App in VM asks for activation after moving VM from physical HDD to SSD

M

mabam

Junior Member
When moving my Snow Leopard Server VM from an HDD to an SSD, an app requires activation again.
Comparing the results of running "system_profiler" in Terminal before and after moving from HDD to SSD, I found this under "Serial-ATA":

Before:
Code: 
        Snow Leopard Server-0:

          Capacity: 68,72 GB (68.719.476.736 bytes)
          Model: Snow Leopard Server-0                   
          Revision: F.A5JNMR
          Serial Number: FNJEQQV09E64N9Q4X38D
          Native Command Queuing: Yes
          Queue Depth: 32
          Removable Media: No
          Detachable Drive: No
          BSD Name: disk0
          Rotational Rate: 7200
          Medium Type: Rotational
          Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table)
          S.M.A.R.T. status: Not Supported
[...]


After:
Code: 
        APPLE SSD Snow Leopard Server-0:

          Capacity: 68,72 GB (68.719.476.736 bytes)
          Model: APPLE SSD Snow Leopard Server-0         
          Revision: F.A5JNMR
          Serial Number: FNJEQQV09E64N9Q4X38D
          Native Command Queuing: Yes
          Queue Depth: 32
          Removable Media: No
          Detachable Drive: No
          BSD Name: disk0
          Medium Type: Solid State
          TRIM Support: Yes
          Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table)
          S.M.A.R.T. status: Not Supported
[...]


Dear Parallels team:
Why is "model" changed from "Snow Leopard Server-0" to "APPLE SSD Snow Leopard Server-0"?
Some applications tie their activation to the model name of the disk they're installed on. By reporting a different model name just because a VM is moved to an SSD, Parallels Desktop renders many of those applications unusable as their allowed number of activations is limited.

How can I get rid of the "APPLE SSD" part and change the model name back to "Snow Leopard Server-0"?
 
I found that on the host, the detection of HDD vs. SSD is reflected in the file /Users/mabam/Library/Preferences/Parallels/hwInfoCache .
There, for an SSD, it says:
Code: 
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<ParallelsHostInfo dyn_lists="" schemaVersion="1.0">
   [...]
   <HardDisks dyn_lists="HardDisk 3">
      [...]
      <HardDisk dyn_lists="Partition 5" id="1">
         <Name>AppleAPFSMedia (disk1)</Name>
         <Size>924995129344</Size>
         <Uuid>/dev/disk1</Uuid>
         <Type>1</Type>
         <LogicalSectorSize>512</LogicalSectorSize>
         <Index>0</Index>
         <Partition dyn_lists="OsDistrInfo 0 Partition 0" id="0">
            [...]
         </Partition>
         [...]
      </HardDisk>
   </HardDisks>
</ParallelsHostInfo>
The line <Type>1</Type> in that file results in "APPLE SSD Snow Leopard Server-0" in the VM as described in my initial post.

For an HDD, <Type> has the value "0" i.s.o. "1" in the hwInfoCache file and results in "Snow Leopard Server-0" in the VM.

The hwInfoCache file is updated every time "Parallels Desktop.app" gets started. I have tried editing it manually by changing "1" to "0" after Parallels Desktop has started, but before starting the VM. But that doesn't have any effect, unfortunately. It seems when Parallels Desktop is starting, it just writes into the file what it has already loaded into memory. So the files isn't really a settings file but merely a reflection of the hardware info that was gathered during the start of Parallels Desktop.

Dear Parallels team:
I have extensively searched my system and the internet for any clues on how to prevent Parallels Desktop from prepending "APPLE SSD" to the VM's hard disk model name. I have spent days and nights on this to no avail. This is very annoying.

Please, would you kindly provide a solution to this, preferably by an update to Parallels Desktop introducing a setting to disable any change of the HD model name?
 
I just found that "APPLE SSD" is not prepended in a Debian or WIN XP VM.

WIN XP:
Code: 
DISKPART> select disk 0

Disk 0 is now the selected disk.

DISKPART> detail disk

Windows XP-0
Disk ID: D6A1D6A1
Type   : IDE
Bus    : 0
Target : 0
LUN ID : 0

  Volume      Ltr  Label        Fs     Type        Size     Status     Info
  ----------  ---  -----------  -----  ----------  -------  ---------  --------
  Volume 1     C                NTFS   Partition     64 GB  Healthy    System

Code: 
$ smartctl/ -a /dev/sda1
smartctl 6.6 2017-11-05 r4594 [x86_64-linux-4.19.0-9-amd64] (local build)
Copyright (C) 2002-17, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, www.smartmontools.org

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Device Model:     Debian 10 Buster-0
Serial Number:    XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Firmware Version: F.RB0FK8
User Capacity:    68.719.476.736 bytes [68,7 GB]
Sector Sizes:     512 bytes logical, 4096 bytes physical
Rotation Rate:    Solid State Device
Device is:        Not in smartctl database [for details use: -P showall]
ATA Version is:   ATA8-ACS, ATA/ATAPI-5 T13/1321D revision 1
SATA Version is:  SATA 2.6, 3.0 Gb/s
Local Time is:    Mon Feb  1 10:29:27 2021 CET
SMART support is: Unavailable - device lacks SMART capability.
 
... I clicked on "Post Reply" accidentally and in this forum it is not possible to edit posts. So I'll continue here:

WIN XP returns:
"Windows XP-0"

The second code block in the post above is the output from the Debian VM. There it says:
"Device Model: Debian Buster-0" while reporting "Rotation Rate: Solid State Device".

So in none of them "APPLE SSD" is prepended to the model name, only in all my macOS VMs.

So how does it get prepended - by Parallels Desktop doing this for macOS VMs only, by Parallels Tools doing this in macOS VMs only, or by the virtualised macOS itself?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top