Installing Snow Leopard (and Rosetta) into Parallels on modern Intel Macs

Incorrect virtual start-up disk

MichaelLAX said:

Much to chew on in this last post and I am not sure if I completely understand it.

Most importantly, did you solve YOUR problem?

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Sorry, what seems to have happened is quite complex. It needs checking to see if I did something cack-handed or whether this is a general problem. If confirmed then I think it's a possible bug with Parallels 7.

Anyone wishing to repeat my experiment should follow your instructions in post #68, but give the VMs different names and give the v Hard Disks different names too. Then watch the boot-up screen carefully to see which v disk is used, for each VM. Each VM should use its own Hard Disk 1, even if another disk is configured to mount.

That said, yes, what I did solved my problem. I now have a recovery system that will boot up correctly from its own Hard Disk 1 even if Hard Disk 2 (the one you'd want to fix) would give the message "An invalid Mac OS version is installed", if it were used as the boot disk.

MichaelLAX said:

And if so, could you point out any specific additions/modifications that I can make to Post #68 based upon your experiences?

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Maybe post #68 could suggest renaming the recovery system and its boot disk, and advise checking the boot process? If the recovery system boots from the wrong disk, then the instructions could advise that the recovery system needs to be rebuilt from the beginning of Step 2. There is no need to re-create the Snow Leopard image file made in Step 1.

MichaelLAX said:

And, do you think that Post #68 suggestions have changed in light of Mountain Lion? I still have not upgraded.

Thanks!

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Your instructions are really clear and precise and they worked fine for me under ML. I only used Lion for 2 days and did not attempt a vSL installation under it, so I can't tell if the incorrect start-up disk is ML related.

Incorrect virtual start-up disk

To start with I didn't change your instructions - I followed them to the letter! When I got the "An invalid Mac OS version is installed" message, I attempted to recover as you recommended. But the recovery system then also gave the "An invalid Mac OS version is installed" message, as if BOTH VM images had lost the ServerVersion.plist file.

In fact, they had not both lost the ServerVersion.plist file (as I subsequently found out), only the main VM image. But the recovery VM attempted to boot from the wrong virtual disc, so it looked as if it was also broken.

As I reported before, I tried all possible ways to ensure that the correct boot disc would be used, checking "boot order" from the configuration options, selecting startup disk from System Preferences, etc.

So it was not the changes I made that caused my problem. I only made a change to check out what was happening.

The only change I made then to your instructions was to assign distinguishable names to the two VMs and their respective main boot discs. This ought not to be a significant change, except that it allows you to see what's going on, unambiguously.

However, nobody else seems to have encountered this problem, so maybe it is just me having been cack-handed - a possibility that I certainly do not discount!

Looks like I'm good to go with that retail SL disk. Was even able to make the SL .cdr file from Leopard (which is just as well since I didn't have an Intel machine on which to install SL, other than the two new ML ones that won't take it!).

One small change with Parallels 8 seems to be the way one installs Parallels Tools (unless I completely missed something) - there didn't seem to be a way to do it without SL running and no .iso file to run it from. So I ended up starting SL and then simply clicking the Parallel Tools Install icon to the bottom right of the Parallels 8 Desktop window. This temporarily mounted Parallel Tools to the SL desktop and I could do the install as you've laid it out otherwise. However, I did end up with a folder in /Macintosh HD/Library called Parallel Guest Tools. Does that sound too abnormal?

Anyway, after the reboot from the Parallel Tools install, the Terminal work, and the Apple Updates, I now have a working SL environment with a Shared Folders icon on my SL desktop that looks like it maps back to the Home directory of the ML installation.

One down, one to go.

So now I guess I need to tackle Eudora. Do you reckon I can just copy the whole Mail folder from a backup and then plonk a copy of the settings file on the SL desktop? Or do you think I'd have to go with a full reinstall of the software and then copy the mailboxes, etc...over?

Thanks so much for this. It's been a real lifesaver!

MichaelLAX said:

Good work!

