The Welcome Window

When you start Parallels Desktop for the first time, you will see the Welcome window that will help you start working in Parallels Desktop. The Welcome window provides you with fast access to the most common Parallels Desktop dialogs and assistants.

If you want to start working with the virtual machines already registered in Parallels Desktop, close the Welcome window and the Parallels Virtual Machines list will open.

Note: Later on, if you do not want to see the Welcome window again, just deselect the Show at startup option at the left bottom corner of the window.

PD6 - Welcome window

From the Welcome window, you can navigate between the following options:

New Windows installation . This option allows you to launch New Virtual Machine Assistant to create a virtual machine with a Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, or any other supported guest operating system .
Migrate Windows from PC . This option allows you to transfer an entire physical Windows computer to a Parallels virtual machine running on your Mac. The source computer data will be transferred using Parallels Transporter. To learn more about this utility, refer to Parallels Transporter User's Guide .
Use your Virtual Machines . If you have any virtual machines registered in Parallels Desktop, this option opens the Parallels Virtual Machines list with these virtual machines. If you have no virtual machines registered in Parallels Desktop, this option launches New Virtual Machine Assistant.

You can open and view the Parallels Desktop brief tutorials on the Parallels website by clicking the Watch video tutorials button.

You can open virtual machines that are not registered in Parallels Desktop by clicking the Open button. If you open a Parallels virtual machine, it will be registered in Parallels Desktop and added to the Parallels Virtual Machines list . You can also open third party (VMware, Microsoft Virtual PC, VirtualBox) virtual machines. If you open a third party virtual machine, it will be converted into the Parallels Desktop format and added to the Parallels Virtual Machines list .