How to uninstall all Parallels? Effective Ways to Uninstall Parallels on Mac What is Parallels Desktop for Mac.

Two operating systems on one computer is convenient and useful. Especially when it comes to Apple PCs. Are you used to working in a Windows environment, but there is an opportunity? There is only one major difficulty here. Most likely, you will encounter misunderstandings from Apple adherents. The rest can be overcome without much difficulty. Installing Windows on a MacBook has become so trivial that it is well described in the official sources of manufacturers. We will look at the process from the other side, adjusted for you and your tasks.

How to put Windows on a MacBook without removing Mac OS.

You can install a second OS on an Apple laptop in two different ways - as a base system along with macOS or as built into it. The first method allows you to allocate all the resources of the computer for your needs, since the first system will not be active. It's geared towards entertainment. Are you missing native games from Windows? Or maybe you want to test a powerful graphics package? Then he is for you.

The second way is virtualization. This is the launch of a new OS inside an existing one. So you can install not only Windows, but also Linux and other systems. The method is well suited for testing simple programs and office work. Consider each method, its advantages and disadvantages.

To start, you must have an image of the Windows 10 operating system prepared. We will consider the installation using its example. Make sure you have enough free disk space for the installation (at least 25 GB).

Virtualization

Virtualization is a phenomenon where 2 work environments are isolated from each other, but use the same hardware resources. Moreover, one of the environments is most often subordinate to the other. We use an Apple virtual machine called Parallels Desktop. It provides a good integration of the new system into the base.

If Windows is no longer needed

Removing an OS that was running on a virtual machine is easy. It is enough to erase the car in a special menu. First make sure that you no longer need the guest system data. The system will delete all information located on the virtual partition, and it will be erased from the real MacBook disk.

It is a little more difficult to remove a fully installed Windows:

findings

We learned how to install everyone's favorite OS on a MacBook and dealt with the difficulties that may arise. And for those who decided to return to the circles of macOS admirers (this time forever) - we talked about removing the system from the computer.

Do you have any questions? Or maybe you want to arrange a holivar on the topic “Windows vs MacOS”? In the comments there is a place for any authoritative opinion.

Once you've decided uninstall Parallels on Mac You may encounter several unexpected problems Most people think that, just like with other applications, you can easily uninstall this application from your Mac, but as it turns out, the opposite is true.

Parallels Desktop for Mac is a widely used virtualization software that allows Mac users with Intel processors to run Windows, Linux, or other virtual machines. Unfortunately, there are some problems that you will face if you decide to uninstall Parallels on Mac:

• The application continues to run in the background or cannot be closed.
• The app cannot be moved to the trash because it is currently in use.
• Application components cannot be completely removed from your Mac.

If you are no longer using the application, or just want to free up some disk space, you should take a close look at methods to safely uninstall Parallels on Mac .

What is Parallels Desktop for Mac?

Parallels Desktop for Mac is simply desktop virtualization software that allows Microsoft Windows, Linux operating systems, and applications to run seamlessly on a Mac. The software assimilates the guest operating system (OS) into Mac OS, allowing it to mimic the operation of its own OS.

Users of this application can choose whether to use Mac and guest applications alongside Mac OS or as a separate guest virtual desktop. For example, users can open a Windows-based application such as Windows Media Player or Internet Explorer from the Mac Finder utility.

In the same way, you can drag folders, documents, and other items from Windows Explorer to Finder, or vice versa. You can also switch between Windows and Mac OS without restarting your computer and choose which operating system they want with specific applications to use.

For Mac, there are 3 modes to choose from:

How to uninstall Parallels with iMyMac Mac Cleaner

It is a highly effective tool that cleans and optimizes your device. If you want to clean up apps and related files effectively, this tool is what you need. It only takes a few clicks to free up hard drive space, optimize your system, and provide better privacy.

Since you want to uninstall Parallels on Mac, this is an easy solution to uninstall the app from your device. Mac Cleaner is a comprehensive and powerful software that provides Mac users with all the tools they need.

