Possible hardware issue? 100% CPU, fragmented grapgics

Possible hardware issue? 100% CPU, fragmented graphics.

I use a Mini for mostly home use with a tad of AutoCAD 2013 and Inventor to keep things going inside of Windows 7 Enterprise.

The image, (pvm) recently took a crap and was unbootable. It might have been a poor shutdown or a hardware issue. Not really sure, but here's what's happening. It was a Windows 7 Enterprise version running with the following settings in Parallels. CPU: 2, Memory 8 Gb, and this used to run perfectly and quite fast under those settings.

For some reason it crashed last week and will not repair. The image will also not install without the CPU going to at least 100% or more and getting searing hot.. It gets in a few minutes and stalls. I have uninstalled Parallels, removed the .pvm and tried installing a new image with the same results. I have also tried to install the machine with 1 CPU and 4 Gb Ram and it ran noticeably slower with the same results and heat. Also throttled back the video to no avail.

The Mini is current to 10.7.4 and runs great otherwise.. I have another copy of Parallels running on a MBP with the same Windows 7 Ent image and it runs great.

The only thing that I can think of is memory tests on the Mini with a possible bad stick from the heat, but I have run deep tests on all memory with an ok..

I would welcome any suggestions as I can't get any guest OS to install at this point without the heavy CPU loading and stalling.

Thank you in advance.

 

Try to remove Parallels Desktop completely and reinstall all from the scratch:

Note: We strongly recommend that you make a backup of the virtual machine and backup of your Mac before proceeding.

After the backup is created stop Parallels services by running the commands below in Terminal application ( /Applications/Utilities/Terminal ). Press Return after entering each command to execute it.
Note: Before executing commands, make sure folders in the list below do not contain your virtual machine file (ends with .pvm, e.g "Windows XP.pvm"). Your virtual machine may be found in /Library/Parallels.

Note: Please make sure to enter the commands exactly or copy and paste them; if entered incorrectly, commands can corrupt Mac OS X.
sudo launchctl stop com.parallels.vm.prl_naptd
sudo launchctl stop com.parallels.desktop.launchdaemon
sudo launchctl stop com.parallels.vm.prl_pcproxy


sudo kextunload -b com.parallels.kext.prl_hypervisor
sudo kextunload -b com.parallels.kext.prl_hid_hook
sudo kextunload -b com.parallels.kext.prl_usb_connect
sudo kextunload -b com.parallels.kext.prl_netbridge
sudo kextunload -b com.parallels.kext.prl_vnic
sudo kextunload -b com.parallels.filesystems.prlufs


sudo rm -rf /Library/Parallels
sudo rm -rf /Applications/Parallels\ Desktop.app
sudo rm -rf /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.parallels.desktop.launchdaemon.plist
sudo rm -rf /Library/LaunchAgents/com.parallels.*
sudo rm -rf /Library/Python/*/site-packages/prlsdkapi
sudo rm -rf /usr/bin/prl_perf_ctl
sudo rm -rf /usr/bin/prlctl
sudo rm -rf /usr/bin/prlsrvctl
sudo rm -rf /usr/bin/prl_disk_tool
sudo rm -rf /usr/share/man/man8/prl*
sudo rm -rf /var/db/Parallels/Stats/ParallelsDesktop.*
sudo rm -rf /usr/lib/parallels
sudo rm -rf /Library/Filesystems/prlufs.fs

sudo rm -rf /Library/Preferences/Parallels
sudo rm -rf /Library/Logs/parallels


Note: In case Terminal does not show any output after executing the command it means the command has been performed successfully.
If you see 'No such file or directory' message it means this file of directory has been removed by the regular uninstaller and you may continue.



Additional Information
For information on removing Parallels Desktop 3.0, please check 4709
For information on removing Parallels Desktop 4.0, please check 5714
For information on removing Parallels Desktop 5.0, please check 6904
For information on removing Parallels Desktop 6.0, please check 9087

 

Thank you so much for the very explicit instructions.

I had already somewhat gotten there, although not to the depth that you describe. I used the uninstaller and then removed some specific /Library files that you mentioned above. I shyed away from removing any kexts and relied on the uninstaller to perform that task as removing kexts by hand for a application on a production machine, generally tends to make me leak like a spooked puppy.

Regardless, I downloaded the most recent version and installed the updates before re-introducing the .pvm back in..

Voila.. Full control, the system with the VM running is about 6 to 15% depending on what I'm doing. (That's with Autodesk Inventor 2012 open). I upped the ram in the VM to 8GB and it runs really fast like it used to.

Not sure what happened but I would love to know so I might prevent it in the future. My only assumption is that the 10.7.4 update had something, if not all to do with it as there were no other changes nor updates made to the system before this issue.

Incredible product and service to match.. I have a few friends with the same issue and will be forwarding your information and sending a link.

Thanks again,

Steve

 

The reason is suppose was incorrect update installation. The only solution here is to reinstall Parallels Desktop.