friday my Win10 installation have been running much, much smoother and stable than ever before.

I have tried a lot of things and settings and I am not 100% certain I have nailed the exact optimal solution. BUT my current best guess is that disabling TRIM did the trick - no more freezes and frustrating hick-ups. I will try it out even more of course, but would like to share this with you all experiencing this annoying problem.

View attachment 15990

I have a MacBook Pro 2014 with 512 SSD and 16GB RAM - I am running Catalina 10.15.4 and Parallels 15.1.3

Please try it out if you want and post back your own experience! It would be super-interesting to hear your experience and maybe there is some other setting combo that have worked much better for you (and for me without knowing...)!

Best Regards, Daniel
Click to expand...

I have Parallels 14 running on an iMac 2012 macOs Catalina. I know my machine is totally out of date, etc.....but it is still going strong for what I need it to do. Lately, I was having problems with my Windows 10 VM. It would freeze and it would just take forever to suspend it or restart it, etc. I couldn't kill it through activity monitor, etc.

I have tried disabling TRIM. So far, it's working fine. However I do believe one of the reasons for the freeze was...I had a ton of Windows updates to install. It probably was installing in the background and making things hang.

One thing I really really hate with Parallels is...I'm using the desktop version. Yes, for a few dollars more, I can get the business edition and I can adjust my VM to use more memory. I think that's such a rip off ... that we can't do that in the desktop version. I've been using Parallels faithfully for a long time but they refuse to give some time of loyalty break/discount. When it's the holidays, they litter you with junk you don't want to buy but never come down on their business license.
 
video.metal=0

fixed my issue completely

go to Actions > Configure > Hardware Tab > Boot Order > Click Advance Settings > under Boot Flags , type video.metal=0
 
Does this only have to do with video distortion, or the TOTAL freezing of a Windows 10 session, whereby you get NO response from Windows 10, and are forced to do a RESET ???
 
I have same problem, it freezes about 3 times a month, takes over an hour of my time each time to recover sometime longer
 
JamesS39 said:
I'm running Windows 10 (1903) in Parallels 15 (15.1.3) on macOS Catalina (10.15.3).

Every so often, Windows 10 and the Parallels app will completely freeze, and macOS will simultaneously grind to a halt. When this happens, there's nothing I can do to try to unfreeze things - Windows won't respond to any input at all, and anything I try to do on the macOS side (like launch Activity Monitor to see what's going on) will just give me a spinning beachball or crash. I just have to sit there and wait, and eventually it'll clear up and start working again (until the next time it freezes, whenever that is).

When it freezes, the freeze can last for anywhere from 1-2 minutes to upwards of a half hour! And it doesn't seem to matter which apps or resources are being used in either macOS or Windows; I've had it freeze while sitting at the Windows desktop with no apps open, and I've had it freeze even if Parallels is the only Mac app running. The VM is stored on my Mac's internal SSD (with ~100 GB of free space), and I have 16 GB of RAM, so I'm not short on resources.

I've tried doing "restore defaults" in the Windows VM's settings to make sure I'm running it with the optimal CPU/RAM settings, and I've tried both the Parallels hypervisor and the Apple one, but nothing's made any difference.

I'm tempted to say this is an issue specific to Catalina, as I didn't notice it on Mojave, but I upgraded to Catalina months ago and the freezing only started more recently (within the last few weeks).

I pay for the Parallels subscription, but I'm going to cancel it and switch to Fusion if I can't get this resolved. I'm running the latest versions of Windows, Parallels, and macOS, so I expect this to be a supported configuration that should work without issue. Having my VM freeze for 30+ minutes with no warning is unacceptable!
Click to expand...

I'm having exact same issue as described by JamesS39. Completely random freezing of windows and MAC slows to snail pace. Was able to open MAC activity monitor to see what is using all resources but nothing unusual, CPU and memory at normal levels the parallels VM 20-40% yet MAC is struggling and Windows locked solid, cannot even open task manager. Just have to wait, can be a few minutes or can be an hour. This seems to getting more frequent and closing laptop will trigger this effect most times. My windows VM mouse curser stops moving but MAC mouse curser still reacts but non functional in VM normally both cursers move in unison. Spinning coloured wheel appears in VM and MAC. After waiting for everything to catch up I must shut down windows and reboot the MAC. Then things will function normally for a while. I am about ready to throw my brand new MacBook out the window. Previous I had 12years of faultless service from my old MacBook running XP but was forced to upgrade with all the non compatible applications coming into use nowadays.
Big steps backward, at least XP was serviceable.
 