I have not yet upgraded to Parallels 8 but what you say sounds correct. The great advantage of version 8 (so far) is that copy & paste works cross environment, so if that works, it is ok.

I have no experience with Eudora. An earlier responsive poster (rdh1) told you:

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Argh! I guess I am having some problems - I can't pull files from the anyplace in ML to the SL environment. And some of the files I place in the Shared Folders that are accessible from SL (like the all important Eudora Settings file, for example) appear like they're getting zeroed out and made simple text documents, though they continue show up in both original format and size in ML (though I can't use them, obviously, because they need Rosetta).

Edit: Well, I'm part way there. Mounting the USB drive in the vSL environment instead of ML seems like it is the best way to go. That's fixed my broken Eudora Settings file issue. But I wanted to put everything but the Eudora Application files and the Settings File aliases for the various "identities" my one user maintains in the ML environment for easier backup. Going to have a play with moving that stuff to the Shared Folders between ML and vSL now and see what happens.

Edit 2: Got it. Moved everything but the new aliases for the Settings files into a place inside Shared Folders and pointed the alias files at the new location. That seems to have worked.

MichaelLAX said:

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Spoke just a hair too soon - can receive email but can't yet send. At least not on his Earthlink account (the only one I can check from where I'm at right now).

Edit: Got that now too - authentication issue (Earthlink now requires full email address instead of just user ID).

So I think I'm golden! Thanks again. Now watch my user take delivery and say he doesn't like the way it works and can we move over to Mail or some other current Mac program instead! I've already had the other user say that she really doesn't mind changing if it came to that. LOL!

Parallels 8 and other issues

Thanks for all the hard work publishing this information!

Starting with Parallels 7.0.15094, then with 7.0.15106 and 8, I've followed your steps numerous times. I've tested with Host 10.6.8 and 10.8.2. In each case, I end up with two problems:

1) Can't run local OS updater, gives generic error after entering admin password. I have a slow and unreliable internet, and the updater available for 10.6.8, so I'm attempting to avoid downloading the updater.

2) Doesn't load Rosetta. The file icons are not correct, and launching a PPC app opens the file in TextEdit.

Guest SL boots up fine, and I can run the pre-installed, Apple Cocoa applications no problem. I can see my volumes in the host system. With PD8, I can copy/paste between guest and host.

I created the cdr file from the standard retail 10.6.0 DVD. When creating the guest, I made sure the option to install Rosetta was checked. I did all the guest setup work on 10.6.8. I also tested the result on Mountain Lion, with the same issues.

Does this sound familiar? Nobody else I saw reported issues once they were able to boot the guest. Is it possible the Rosetta problem is caused by the fact I'm still at 10.6.0 on the guest?

BTW, for Parallels 8, the location of the CD/DVD iso is changed. All the binaries are now inside the application bundle. The new path for the iso is '/Applications/Parallels Desktop.app/Contents/Resources/Tools/prl-tools-mac.iso'. When I updated to PD8, it seemed to fix that automatically for the virtual machine.

For launching, I'm trying to launch the application directly. It opens the executable in TextEdit.

I downloaded the 10.6.8 updater from Apple support. Don't see a version number on it, but the Get Info shows the url as:
http://supportdownload.apple.com/do...-0377.20110623.Muis3/MacOSXUpdCombo10.6.8.dmg

The link you sent is not the combo updater. How would this work to update 10.6.0?

Bill Patterson said:

Thanks for all the hard work publishing this information!

Starting with Parallels 7.0.15094, then with 7.0.15106 and 8, I've followed your steps numerous times. I've tested with Host 10.6.8 and 10.8.2. In each case, I end up with two problems:

1) Can't run local OS updater, gives generic error after entering admin password. I have a slow and unreliable internet, and the updater available for 10.6.8, so I'm attempting to avoid downloading the updater.

2) Doesn't load Rosetta. The file icons are not correct, and launching a PPC app opens the file in TextEdit.