Let us focus on your main task - to uninstall Parallels on Mac. With this task, we will take a close look at Uninstaller. This tool can help you completely remove Parallels Desktop and its related files from your device.

Just follow the steps below to uninstall the app properly:

· Step 1: Open the removal tool

Open iMyMac Mac Cleaner. In the main interface, you will see the general system status of your Mac. On the left side of the interface, you can find Uninstaller, Click on Uninstaller.

· Step 2: Scan

After opening the Uninstaller interface, click on the "Scan" button to start the scanning process. After scanning, you will see the amount of memory used by the applications installed on your Mac. Optionally, click "Rescan" if you want to double check the information of the target app on your device.

· Step 3Browse Installed Applications

Click the View button and go to the Parallels Desktop page. All apps currently installed on your device are listed in the left column.

· Step 4: Search for Parallels Desktop

Scroll through the list of applications until you find Parallels Desktop, or just enter the name in the search bar. Click on Parallels Desktop and the files or folders in the application will expand to the right screen.

· Step 5Clear the app

Find the folders or files you want to clear in the Parallels Desktop application. Just select the "Select All" option to clear all files in the app. Double check that all files you want to delete are selected. Click on the "Clear" button on the bottom right to complete this step. Click "Confirm" to uninstall Parallels on Mac and wait for the process to complete.

How to Uninstall Parallels on Mac Manually

Uninstalling the Parallels Desktop App

If you are going to uninstall Parallels on Mac manually, there are certain steps that you must follow carefully.

• Step 1. Close the parallels. Click the toolbar > click the Parallels icon > click Quit Parallels Desktop. Another option to close the application is to use the Activity Monitor to make sure you have closed all Parallels related processes.
• Step 2: Go to the Applications folder and move Parallels to the Trash.
• Step 3: Empty the trash and restart your device.

These steps are officially recommended by the Parallels website. If you still have doubts if there are any leftover files, you should take a closer look. Typically, apps store their leftovers in a "hidden library folder". When it comes to Parallels, his support files are kept in his personal package. You can find them if you click "Show Parallels Package Contents" before uninstalling.

Deleting Remaining Parallels Desktop Files

Most Mac apps are software that can be easily uninstalled using a manual approach. However, some create components such as cache, settings and support files in different system directories during initial setup and daily use.

If you want to completely uninstall Parallels on Mac, it is important to remove all related components that are scattered around the system. You must follow the steps below to clean up any remaining files:

• Step 1: Open Finder > click "Go" in the menu bar > select "Go to Folder"
• Step 2. Enter the path to the top-level library on your hard drive "/Library" > press the Enter key.
• Step 3: Locate the folders or files containing the name of the target application or provider in the following location and delete the corresponding items:
• /Library
• / library / caches
• /Library/Preferences
• / Library / Application support
• /Library/LaunchAgents
• /Library/LaunchDaemons/
• /Library/PreferencePanes
• /Library/StartupItems

You have to be careful about the items you are about to remove. Be aware that deleting the wrong items from the library can damage or damage other applications or even the system.

Because it can take a long time to go through each folder and find leftovers, you can use "Search" in the Finder to find any related files.

• Open the user library in your home folder: ~/Library.
• Enter the target application or its provider in the search field > click on the library.
• Check for matching items > right click and select "Move to Trash".

If there are still files that you can't identify or find, just do a web search for the application's components. For advanced users, the Terminal (located in the /Utility folder) can be used to view the contents of the target directory and delete it.

Once all related items have been moved to the Trash, empty the Trash. Keep in mind that this action is irreversible and the entire contents of the Trash will be deleted.

• Right click the trash can icon in the dock
• Select "Empty Trash" and click "OK" on the pop-up dialog.
• An alternative is to empty the Trash by selecting "Empty Trash" in the Finder.

If you can't empty the Trash, just restart your device and try again. After restarting your device, you have removed Parallels Desktop from your Mac.

This is a wrapper

iMyMac Mac Cleaner is a must-have application that can uninstall Parallels on Mac easily and effortlessly. Whether you want to free up space on your Mac or no longer use the app, this uninstall method is guaranteed to completely remove the app, along with all of its associated components, from your device.

