Parallels 15 sometimes freezes host system, sometimes won't start on mojave

R

RossK2

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I am running Parallels Desktop for Mac version 15.0.0-46967 on macOS 10.14.6 (mojave).
I have two guests installed: Windows 10 and Ubuntu 18.04, both with the latest parallels tools.
My iMac is the 27-inch, Late 2013 model with an SSD installed in place of the original fusion drive.

When parallels starts, it does one of three things:
  • Causes my iMac to hang while showing the spinning beachball/pinwheel and being completely unresponsive aside from mouse movement.
  • Gets stuck on the parallels splash screen, never showing the control center window.
  • Gets stuck starting one of the guests (it doesn't seem matter whether it's the Windows or Ubuntu guest).
I have tried:
  • Uninstalling and reinstalling parallels
  • Running Disk First Aid (this shows no issues, and my hard drive is quite new).
  • Running the Apple diagnostic tool (this shows a System Management Controller issue, but this seems unrelated according to https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT201295).
  • Switching my guest to the Apple hypervisor.
  • Restarting my mac and removing the power cable for a few minutes, then replacing my power cable and trying again.
Occasionally after uninstalling and reinstalling, parallels will work for a few days with no issues before hitting this problem again.
I notice that the process 'prl_disp_service' is often stuck at 100% CPU at times when the system hangs.
I run ESET antivirus, but have disabled the firewall feature to ensure there are no issues connecting with prl_disp_service.
My iMac often stays in standby for hours at a time with parallels running, but the issues frequently happen after a clean reboot.
I have attached my parallels.log for your reference.

These issues have cost me a lot of time and energy. How can I get parallels working properly on my mac?
 

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RossK2 said:
I am running Parallels Desktop for Mac version 15.0.0-46967 on macOS 10.14.6 (mojave).
I have two guests installed: Windows 10 and Ubuntu 18.04, both with the latest parallels tools.
My iMac is the 27-inch, Late 2013 model with an SSD installed in place of the original fusion drive.

When parallels starts, it does one of three things:
  • Causes my iMac to hang while showing the spinning beachball/pinwheel and being completely unresponsive aside from mouse movement.
  • Gets stuck on the parallels splash screen, never showing the control center window.
  • Gets stuck starting one of the guests (it doesn't seem matter whether it's the Windows or Ubuntu guest).
I have tried:
  • Uninstalling and reinstalling parallels
  • Running Disk First Aid (this shows no issues, and my hard drive is quite new).
  • Running the Apple diagnostic tool (this shows a System Management Controller issue, but this seems unrelated according to https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT201295).
  • Switching my guest to the Apple hypervisor.
  • Restarting my mac and removing the power cable for a few minutes, then replacing my power cable and trying again.
Occasionally after uninstalling and reinstalling, parallels will work for a few days with no issues before hitting this problem again.
I notice that the process 'prl_disp_service' is often stuck at 100% CPU at times when the system hangs.
I run ESET antivirus, but have disabled the firewall feature to ensure there are no issues connecting with prl_disp_service.
My iMac often stays in standby for hours at a time with parallels running, but the issues frequently happen after a clean reboot.
I have attached my parallels.log for your reference.

These issues have cost me a lot of time and energy. How can I get parallels working properly on my mac?
Click to expand...

How much RAM you are assigned to Parallels? The Checkbox Adaptative Hypervisor is marked?
 
I'm having problems similar to RossK2 since upgrading to Parallels 15. (version 15.0.0 46967)
Now impossible to get Parallels to run, even after multiple reboots / restarts of iMac (OS 10.14.6 on 27 inch 2017 with 64GB ram).
Once today I was able to get to the point of resuming Windows 10 in Parallels, but it then hung with the message "Checking Disks after improper shutdown..." and I once again had to force quit parallels.

Is there a way to roll back to ver 14 until you get this fixed?
 
Hmmm
That was easier than I expected: per another support article, I just re-downloaded ver 14 and ran the install program. It "downgraded" Parallels back to ver 14 and now it (and Windows 10) appears to be running fine again.
Hoping it continues to do so.
If it crashes again I'll come back and post to let you know, but if it continues to run fine, then I'll just wait a while to upgrade to ver 15 again (after these problems have been resolved).
 
