Parallels running slow

This article assumes that there are problems with Parallels on a clean or healthy system.

• Close heavy applications running on the Mac side
• Remember that Parallels is sharing resources with Mac OS X and resource intensive programs such as iMovie, Photoshop or music production software should be kept to a minimum.
• Check how much RAM and how many CPUs are assigned
1. Shutdown the virtual machine and click Configure (at the top).
2. On the left, click CPU.
3. If the value is 1, change it to the maximum value allowed.
4. On the left, click Memory.
5. Assign the value to larger one.
6. A message may come up saying the maximum value you are allowed to put if you put a number too high. If that’s the case then change it to the number specified.
7. Then click OK.
• Check the paging file
1. Click Start then right click Computer (or My Computer) and click Properties.
2. If using Vista or above you will need to additionally click Advanced system settings.
3. Click the Advanced tab.
4. Click Settings under the Performance header.
5. Click the Advanced tab.
6. Under the Virtual memory tab click the Change button.
7. Make sure the main drive is set to System managed, click Set and click OK.
• Disable applications folder in the dock
1. Open your Virtual Machine in parallels.
2. Click the Configure button (at the top).
3. If there is more than one tab then click the Options tab.
4. On the left, click on “Shared Applications” or “Applications”.
5. Uncheck the “Show Windows applications folder in Dock” checkbox.
   If it is not there then uncheck “Share Windows applications with Mac OS X”.
6. Click OK.
• Process idle tasks
1. Leave the Virtual machine running for approximately 30 minutes.
2. Open a Command Prompt as an Administrator.
3. Type in: start /wait Rundll32.exe advapi32.dll,ProcessIdleTasks
4. Press Enter. This will take a few minutes.
• Clear items in msconfig
• Repair disk permissions
• Defragment the drive in Windows
• Start -> All Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> Disk Defragmenter