I'm running XP SP2 with Parallel Desktops on a 3 MHz Mac Pro with 2 GB RAM. My ISP (rogers.com) provides free internet security software. The software is a Norton suite with AntiVirus, Personal Firewall, Parental Controls, Mail Scan, etc that are bundled into a Rogers.com front end interface. I've downloaded the free software and it installed fine on the VM, but for reasons that I can't figure out, the product will not successfully activate with Symantec/Norton after the installation. I get a progress window that tries to connect and activate Norton AntiVirus first, but the progress bar spins for 15 minutes or so before telling me it "could not activate my product at this time." Then I click "try later" and it tries to activate Norton Personal Firewall and the same thing happens there. I know the install process works on a regular PC because I've done it for a friend on her PC very recently. Since the free software is PC only, I can't test the install in OS X on my Mac Pro. My ISP is not Mac friendly, and they have no idea how to deal with Parallels. Although I had some difficulty in initially getting the VM to connect to the Net via Shared Networking, I can confirm that I do have a connection to the net. Additionally, I have also successfully run the Norton Live Update utility from the VM, and it does connect to the Symantec site, reads all the updates I need, but then tells me my subscription has expired. I have a strong feeling that this problem might have something to do with trying to activate the service through a virtual machine (the VM IP address is different from the Mac Pro ?). I tried to contact Symantec customer support, but this is not an off-the-shelf product so I doubt I will get any help from them. I was wondering if anyone has had similar problems activating any software through a VM in Parallels ? Any tips on how to get around this issue ? Thanks ! Apple-Z
I am having the identical symptom on a Mac Pro running Parallels on an existing Boot Camp partition, but I have the commercial 2007 5-license Norton Anti-Virus product. My NAV 2007 has nearly a year left on the subscription, and works just fine when booted directly into Windows XP via Boot Camp. Nevertheless, reports as expired in the Parallels VM - online reactivation is not possible and reports an unknown problem when attempting to do so... I also have a Boot Camp partition on my MacBook Pro that I haven't activated Parallels on yet, but I fully expect it to report an expired and un-activatable NAV also. My next plan was to contact Symantec support to see if the NAV can be manually activated... But at any rate, this is obviously a generic problem.
