Preparing Virtual Machines for Deployment and Securing Them

To ensure a smooth deployment of the Parallels Desktop application, pre-configure your Windows, Linux, or macOS virtual machines. This allows the app to automatically download and install these machines as soon as it is deployed to users' devices.

Thankfully, the Management Portal has all the necessary tools to quickly and easily prepare something that is called Golden Images — virtual machine images, from which virtual machines will be deployed to your end users' Parallels Desktop installations.

However, the Golden Images are not without their limitations:

1. Upon the deployment of Parallels Desktop, users will have to manually click the + Add button in the top-right corner of the Control Center to initiate the installation of a company-provide virtual machines.

2. Only one virtual machine per user can be distributed using Golden Images. E.g., if your setup feeds pre-configured Windows 11 virtual machines using Golden Images, and some of your users also need a Linux machine, they would have to install and configure such machines manually.

Therefore, if you envision a completely zero-touch deployment, or your users need more than one pre-configured virtual machine, we recommend to deploy Parallels Desktop and virtual machines using our Autodeploy Package.