User guide

Using Parallels Compressor 247
How Parallels Compressor Process
a Virtual Machine
Compressor processes a virtual machine in the following way:
 Deletes unnecessary files on the current system.
 Defragments virtual disks and cleans up unused space.
 Compacts virtual disks.
The actions performed on your particular virtual machine depend upon the running mode:
 In automatic mode Parallels Compressor compresses only the current system disk
performing the pre-defined set of actions.
 In manual mode you are able to choose disks to compress and actions to perform.
More about running modes and other Compressor properties can be found below in the Options
of Parallels Compressor (page 250) section.
Steps of the Compression Procedure
Parallels Compressor is designed to perform the most efficient compression of a virtual
machine. The procedure consists of two steps:
 a preparatory step performed in the guest operating system (deleting temporary and
unnecessary files, defragmenting virtual disks and cleaning unused disk space);
 a compacting step (reducing the size of the virtual disk files) performed in the primary
operating system.