I have very similar issue, and I suspect Parallels as the it is not reproducing when Parallels is not installed.
Can you help me with troubleshooting?
 
I am running Parallels Desktop for Mac version 15.0.0 on macOS 10.14.6 (Mojave)
My Mac freezes (only shows the spinning pinwheel) when I am on the Windows 10 window.
I have sent the tech report.
Thanks
Diego
 
DiegoV2 said:
I am running Parallels Desktop for Mac version 15.0.0 on macOS 10.14.6 (Mojave)
My Mac freezes (only shows the spinning pinwheel) when I am on the Windows 10 window.
I have sent the tech report.
Thanks
Diego
Click to expand...
Hi, thank you for the report, could you please post the report's ID here?
 
@Maria@Parallels Good morning. I'm running into this same issue or similar. The ticket number is 323120837

What I'm seeing:
  1. When running Windows 10, every once in a while it will freeze. I let it run for a little, which can be 10 minutes or an hour or more.
  2. I've learned when it freezes in Windows to let it run, eventually, it comes back alive.
  3. I don't see any spikes in memory usage. In fact, memory usage seems normal or low, but everything is crawling.
  4. This also freezes up and slows all actions on the Mac side.
  5. This may also happen when I wake my laptop in the morning when I start work.
  6. I've also had it freeze starting to bring up the VM.
  7. My guess is it has something to do with my memory settings or possibly sharing files between mac and windows.
  8. I've tried several times to configure the memory on my own. I've noticed that making this change can take me hours as I would try a change, and it would make the system slower. I did try several of the knowledge base articles to figure it out. But, again this can take hours sometimes and I can't take a half-day off from work to figure it out.
  9. I initially set the configuration as a programmer.
  10. I love my mac and it would be great to figure this out. This happened a year ago or so before so it seems to re-emerge through updates of Windows, Mac, or Parallels, not sure which is causing it.
 
JoeB6 said:
@Maria@Parallels Good morning. I'm running into this same issue or similar. The ticket number is 323120837

What I'm seeing:
  1. When running Windows 10, every once in a while it will freeze. I let it run for a little, which can be 10 minutes or an hour or more.
  2. I've learned when it freezes in Windows to let it run, eventually, it comes back alive.
  3. I don't see any spikes in memory usage. In fact, memory usage seems normal or low, but everything is crawling.
  4. This also freezes up and slows all actions on the Mac side.
  5. This may also happen when I wake my laptop in the morning when I start work.
  6. I've also had it freeze starting to bring up the VM.
  7. My guess is it has something to do with my memory settings or possibly sharing files between mac and windows.
  8. I've tried several times to configure the memory on my own. I've noticed that making this change can take me hours as I would try a change, and it would make the system slower. I did try several of the knowledge base articles to figure it out. But, again this can take hours sometimes and I can't take a half-day off from work to figure it out.
  9. I initially set the configuration as a programmer.
  10. I love my mac and it would be great to figure this out. This happened a year ago or so before so it seems to re-emerge through updates of Windows, Mac, or Parallels, not sure which is causing it.
Click to expand...
Thanks a lot for the detailed info! Could you also please generate report with the detailed log enabled? Instruction you can find here.
 
@Maria@Parallels thanks for the response. I have resolved my situation for now. All detailed reports (2) have already been applied to the ticket.
To do so, I went to the settings | General | Configure For "Productivity" (I have 16GB of ram.) This sets it to 2 processors with 4GB. I think the confusing part is the other options overwhelm my system. If this logic is correct then if someone chooses one of the defaults, it could immediately cause problems. I chose developer mode and it shut the system down because it gave 16GB to Parallels. Like why would that even be an option if it will crash my system? It would be nice if I could tell parallels how much Ram I have and Parallels could tell me the Exact settings I need. The confusing part is no one can tell us. We are always guided to some other article on how to configure it, not a direct answer. The issue of testing based on these articles causes hours of time on our end. Thanks in advance, no response is necessary.
 