We have been familiar with the Parallels Desktop solution for 7 years already. Paradoxically, the need to work with Windows (someone has Linux) on a Mac still persists. Every year, Parallels developers try to make it faster with each new version, but questions about how much memory a virtual machine consumes and how to make a guest operating system run as fast as a native one seem to remain (and will not disappear). until hardware capabilities allow Windows and Mac OS X to run simultaneously, while leaving more free resources for applications).

The editors of MacDigger found 5 useful hints of the latest versions that will help remove the possible "brakes" of the virtual machine and get the most out of your apple assistant. All of them are dedicated to offloading memory and increasing the speed of work. Obvious advice (for example, take a more modern Mac with four (or even eight - the memory is now cheap) GB of RAM or upgrade to the latest version 9 of Parallels, in which the developers promise a performance increase of up to 40%), we will omit. Because anyone can buy hardware and newer software, but what can be done from the not so obvious?

Method 1: useful settings

For example, from the Parallels Desktop menu, select Preferences, then Advanced. Disable there the possibility of sending detailed logs (Use detailed log messages). This feature should be enabled only if you have any problems related to the operation of the virtual machine, and you communicate with Parallels technical support about this. Collecting detailed logs consumes more resources.

Now let's play with the performance and power consumption settings. In the Virtual Machine menu, select in sequence: Configure, Options, Optimization. In the Performance section, select Faster Virtual Machine and check the boxes next to Enable Adaptive Hypervisor and Tune Windows for Speed. The Faster Virtual Machine and Enable Adaptive Hypervisor options prioritize virtual machine processes over OS X processes. Tune Windows for speed speeds up Windows startup and optimizes applications in the virtual machine.

If you don't plan on unplugging your Mac anytime soon, you can also choose Better Performance instead of Longer Battery Life in the Power section. If you're the proud owner of a dual-GPU MacBook Pro, in addition to taking general energy-saving measures, this option will force your Mac to switch to the integrated graphics chip - less powerful, but consuming significantly less battery power. You will need to completely restart Parallels Desktop for any changed settings to take effect.

Next, what eats a lot of resources? That's right, video and 3D graphics. Therefore, you can reduce the amount of video memory allocated to the virtual machine. By default, its value is 256 MB. For office work and even for 2D graphics (like Photoshop) this is overkill. In the Virtual Machine menu, select Configure, then Hardware, and in the Video section, reduce the Video memory value to 128 MB. There you can also select the 3D acceleration mode, or turn it off completely (especially useful for those who have a not-so-new Mac).

What else can be done? For example, try disabling access to Windows folders from OS X. This can be done in the Sharing section of the Options tab.

But all these are trifles, and now about the important thing - about independently regulating the number of processors and memory that can be assigned to a virtual machine. By default, everyone in the virtual machine settings has 1 processor and 1 GB of memory, and by default, many have itchy hands to add everything and more to themselves. At the same time, users forget that virtual processors and memory do not behave exactly the same as "iron", "more memory" will not always mean "faster flies", and an overdose can sometimes just do harm.

In fact, in most cases, the best performance will be if you leave one processor per virtual machine. Multiple processors may only be needed if you are running multiple applications, each of which is associated with the processing of large amounts of data, such as scientific computing or online trading systems. At the same time, the minimum assigned memory must correspond to the minimum that is recommended in the system requirements for your guest OS (they are usually posted on the website of its developer).

If you are not sure that the default settings will save your applications, then you need to test everything first. Let's say you have a Windows virtual machine and you usually work with Microsoft Office Suite, FireFox, and a couple of other applications. Run your Windows at default settings and a few application files that you usually work with, say, open several messages in Microsoft Outlook, 3 Microsoft Word documents, a couple of Microsoft Excel files, 10 tabs in Firefox and IE to a heap, a PowerPoint presentation and more a couple of applications - and work with them a little. Right-click on the Windows taskbar and launch Task Manager. Switch to the Applications tab and check how much is currently being used.

You can usually see that everything running consumes about 80% of memory and less than 1% of the processor, which means that the default is enough for everything to work decently. However, if you use something flashy, this may not be enough (we'll talk about flash in a hint below).