Guest SL boots up fine, and I can run the pre-installed, Apple Cocoa applications no problem. I can see my volumes in the host system. With PD8, I can copy/paste between guest and host.

I created the cdr file from the standard retail 10.6.0 DVD. When creating the guest, I made sure the option to install Rosetta was checked. I did all the guest setup work on 10.6.8. I also tested the result on Mountain Lion, with the same issues.

Does this sound familiar? Nobody else I saw reported issues once they were able to boot the guest. Is it possible the Rosetta problem is caused by the fact I'm still at 10.6.0 on the guest?

BTW, for Parallels 8, the location of the CD/DVD iso is changed. All the binaries are now inside the application bundle. The new path for the iso is '/Applications/Parallels Desktop.app/Contents/Resources/Tools/prl-tools-mac.iso'. When I updated to PD8, it seemed to fix that automatically for the virtual machine.

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Your issue with files opening in TextEdit rather than the app they are supposed to sounds like the issue I was having with my Eudora settings files. Did you mount your backup in Lion (or Mountain Lion) and copy the files to the folders shared by Parallels Tools? I found that I had to mount my backup in the vSL under Parallels and then move them to the Shared Folders before they were properly recognized.

I managed to install Snow Leopard on Parallels 8 in Mountain Lion (thanks to this thread). The issue I'm having is that I can't access my hp printer attached to my time capsule within SL. The airport utility cannot find my time capsule either. Everything works fine on the host.

MichaelLAX said:

Try this: in Mountain Lion, go to System Preferences, Sharing and turn on Printer Sharing.

How were you able to complete STEP ONE?

What do you need Rosetta for?

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That worked. Thank you!!. I was able to modify the disk image before upgrading to mountain lion. I need Rosetta mainly to run Canvas 8 for mac. I have not seen another CAD program like it that is affordable. That was what kept me in SL after Lion was released. Now I'm able to move to a retina macbook pro and still have Canvas!

rstreborg said:

I really like the idea of being able to run SL without re-booting. However, I'm having a problem.

The touch command fails to create the ServerVersion.plist file. It tell me that I have a Read-only file system. Here is the output from the terminal command.

Admins-Mac-Pro:~ Admin$ touch '/Volumes/Mac OS X Install DVD/System/Library/CoreServices/ServerVersion.plist'
touch: /Volumes/Mac OS X Install DVD/System/Library/CoreServices/ServerVersion.plist: Read-only file system
Admins-Mac-Pro:~ Admin$

Drilling down and examining the .../CoreServices sub-directory I can confirm the file was not created.

I'm using a boxed Snow Leopard DVD purchased from Apple identical to the image shown by MichaelLAX.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

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I am having this same issue. I have followed the guide step by step, on both a SL machine and a Lion machine, but am still getting the "read-only" error. Any suggestions? Really need to get this going for my business.

I don't have any ML machines. Only Lion (and I borrowed one with SL to try this on). I went through step one, created the .cdr file, ejected the snow leopard disk, closed disk utility, double clicked the .cdr so that it and the image were both showing on the desktop, then ran the touch command in terminal. That's where I'm getting the read-only error.

Again, I tried all of these steps on both Lion and Snow Leopard machines and got the read-only on both. Not sure what I'm doing wrong.

MichaelLAX said:

rstreborg got it to work here

ALL of STEP ONE must be completed in Snow Leopard or Lion BEFORE the .cdr image file is moved over to Mountain Lion.

At what STEP and sub-step are you getting the read only error?

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Urgh! I'm having one problem with Eudora under vSL that I just can't find a solution to - the mouse pointer and cursor both disappear when moved into a message pane. I've already found a workaround - if you use the pointer to highlight any text already there the pointer will display and you can move the cursor where you want to add text or make an edit - but it's not very elegant.

Does anyone else using this solution so they can run Eudora have any suggestions? The problem is evident on both the Mini and the MacBook Pro, so it's either a Eudora or implementation issue rather than a hardware issue. Or at least that's the way I'm thinking.