My Full Screen is Not Full Screen Anymore.

Discussion in 'Parallels Desktop for Mac' started by Jim Waugh, Jun 9, 2006.

  1. Jim Waugh

    Jim Waugh Bit poster

    Messages:
    9
    I am new to Parallels Desktop and my new MacBook 2.0 GHz, 1 gig memory and 80 gig HD with the newest version of OS X for dual intels with your latest Parallels for Desktop for Mac installed.

    My Parallels install went like all Mac installs and it seems to start up just fine.

    Going from the windowed VM on the Mac desktop to full screen and back again is not working as advertised.

    To start with, I noticed that it started coming back to the Mac desktop from the full screen mode, which was running full screen as advertised, with the VM screen much larger than the window for it and this window is the correct size at about half of the size of the Mac desktop. I would have to use the mouse to drag the VM around in the window to access the controls.

    Currently, the VM starts up just fine but when I go to full screen, what I see momentarily is a full screen which disappears and the half screen VM window appears with everything outside of that being black. When I switch back to the window on the Mac desktop it comes back to the desktop and normal size VM window.

    I have searched this forum and did not see any other postings about or similar to this with the problem being that I can't get full screen even when I switch to full screen.

    I have deleted my VM a couple of times to wipeout a bad install of WIN98SE and then go with a new VM and reinstall of windows.

    So, not being a techie, is this a corrupted Parallels installation or maybe something that you are working on. How do I go about getting it to work normally again? My hope is that I won't have to reinstall windows again, if that is possible.

    Thanks for your attention.
     
  2. tacit_one

    tacit_one Pro

    Messages:
    434
    Jim,
    it's not easy to understand the problem.

    Can you please provide some screenshots of what's happening wrong ?
     
  3. Jim Waugh

    Jim Waugh Bit poster

    Messages:
    9
    I have discovered the problem. When I loaded the second machine and it did the same thing, I knew it was something with the video settings.

    WIN98SE loaded in the "VPX" video mode this last time. Don't hold me to that VPX but it is close to what briefly appeared on the screen. There was no choice but it did say that the video might be different. It is. I can set the video to 1024 x 768 in windows and it makes the VM window fill the display but you can't see the buttoms at the bottom of the Windows VM but you can go to full screen mode and it stays the same resolution, which is full screen, drops the Mac desktop top menu bar and the icon bar at the bottom of the screen and so full screen is fully useable and much better than the low resolution that I first saw a couple of installations ago.

    I tried setting a different video resolution for the full screen mode and the normal screen mode on the Mac desktop but it only accepts one. It is very useable this way, but is there a way to set it so the VM screen is smaller and still get the full screen when you go full screen?

    Additionally, there is a great manual for Parallels in the folder of the installation of Parallels but it doesn't get put in the parallels folder that gets installed in the Mac Applications directory and the software does not permit me to alter that folder by adding the manual by drag and drop. Is it possible to arrange the install software so that your manual gets left in the folder in the Applications directory on Mac? Otherwise, unless you take it out of the install folder, it gets trashed when you clean up the desktop after the install.

    Thanks for your time and attention.
     
    Last edited: Jun 9, 2006
  4. Jim Waugh

    Jim Waugh Bit poster

    Messages:
    9
    Now that I recoved your very nicely done manual from the second download and install of your Parallels software and started leafing through it in Adobe, I did get the video changes AFTER I installed Parallels Tools and the SVGA driver started working. I really did not know what I was installing at the time but that I was supposed to do it.

    I am working on two systems with MacBooks here and on the other, I encountered a problem and tried to find out how to uninstall the tools and couldn't so I reinstalled over what was there. I trashed that installation because my daughter had installed Parallels for Workstation, so I removed that software and installed Parallels for Desktop on both machines. Now both are the same.

    The installation of tools put the windows SVGA driver and it's color of teal for the desktop and etc but when I shutdown, it changed the colors to the VGA blue of the windows yet left the SVGA screen running. I reset the colors and they have stayed.

    Only in your manual running in Adobe Reader did I find the sound driver installation and that went as published. Your instructions are very detailed. Much thanks for the work that went into your manual.

    Now if I go to help from the VM screen, I get help alright but running in my browser and the information in it does not seem to be as inclusive as the manual that I saved from the installation package folder, the one I trashed the first time when I cleaned up my desktop after the Parallels software installation.

    The next issue is that I use Mozilla's Thunderbird for my EMail on the Mac and your program tries to send out emails only with the Apple email program not the default email progran and of course I do not have it setup to send anything. I will now set up the Apple email software to run but you will receive several emails when I do. I was using the installation habits of, when everything else fails read the manual because I had trashed it when I cleaned up my desktop after the install, so I am not sure that those error that I encountered were valuable to you but here they come anyway!

    My question still remains about screen size in the normal and full screen modes. I will continue through your manual and if it is in there, I will find it.

    You ask for screen shots and I don't know how to do that yet on the Mac with the MacBook keyboard.

    Thank you in advance for your help.
     
    Last edited: Jun 10, 2006
  5. Jim Waugh

    Jim Waugh Bit poster

    Messages:
    9
    I have now completely read your manual and my question still remains. I am not able to get the 1024x768 in full screen mode and a different resolution in the normal windowed mode, I was trying to set that one to 800x600 both of which are supported by WIN98SE and parallels desktop. I only get one size in both windowed and full screen.

    I found a couple of different places in the manual refering to screen resolution and user screen resolutions. I tried every combination of these that I could think of but nothing seems to allow for a different resolution between the small windowed screen and the full screen.

    I would appreciate knowing if you can set these screens differently, given the Parallels Desktop and WIN98SE installation.

    Thank you for your help.
     
  6. Marko

    Marko Member

    Messages:
    27
    I do not know if this will work under Win98 but it works fine with WinXP installed...

    1) Launch Parallels
    2) At the Guest OS Properties page at the bottom select 'Edit'
    3) This Opens Up The Preferences for the Guest OS.
    4) Under Video add a new resolution size 1024x768
    4) Click OK to close Guest OS Preferences
    5) Click Save to save Guest OS Properites
    6) Start your OS
    7) At the OS Desktop (Windowd mode) Right Click on the Dekstp and select Properties. This opens up Display Control Panel.
    8) Select Display Control Panel Settings Tab - and set you Windows mode Screen Size to say 800x600. Click Apply and then Close Display Control Panel by clicking OK.


    So Now when in Windowd mode you Guest OS Desktop will be 800x600, but when you switch to Full Screen mode the desktop will be 1024x768

    :)
     
    Last edited: Jun 12, 2006
  7. Jim Waugh

    Jim Waugh Bit poster

    Messages:
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    That is precisely what I thought should work and I just went through the sequence that you listed again just now but the full screen still shows up as 800x600.

    So, either I have missed something or Parallels Desktop doesn't support this yet in Win98SE. I would like to know which.

    Something else looks a little strange. When I open Parallels Tools, the video driver is listed as unknown. The remarks do say that it supports SVGA and etc. I expected a name other than "unknown". Should I have?


    Thanks
     
    Last edited: Jun 13, 2006
  8. Jisi

    Jisi Member

    Messages:
    57
    I think this is sort of "normal". Ever since Beta6 or so under Win98se it always says "unknown" for the video driver and thus the mouse synchronization also didn't work. But I haven't investigated this any further since I _very_ seldom use my Win98VM.
     

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