If the indicators are not encouraging, then turn off Windows through the Start button. After the OS shuts down, go to the top menu of Virtual Machine, select Configure, then General. Here, with a small margin, we set the value of RAM shown by the Windows Task Manager with a small margin, say, 15%. We recommend adding no more than 256-512 MB at a time. As a result: compared even with the default settings, the amount of memory will decrease. The saved amount of fast (unlike the hard drive) memory will remain with Mac OS X. The “host” will not slow down, which means that the virtual machine will also run faster.

Method 2: use unused

According to developer statistics, users do not have much free disk space (8% have less than 10 GB). The Reclaim feature checks, finds, and allows you to work with unused disk space in a virtual machine. For example, at one time they occupied part of the disk space by a virtual machine, the space remained allocated, but is no longer needed. In this case, you can return it from the virtual machine back to the Mac. To do this, open the menu of the virtual machine, select Configure there, then General. Under the Reclaim... button, the disk space that can be reclaimed will be indicated. Click Reclaim... and confirm. The feature works in versions 8 and 9.

Method 3: snapshots

People who use snapshots often forget to delete them. People who forget to delete snapshots often forget how much disk space they are eating.

Snapshots are unnecessary for an ordinary user, but they are in large quantities (especially if the automatic creation mode is enabled while the virtual machine is running) produced by fellow developers in guest OSes and fans of something like that to install or reconfigure (so that you can always roll back). If you don't need any of that, it's best to check if SmartGuard auto-snapshots are turned on (and turn it off) in the Backup section of the Options tab. And if you need snapshots and are useful, but from time to time, then you can also select the following Custom option there, then you can limit the frequency and the maximum number of stored snapshots yourself (by default, the maximum is 100, when 101 appears, the oldest is deleted ). The Notify me before snapshot creation option will allow you to reject the creation of an unnecessary snapshot and inform you about its creation.

True, you will forget later anyway, so here's how to delete a snapshot:

1. Launch Parallels Desktop.
2. In the Parallels Virtual Machines list, select the virtual machine where you want to delete snapshots.
3. Click the virtual machine menu and select Manage Snapshots.
4. Select unwanted snapshots and click Delete.

All of the above is for versions 6 to 8, and since version 8 Parallels Desktop has the ability to delete snapshots even if the disk space is less than the size of the snapshot.

Method 4: manage gluttonous applications

Firstly, "braking" may well occur due to the use of some antiviruses. Try to use only the antivirus programs that Parallels Desktop offers - they were chosen based on the fact that they work optimally in a virtual machine. Incidentally, the 9th version of Parallels Desktop now has a rather convenient Security Wizard, where all operations with all available anti-virus programs can be performed in one window. If your antivirus is “not from the list”, try temporarily turning it off and looking at the indicators.

Secondly, there are serious complaints about Adobe Flash, which eats memory uncontrollably, especially if you actively surf the Internet, and there are a lot of flash banners. The operating system memory is allocated for the browser. The cache overflows and the data is flushed to the hard disk in the swap file (swap). If you have a minimized (rather than closed) browser hanging for a long time, then a huge amount of data accumulates in the “swap”.

Therefore, look at the Swap used parameter in Activity Monitor. If the amount of data there grows and has clearly become more than 1 GB, it is likely that some application does not let go of its memory.

Prevention is very simple - periodically close the entire browser using Cmd + Q, and in general, use this function more often.

Method 5: SSD, and again SSD

According to the developers, 30% of Parallels Desktop users are already using Macs with SSDs and they have not received any complaints about the product's gluttony. The fact is that Parallels Desktop uses multi-threaded I / O operations when working with a hard drive, which gives a particularly noticeable performance boost on Macs with an SSD. In addition, disk type information is provided to the guest OS so that it can use its own mechanisms to optimize SSD performance.

Having trouble when trying to? Not sure whether you have fully removed all the app components from your computer? If you have doubts about removing Parallels Desktop for Mac, check out this post for solutions.

