Shutdown/resume problem with Beta 6

I first saw this in Beta 5, and I'm still seeing it after upgrading to Beta 6 (and reinstalling the Tools). I'm pretty sure this did not happen in Beta 4, which is where my VM was first created.

It's very easy to reproduce:
- start Internet Explorer
- go to website of your choice (I use cnn.com)
- suspend VM
- start VM back up
- try the Start menu - it should work
- move IE window around - it should work, mouseovers should work
- click on a link in the IE window that is still open
- IE immediately goes dead - it's still there but does not respond and window cannot be moved
- most of the time Windows is dead as well (Start menu no longer works)

Restart VM and all is well again.

I've gathered from other comments here that if I created a new VM it would probably work ok, but that would mean having to sit on hold with Microsoft so I can reauthorize XP and I'd really rather not have to do that. On the other hand, this makes the VM I have not very usable, to say the least.

Any chance that this is a bug that will be fixed? Can I run a debug build for you, would that help track it down? Others have reported seeing their VM hang on network access after suspend so I'm assuming that is what is happening here; it's not the click on the IE window that's killing it, it's the resulting network access.

 

Your reported problem with IE is similar to what I experience with the Windows File Explorer application. Suspend and Resume makes this application unusable as well. Shut down and Re-boot allow the application to work once again.

For the time being, I am giving up on the suspend option of Parallels.

Hopefully this will get better, The problem did not occur for me until Beta 5 -- as you experienced, Windows Explorer worked after Suspend/Resume in Betas 3 and 4.

 

Confirmed, this happens for me, with a bit more info that may be helpful to the Parallels folks:

1. New start VM (XPSP2)
2. Start IE, go to google.com
3. Suspend VM
4. Restart VM (I have fullscreen auto and autorunVM auto settings set)
5. Type in a new url, hit enter
6. XP immediately goes to login page (my profile is part of a corporate domain).
7. I login, again, and the IE window is still there
8. Try to click in URL and XP freezes, have to end VM and restart

For the record, I have clean uninstalled Parallels every time from Beta4 (my first) to Beta5 to Beta6, only leaving the VM itself. Even removed receipts. Reinstalled Parallels tools each time.

-Adam

 

I'm running into the same thing. We still have the same issue with emerging from suspend and it is not tied to using sound.

 

From the original poster.

I have followed your instructions, except I use Firefox within the VM. I don't get a hang, with Firefox.

I did also disabled sound in my VM profile, since I don't need it.

Beta6/Win2000/MBP2GHz/2GB

 

There's a reason why Firefox is winning

 

Firefox does the same "crash" for me. So does Outlook. Perhaps the difference is I have WinXP running.

OK, I clean uninstalled Parallels, down to removing the receipts and all traces. Reinstalled the latest B6 build. Created a brand-new XP VM. Reinstalled a fresh copy of WinXP. Installed all Windows Update updates. Installed Parallels Tools. Restart.

After restart, suspended the VM.

Restarted the suspended VM.

Go to fullscreen, open IE. Home page opens. Type a new URL. Crash/Freeze. Must end VM and restart to get it.

To me, this is a reproduceable bug. It is not related to using a VM created in an older Beta.

Config:

MacBookPro, l0.4.6, latest 1.0.1 firmware, all Apple updates installed. 2Gb ram.
AirPort wireless networking.
Paralles B6 latest build, XP VM (default). Win XP SP2 with all updates.

Could someone from Parallels please comment?

-Adam

 

adamsfbay,

I can reproduce the same "crash" here with my MBP...

 

Suspend/Resume works if sound is disabled!

I posted earlier in this thread about Windows Explorer hanging the VM rather than IE when using after a suspend and subsequent resume.

I had a hunch that sound might have to do something with this since others had posted in other threads that the VM would hang when trying to play a sound after a suspend and resume.

I realize that IE and the Explorer applications don't necessarily play sounds but perhaps some part of them touches the sound driver in some way.

Well, on a shut down VM (not suspended) I first disabled sound. Then I booted the VM, opened the Explorer app, used it to browse some files on my C drive and then suspended the VM. I then resumed the VM and went back to browsing files. This time IT WORKED! No frozen VM with sound disabled.

So I suspect this is fixable when the sound support is tweaked by the Parallels developers.

So those of you who are seeing VM freezes after a suspend/resume cycle, try disabling sound and see if things don't improve.

This is with a Windows XP Pro with Service Pack 2 installed, running the hot fix version of beta 6.

Since there has been significant sound work from betas 4 through 6 -- sound is much smoother now when enabled -- I suspect there needs to be more attention paid when the VM is suspended to the state of sound support. Then resuming ought to be possible with sound enabled AND have sounds play as expected and have IE and the Explorer file browser application run like they are supposed to.

 

it's the same with me. after discovering the fullscreen resolution problem after a resume my w2k sp4 vm also hungup.
startmenu was working, but accessing other programs led to a no responding vm.

 

Unfortunately, turning off the sound doesn't fix it for me. I also tried uninstalling Norton Anti-Virus, since it often causes trouble, but that didn't help either.

Turning off the sound just means unchecking the Enabled box in the Configuration Editor and saving, right?

I just finished doing a bunch of suspends and restarts, trying to isolate the problem further, but didn't really figure out anything useful. The whole OS X system crashed on me once when I hit the suspend button; this is the second time that has happened. One moment all is well, the next I'm looking at a black screen and then the system is restarting.

This isn't a complete show-stopper since shutting down and restarting always works and has not (so far, anyway) crashed my system. But it definintely seems like something that should be fixed before GA.

 

Ok, I take that back, sort of.

I had missed the fact that there was a new version of Beta 6. I installed that, and now things are working somewhat better.

When I resume, IE does work but it takes a *very* long time to load the first page I try to go to. After that it's fine. I assume this has something to do with establishing a network connection but I don't know enough about Windows to be able to confirm that.

And, a related behavior - if I am doing something else when the VM comes back up, when I go to use it IE seems hung, but the rest of Windows is functioning. If I open the Start menu the portion of the IE window that is covered by it does not get repainted when I close the Start menu. IE seems totally dead. But, if I wait long enough, it comes back to life! This does not happen if I go to it right away when it first starts up and move the window around; I can then go off and do something else and it never appears hung.

It also seems that if I wait long enough to click on a link, I don't get the very long pause, so something seems to be happening in the background when Windows first resumes.

All of the above is with the sound turned off. I can confirm that turning sound back on causes the total hang/freeze to reoccur. I haven't seen any more crashes, but since they were infrequent to start with that doesn't really mean much.

FWIW, I had some trouble with the new Beta 6. When I first tried to start up my VM I got the message about VMX mode, so I rebooted. Then when I tried to run the Parallels software I got an error that it could not communicate with a driver and to try again. I tried again and it ran ok.