WilliamT12 said:
I'm having exact same issue as described by JamesS39. Completely random freezing of windows and MAC slows to snail pace. Was able to open MAC activity monitor to see what is using all resources but nothing unusual, CPU and memory at normal levels the parallels VM 20-40% yet MAC is struggling and Windows locked solid, cannot even open task manager. Just have to wait, can be a few minutes or can be an hour. This seems to getting more frequent and closing laptop will trigger this effect most times. My windows VM mouse curser stops moving but MAC mouse curser still reacts but non functional in VM normally both cursers move in unison. Spinning coloured wheel appears in VM and MAC. After waiting for everything to catch up I must shut down windows and reboot the MAC. Then things will function normally for a while. I am about ready to throw my brand new MacBook out the window. Previous I had 12years of faultless service from my old MacBook running XP but was forced to upgrade with all the non compatible applications coming into use nowadays.
Big steps backward, at least XP was serviceable.
Click to expand...


I regularly have the same issue, can take up to 4 hours to clear.
 
I also started having this issue with 15.1.5. It coincided with a pending Windows update. I have iStat menus and the hard disk (flash, MacBook Pro Mid 2015) sits at a constant ~30MB/s read when this happens. The computer is definitely capable of more, so it's parallels-limited, but still somehow chokes the MacOS as well. I also have trouble killing the VM - something remains stuck in a 30MB/s spin lock.
 
I started having this same problem a couple months ago after a Parallels update. I am using Parallels Version 17.0.0 (51461). MacOS Version 11.5.2. MAcBook Pro with 6-core I7 CPU, 32GB RAM and 1TB SSD and Radeon Pro 555x (2GB). I have the latest windows updates installed. My windows version is Windows PRO 64-bit, Build 21H1, OS Build 19043.1165, Windows Feature Experience Pack 120.2212.3530.0. I am also using the latest Office 365 Version 2107. I have 16GB memory assigned to Windows 10. What I see happen is many times an hour Windows appears to freeze for up to 30 seconds with Mac spinning ball visible. When the spinning ball stops, Windows again becomes responsive.
 
DanielO5 said:
Dear All!
I have been having exactly the same problem as described by @jamesS339 above. It has been driving me absolutely nuts for many months and have practically made my Parallels installation completely useless.!! BUT since last Friday my Win10 installation have been running much, much smoother and stable than ever before.

I have tried a lot of things and settings and I am not 100% certain I have nailed the exact optimal solution. BUT my current best guess is that disabling TRIM did the trick - no more freezes and frustrating hick-ups. I will try it out even more of course, but would like to share this with you all experiencing this annoying problem.

View attachment 15990

I have a MacBook Pro 2014 with 512 SSD and 16GB RAM - I am running Catalina 10.15.4 and Parallels 15.1.3

Please try it out if you want and post back your own experience! It would be super-interesting to hear your experience and maybe there is some other setting combo that have worked much better for you (and for me without knowing...)!

Best Regards, Daniel
Click to expand...


Thanks for taking the time to add this.

I have a MacBook Pro running Monterey, on a 2020 out 2.3GHz Quad core and i7, with Windows 10 installed as VM on Parallels since June 2020.

I was running Parallels 16 with occasional freezing (whirling colour wheel), but after upgrade to 17 it's been a total nightmare, freezing multiple times a day for 1-3 mins at a time - sometimes longer. It would disable bluetooth resulting in the wireless keyboard and trackpad disappearing, then would finally reconnect. I've lost hours of work time. I had tried most of the suggestions on the forum, messing around with CPU & memory settings, enabling gaming mode instead of Productivity, switching between Apple / Parallels Adaptive Hypervisor, and noticed the lack of official authoritative responses. I hadn't spotted this post detailing the disabling of TRIM (under the Hardware tab then under Hard Disk), as pointed out with the screenshot (prior to this I had no idea where to find it).

Oh my word, the difference has been incredible! I only made the change 20minutes ago and I haven't seen the wheel of death at all! So rather than buying a dedicated laptop with Windows, I have realised that a Mac with Windows 10 on Parallels can actually work!!!!

I had even considered contacting support (I have an annual subscription) but after seeing some of the suggestions of re-installing Parallels and rebuilding the Windows 10 VM, decided that I didn't want to go down that route... Especially seeing the 19 hours of screen time to resolve.

I'm hoping by including as much information as possible, that if others are searching for a similar problem, they find this solution. It will stop you wasting precious years of your life...
 
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