Backup for XP/Parallels via Time Machine

Howdy,
I'm a virgin to this forum. So please be gentle.

I would like to backup my Parallel Desktop vm. Is the copy backup contained in Time Machine the same as a backup created in the vm environment via a windows 3rd party software and/or via Parallel's snapshot?
How would they be different? One method better than another?
I want to save time and effort in case I need to reinstall a vm to a working state at the time of any corruption/crash. In other words, so I don't have to reinstall all my software and data.
Thanks in advance...

If backing up via Time machine then it will backup the virtual hard disk and the vm settings assuming you have included the location of the files in the schedule.
So if your vm is corrupt you can restore from a given date...

http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/timemachine.html

If you dont want to backup the entire VM disk, you can setup sharing between the VM and MAC and keep dumping the files to be backed up from VM to the MAC shared folder (using some scheduled job from Windows or MAC). This folder will bet automatically backed up. Thus you can save on the disk space.

Thanks for your information! Sounds like I won't need to deal with any windows based backup software.

Happy New Year!