Parallels Desktop for Mac is a popular virtualization software that allows Macintosh computers with Intel processors to run Windows, Linux and other virtual machines. Here are some problems you may encounter when uninstall Parallels Desktop:

> Parallels Desktop keeps running on background or cannot be quit;
> Parallels Desktop cannot be moved to the Trash because it is in use;
> Parallels Desktop components cannot be totally deleted from your Mac…

Looking for an effective solution to uninstall Parallels Desktop without hassle?We highly suggest you to remove Parallels Desktop by using a dedicated uninstaller.

How to Uninstall Parallels Desktop Effortlessly?

Osx Uninstaller is a lightweight yet high-efficient tool designed to help Mac users to remove any problematic, stubborn or malicious apps. To uninstall Parallels Desktop along with all its traces, you just need to follow 3 simple steps: launch > select > uninstall. Now watch the video clip to know how it works to quickly delete an app.

Here are the simple steps you can take to completely remove Parallels Desktop:

• 1. Quit Parallels Desktop if it is running, and then launch Osx Uninstaller.
• 2. Select Parallels Desktop, and then click Run Analysis to start scanning.

• 3. Review the app components that are scanned out from your system, click Complete Uninstall and then Yes in the pop-up dialog box to perform a thorough uninstall.
• 4. Once the removal is complete, click Back to Interface button to re-scan your Mac.

As can be seen in the video demonstration, Osx Uninstaller takes less than one minute to totally uninstall Parallels Desktop. There is no need to worry about the leftovers that may occupy large disk space if you adopt this option to remove Parallels Desktop. A reputable uninstaller guarantees a clean uninstall and saves you much trouble.

How Can I Remove Parallels Desktop Manually?

An all-in-one uninstaller will save you a lot of time and avoid possible issues in the app removal task. Yet if you persist to uninstall Parallels Desktop without using this handy tool, you could follow the proper steps listed below to complete the task.

Note that you should be logged into the Mac with an administrator account, and you might be asked for the password again during the uninstall process.

Part 1: Quit & Uninstall Parallels Desktop

First of all, if Parallels Desktop is currently running, you need to shut down your virtual machines (Parallels Desktop > Actions > Shut Down), and then quit Parallels Desktop by clicking Parallels Desktop icon in Menu Bar and choose Quit Parallels Desktop.

If the app is not responding, launch Activity Monitor to force quit it there.

Now, here's how you can uninstall Parallels Desktop from the /Applications folder:

• Open up Finder from the Dock, and click Applications on the sidebar.
• Locate Parallels Desktop, right click its icon and choose Move to Trash.

• When prompted, enter the current admin account password to allow this change.

• Head to Finder menu, choose Empty Trash, and then reboot your Mac.

What about the virtual machines created by Parallels Desktop? The uninstall steps listed above does not affect your virtual machines. If you don't want to keep the virtual machines and related data on your Mac, you can delete them before you uninstall Parallels Desktop. Here's how you can do to remove virtual machines:

• Right click on Parallels Desktop icon in Dock and choose Control Center.
• Right click on the virtual machine in the list and choose Remove option.
• Click Move to Trash to erase the data completely from this virtual machine.

Part 2. Delete Parallels Desktop Leftovers

Most Mac apps are bundle software that can be easily removed by aforementioned method. Yet some of them will create components like preference, cache and support files in different system directories during the first setup and daily usage. If you want to completely get rid of Parallels Desktop, it is necessary to delete all related components scattered around the system. Here's how to clear up the app remnants:

• Open the Finder, click the “Go” from the Menu Bar, and select Go to Folder…
• Type the path of the top level Library on hard disk: /Library, and hit Enter key.

• Search for the files or folders which contains the name of target app or the vendor in the following locations and delete the matched items: /Library, /Library/Caches, /Library/Preferences, /Library/Application Support, /Library/LaunchAgents, /Library/LaunchDaemons, /Library/PreferencePanes, /Library/StartupItems

Warming : deleting the wrong items from Library could do harm to your other apps or even system, so make sure to be very careful what you try to delete. Meanwhile, it could be time-wasting going through each folder and searching for app leftovers. Luckily, you can make use of the Search in Finder to hunt down associated files.

