Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

kennedy · Aug 18, 2006, 09:55 AM

So far, Parallels has been working great for me... XP Pro, VS 2005, VSS, Office Pro... snappy performance... its great. Here's my first real stumble...

I need to connect to my company VPN. I think I have all the same settings in XP on my Mac as on PC's that are connecting fine. But I consistently get Error 721: The remote computer did not respond.

The first time I tried to connect, I got a "wrong password or username" sort of error... so, I tried a different password... but since then I always get 721... even going back to the original username and password I tried. Don't know if that first time was a glitch... or if there was a state change that I need to undo somehow. I did try rebooting. I did try restarting Parallels.

My questions:

(1) Has anybody gotten XP under Parallels to connect via VPN?

(2) Has anybody figured out how to make a Mac's Internet Connect work with a VPN Server targeted for Windows-style PPTP VPN (PAP and CHAP and all that jazz)?

(3) Has anybody solved 721 errors when trying to connect?

Thanks!!

subvertbeats · Aug 18, 2006, 10:36 AM

I dont use parallels sorry so cant provide specific advice,

but one thing that I observed recently is that our work VPN is sensitive to the MTU setting used on the client.

I simply couldnt connect to the VPN server after making some MTU changes. Changed back and voila working again.

So it might be worth checking what your MTU is set to for the Windows guest, and try changing it to say 1500 using Dr. TCP or similar.

Someone else may have other things to try first, but those were my observations..

sieb · Aug 19, 2006, 08:45 PM

My Parallels connects fine over VPN, that's primarily how I use it. I haven't gotten any errors. Make sure the network IP the Parallels machine gets before you connect over VPN isn't within the same subnet as the VPN network your connecting to. I had to switch our office to a 10.x.x.x network since most home networks are 192.168.1.x. And make sure you have the domain name filled in if your connecting to a Windows domain.

kennedy · Aug 20, 2006, 09:19 AM

Originally Posted by sieb

My Parallels connects fine over VPN, that's primarily how I use it. I haven't gotten any errors. Make sure the network IP the Parallels machine gets before you connect over VPN isn't within the same subnet as the VPN network your connecting to. I had to switch our office to a 10.x.x.x network since most home networks are 192.168.1.x. And make sure you have the domain name filled in if your connecting to a Windows domain.

Hmmm... my VPN gives you a 10.0.0.xx address; parallels gives a 10.37.129.xx address. Is that a problem?

sieb · Aug 20, 2006, 10:57 AM

No, thats not a problem.

pbook7777 · Aug 26, 2006, 07:03 PM

I use our corporate VPN to connect to work for days at a time with no problem using Parallels. It even works pretty well on the 30" lcd rotated to 1600x2560 resolution in windows using full screen mode.

JDro · Jan 24, 2007, 10:17 PM

I have been having the same problem using the Windows VPN in Parallels to connect to my exchange server at the office. I installed the Parallels 3120 update and actually got the VPN to connect one time. Now I'm back to getting the 721 error. I've tried contacting Parallels support, but I have not received a reply. Any luck on your end?

mac128k-1984 · Jan 24, 2007, 10:33 PM

No problems using my cisco vpn software in parallels. Worked like a charm

jd555 · Feb 10, 2007, 01:36 PM

I had a similar problem in my Parallels running Win XP. I could connect to work via a cisco VPN but could not connect to a client's system using the Windows VPN. I just figured out what the problem was.

On my system, Norton AV (14?), the Internet Worm Protection interferes w/ PPTP VPNs. I believe I am running the latest version of Symantec's security package (but I am embarassed to say that I don't know for sure -- I am still running in demo mode and downloaded via MSFT's site; the only About info I can find says it is Norton AV 14.0.0.89). Turned off the Worm protection, and voila, connected to the remote system right away. From another discussion, there doesn't seem to be a way to configure the exceptions to allow the PPTP VPN in the NAV product. Here is a link to a blog discussion on this which savages Symantec for the way they implemented this feature:

Robert Accettura’s Fun With Wordage � Blog Archive � Norton “Internet Worm Protection”

The workaround is to turn the Windows firewall protection on and the Symantec worm protection off.

jd555 · Feb 10, 2007, 01:42 PM

Even if your problem is not specifically Norton interfering, you might want to run through all of your security software settings, to verify that they aren't interfering w/ the VPN.

I too emailed Parallels support on this after my first go round, to no avail.

Good luck,

jd

besson3c · Feb 10, 2007, 04:44 PM

If Parallels is using bridged networking (i.e. sharing your OS X networking), why not establish your VPN connection using Internet Connect (yes, I've gotten it to work with PPTP, whether is works for you or not depends)?

jeena · Jul 3, 2007, 05:27 AM

I had the same problem. When I checked all exceptions in my windows and applayed it, it worked.

Kadarin · Jul 18, 2007, 04:57 AM

FYI, the Citrix/NetScaler sslvpn agent does work for WinXP within Parallels. I have networking set up such that XP within the VM gets one ip from my router, and OSX gets a different one on the same subnet. Once XP is connected, applications within XP can reach the internal networks, whereas OSX apps cannot.