Symptoms

Ubuntu Server hangs when booting.  "Starting up..." message appears and the Virtual Machine stops responding.

Cause

By default,  the Ubuntu Server kernel is compiled with PAE (Physical Address Extensions) support, but the current versions of Parallels Virtual Machines do not support PAE technology. The support of PAE will be added in future updates.

Resolution

1. Boot Ubuntu Server in the rescue mode:
   
   
   
   1. Insert the original Ubuntu Server installation disk into the MAC CD/DVD drive or please open the configuration editor of the Ubuntu virtual machine and connect the Ubuntu Server ISO image to the virtual CD/DVD disk. For more information about the editing of the virtual machine please read this article: How to Edit the VM configuration
   
   
   2. Set the boot sequence to "CD ROM - Hard Disk  - Floppy" in the Booting options.
   
   
   3. Boot the virtual machine using the Ubuntu Server CD.
   
   
   4. A welcome screen should appear. Type "rescue" without quotes at the beginning of the OS startup in order to boot Ubuntu Server in the rescue mode. [Another way: at the welcome screen, choose the rescue option].


2. Install generic kernel: type "apt-get install linux-generic" in the console logged as  a root. [To get to the shell prompt you will have to answer a series of questions and then be provided a list of choices, one of which is a shell prompt]. 

After that you will be able to load Ubuntu server using that kernel.

If you want to use Ubuntu server kernel, you should recompile it without PAE support from its sources.

Note:

In case of Ubuntu Server 7.10 you should install a linux kernel for i386:

• apt-get install linux-image-2.6.22-14-386

and reboot Ubuntu.