• Go ahead to open up the user library inside home folder: ~/Library.
• Type the name of target app or its vendor in the Search Bar, and click on Library.
• Identify the matched items, right click on them and choose Move to Trash option.

If there are still some files you fail to locate or identify, do a web search about the app components. Besides, advanced users can utilize the Terminal (located in /Utilities folder) to list the contents of the directory in question and then delete offending items.

Final Step: Empty the Trash

After moving all associated items to the Trash, you can carry out the last step – emptying the trash. Notice: the act is irrevocable, and everything in the Trash will be deleted immediately, so be very careful when you are performing this part.

• Right click on the Trash icon in the dock.

• Choose Empty Trash and click OK in the pop-up dialog.

• alternatively, empty the Trash by choosing Empty Trash under Finder menu.
• In any case you cannot empty the Trash, reboot your Mac and try it again.

Now, you can check if you have successfully remove Parallels Desktop thoroughly.

In this post we list mainly two options to help you uninstall Parallels Desktop for Mac. Which method do you prefer to adopt? Or say which one is more efficient and handy? Welcome to leave your comment or suggestion here to help us improve this post.

Prerequisites: Mac Pro 4.1 circa 2009, specs:

• OS X El Capitan Version 10.11.3 (just updated over the weekend)
• SN-H09440CK20H
• 2 - 2.93 GHz Quad-core Intel Xenon processors
• 32 GB RAM
• 2-1TB HD
• 1 - MacPro Raid Map

The last user of the machine had Parallels 3 running on it, and this can ruin the machine. I don't need or need Parallels and want to completely remove it and its partition. Looks like someone tried to uninstall Parallels in the past, reset the partition size and delete some files - kinda messy.

I ran Disk Utility - First Aid to see what it showed:

You can see that Parallels has some problems.

Commenters have noted that the images look too small, but I think the main takeaway is that the first aid on the Parallels volume is failing.

Also, the following screenshot shows what's left in the Parallels section:

Which only shows an empty Backup folder and some inaccessible VMs since Snow Leopard.

How can I get rid of Parallels , its partition, and everything previously associated with it (hopefully a full machine wipe is not enough, but I'll do it if necessary)?

Additional things I've tried... I tried using Disk Utility to Erase a Parallels Volume. This gives me an error:

Unmounting a drive

Failed to disconnect disk.

Operation failed...

Running the same task on an APPLE RAID Card Media which has Parallels gives me the same error.

Clicking the Unmount button in Disk Utility doesn't seem to do anything, no message at all.

Right-click on the "Parallels" drive that appears on my desktop and select "Eject" Parallels generates the following error message:

The Parallels "drive" was not ejected due to the use of one or more programs.

You can try to eject the disc again or click Force Eject to eject it immediately.

I haven't yet tried the Force Eject Parallels "disk" Parallels which shows up on my desktop. Thoughts?

1. (Optional 🙂 back up the contents of the "Backup" volume. If the volume is empty, do nothing.
2. Boot into recovery mode by pressing cmd R.
3. Open Terminal from Menu -> Utilities
4. Type diskutil list to get an overview.
5. Determine the sequence of partitions on the RAID.

Close terminal and open Disk Utility

If the sequence (1: EFI) is 2: Parallels – 3: Untitled – 4: Backup either selects an excellent Apple RAID device, "Erase" and remake the RAID drive if you not want to keep "Backup" or choose an excellent Apple RAID device, click "Partition", select the "Untitled" section in the new overlay, and click the "-" button to combine "Parallels" and "Untitled" if you want to keep "Backed up". In the latter case, select the extended "Parallels" partition and click "Erase" to create a new HFS+ file system and rename the volume.

If the sequence is different, consider the following rule: If you select section x (with x ≠ 1 or 2) and press the "-" button, the section will be merged with section (x-1) and only the contents of section (x-1).

Quit Disk Utility and reboot into your main system.

Uninstall any leftover Parallels 3.0 as per user comment 3439894: How do I completely uninstall Parallels Desktop 3?.