This is happening to me as well. Also happened on V14. I don't understand how to create a report if the whole system has frozen - I can only hard boot the iMac as it doesn't respond to anything else - I've never left it for an appreciable period of time, e.g. 1 hour. It's not at-will reproducible, it just happens with no consistency of operation at the point it does (i.e. it doesn't seem linked to what I might be doing in Windows at the time.) When I say it is frozen, I can move the mouse; I can click on some menu items; I cannot type any data in as no key presses are actioned; other Mac apps appear locked - for example, Apple Mail will just lose all connectivity to mail servers and flag that up. If I try and log out, it is prevented until I force quit all open applications.

Mine is already set to productivity, although using 8GB RAM out of a system 24GB, and the Apple Hypervisor with the Adaptive Hypervisor option selected. Version 15.0.0 (46967)

It's very frustrating and given the need for a hard re-boot, I'm in danger of losing other work as is my wife who might also be signed in.
 
It's crazy - it crashes Mac even if no VM is running. I left Mac for a couple of hours, went back, wouldn't exit screensaver and eventually spinning beach ball appeared. Had to hard cycle the machine. It is reproducible; have Parallels Desktop and/or Parallels Tools running (with or without VM launched), sit back, wait an indeterminate period of time. Note that if Parallels isn't running then this problem NEVER occurs. I have an 8-core i9 iMac with 24GB ram; VM is allocated 2 processors and 8GB, uses Apple hypervisor with the Adaptive Hypervisor option checked. I don't believe that is 'over' resourced, but in any case the problem happens even if the VM isn't running.

Any ideas?
 
I have reported the details below to support but add here for the benefit of anyone else who may be having problems.

I have isolated the cause of the issue. As mentioned previously, using Parallels eventually causes my iMac 2019 to become catastrophically unstable leaving me no option but to hard re-boot. Whatever is happening causes the UI to become unresponsive leading to a spinning beach ball on any app I try to interact with that requires any UI refresh. The network connection is no longer working: I was hoping to SSH into the iMac from my laptop to run the trouble reporter remotely but the iMac is not reachable over the network - I can't even ping it (I can ping other devices on the network, including the router) Parallels Desktop will not even Force Quit via Activity Monitor.
This issue occurs when the Arduino Create Plugin is active and Parallels Desktop is running. WhenParallels is not running I have no problem with stability at all, and no issue with programming any connected Arduino. It's worth mentioning that I don't have an Arduino connected at the time of these problems, the Arduino Create plugin is running in the background.
If I pause the Arduino Create plugin, then I experience no problems with Parallels Desktop.
For troubleshooting purposes, the Arduino Create plugin can be found here: https://create.arduino.cc/getting-started/plugin It's a free download. Obviously, I don't know what is misbehaving, but as I say, I only have the issue when Parallels Desktop is running at the same time as the plugin.
This has happened consistently every single time. It has happened on my 2019 iMac and my old 2012 iMac. It is consistent across V14 and V15 of Parallels.
 
I see a similar issue on and off again with my MBP 2017 Quad Core i7 w/16gb RAM. Host OS is fine, no issues at all. Latest version of Parallels 15. I spin up a Parallels Win 10 Pro VM. I'll see the VM is running unusually slow. I will then start seeing a beachball on the Host OS (Mojave), eventually the entire machine will appear to lock up (nothing responding on screen, no ability to forcequit). If I kill power on MBP and reboot, this forces Parallel's to recheck the image before starting (prl_disp_service) and even with just the VM being checked (not booted) the same cycle starts (beachball, hostos lockup).

I started a support chat this morning with Parallels to determine the best way to get out of this cycle... I dont seem to be getting anywhere with my support rep. Despite providing every possible piece of information up front, all the suggestions and KB's given are either for different issues, or dont address the problem.
 
I'm not sure why there isnt a way to limit the resources Parallel's is able to use from Mojave ... so it cuts it off before the entire HostOS gets impacted to the point where the trackpad and mouse even stop working.
 
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