Category Archives: VMware Workstation

Posts, tutorials, and solutions covering the VMware Workstation platform

VMware – Cannot Cut, Copy, or Paste to VM’s

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KB ID 0000515

Problem

Ever since ESX 4.1 this feature has been disabled and you have been unable to paste to VM, VMware say in their own documentation:

Source (Page 215 – ESX Configuration Guide ESX 4.1 vCenter Server 4.1).

To turn this feature back ON you have a few choices.

Please be aware: We are talking about copy and pasting TEXT to and from a guest VM NOT files and folders.

Solution

ESX Option 1 (Enable Copy and Paste to VM an individual Guest machine)

Using vSphere 8 or Above

Firstly, you need to shut the virtual machine down > Right Click it > Edit Settings >  Advanced > Add the following TWO attributes and values.

Add in the following two;
Attribute: isolation.tools.copy.disable, Value: false
Attribute: isolation.tools.paste.disable, Value: false

Click OK >  Power the VM back on.

Using HML5 Web Client (Enable Copy and Paste to VM)

Firstly, you need to shut the virtual machine down > Right Click it > Edit Settings > VM Options > Advanced  > Scroll down.

 

Edit configuration > Add configuration params;

Add in the following two parameters then click OK

Name: isolation.tools.copy.disable, Value: false
Name: isolation.tools.paste.disable, Value: false

Using Flash Web Client.

Firstly, you need to shut the virtual machine down > Right Click it > Edit Settings > VMware Option Tab > Advanced > Edit configuration > Add in the following;

Name: isolation.tools.copy.disable, Value: false
Name: isolation.tools.paste.disable, Value: false

 

OK > OK > Power on VM

Using VMware Client (Enable Copy and Paste to VM)

1. Firstly, you need to shut the virtual machine down > Right Click it > Edit Settings > Option Tab > Advanced > General > Configuration Parameters.

2. Select “Add Row” and add the following two options:

[box]isolation.tools.copy.disable

isolation.tools.paste.disable [/box]

Set both these values to FALSE > OK > OK > Power the VM back on again.

Note: Even without these values set, if a VM is vMotioned to an ESX host that has the copy.paste options set in it’s config file (see below) then these features are automatically enabled.

Option 2 (Enable Copy and Paste to VM on an individual Guest machine)

1. You can also achieve the same as above by directly editing the .vmx file for the virtual machine, Add the following two values as shown below:

[box]isolation.tools.copy.disable=”FALSE”

isolation.tools.paste.disable=”FALSE” [/box]

Note: Even without these values set, if a VM is vMotioned to an ESX host that has the copy.paste options set in it’s config file (see below) then these features are automatically enabled.

Option 3 (Enable Copy and Paste on the ESX host for all the VM’s on that host)

Note: This procedure will be removed/reset after an ESX upgrade. (You will need to carry out this procedure again post upgrade).

1. Connect to your ESX server, either directly on the console, or via SSH. and execute the following command:

[box]vi /etc/vmware/config[/box]

 

2. Press i to insert text and paste in the following two lines:

[box]isolation.tools.copy.disable=”FALSE”

isolation.tools.paste.disable=”FALSE” [/box]

Press Escape > then type :wq to save the changes.

Additional Steps for Linux / Ubuntu to allow Copy and Paste to VM

1. Assuming you have the VMware tools installed in your Linux guest VM, if not execute the following command:

[box]sudo apt-get install open-vm-toolbox[/box]

To enable copy paste on the guest execute the following command:

[box]vmware-toolbox &[/box]

One the VMware tools properties page pops up you will be able to copy and paste.

Enabling Copy and Paste in VMware Workstation

Out of the box, this functionality is switched on. However if you lose it then open the virtual machines settings > Options tab > Guest Isolation > Enable the Copy and paste option.

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Convert (VMware) VMDK to (Microsoft) VHD/VHDX

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Reply

KB ID 0001516

Problem

Recently I’ve looked a lot at converting VMware resources to either Hyper-V, or Azure. But what if you want to take a Microsoft machine (or workload) and run it in VMware? 

Well the easiest way is to use some freeware, “StarWind V2V Image Converter”. These days I’m dubious about any piece of freeware, because it’s either a) Not Free when you actually want to use it in anger, b) Full of adware and nastiness, c) Just a vehicle to get your email address to send you marketing and junk.

Well you do need to supply an email address to get it but, other than suggesting I might want to take a look at their free VSAN software, they have left me alone (ThanQ).

Solution

Launch the software, and browse to the folder containing your .vhd to .vhdx file. (Note: You can connect directly to a Hypervisor if you wish).

Again I’m going to output to a local file, (faster) but as above, you can output to a Hypervisor. (I’ll simply just SCP the image into VMware and create a VM with it, when I’m finished).

Select your output type, basically they are; VMware Workstation (thick or thin), Stream optimised (.OVA), or the one we want, ESXi.

Note: You can also output to RAW file or GQCOW2 (Handy for if you run EVE-NG and what to upload a server/workstation into it!)

Time for a coffee! Hopefully this is what you will see.

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Linux – Install VMware Tools

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KB ID 0001330 

Problem

Note: This is to install the VMware Tools NOT the OPEN-VM-TOOLS.

I’ve had to do this a few times now, and every time I Goolge how to do it, I get pages of instructions on how to install the open vm tools. When what I really want is to install the VMware Tools.

Solution

I’m using vSphere ESX, but even if you are using VMware Workstation or VMware Fusion, you can still select ‘Install/Upgrade VMware tools’, this presents a DVD image to the virtual machine.

The install for VMware tools uses Perl, so you will need to have that installed.

[box]

yum install perl

[/box]

Now we are going to mount the virtual CDROM/DVD drive into a folder, (called/mnt). Then when we have a look inside this folder, you will see the VMwareTools-{version}.tar.gz (take a note of this).

[box]

mount /dev/cdrom /mnt
cd /mnt
ls
TAKE NOTE OF THE VERSION!

[/box]

Unzip those files into the /tmp directory, then run the installer.

[box]

cd /tmp
tar zxf /mnt/VMwareTools-9.10.0-2476743.tar.gz
cd vmware-tools-distrib
./vmware-install.pl

[/box]

Keep pressing {Enter} to accept the defaults, when complete the mounted VMware tools DVD will be ejected.

 

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Booting USB: Boot VMware Guest from USB

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KB ID 0000250

Problem

Booting USB: Last week I wrote an article about installing Windows PE on a USB thumb drive, after making several trips across the room to test my progress by booting the spare PC with said USB drive, I thought “there must be a simpler way to do this?”.

VMware Workstation guest VM’s do not support booting from USB devices, (its not built into their “BIOS”). However there’s nothing to stop you booting to CD then using that to boot to USB.

Booting USB

1. Download the PLoP Boot manager.

2. When you have downloaded the .zip file extract it, and inside you will find an ISO image called plpbt.iso that’s all we need you can get rid of everything else.

3. Set your virtual machine to use this .iso file as its CD drive.

4. Connect your USB drive to the guest VM by clicking VM > Removable Devices > The device you wish to connect > Connect.

5. Boot the VM with your PLoP CD, image and select USB from the boot options.

 

 

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VMware Workstation – Can’t get into the BIOS

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KB ID 0000509 

Problem

I recently upgraded to VMware Workstation 8, I was going to have a play with the Windows 8 developer preview, and needed to get my VM to boot from CD. After Hammering F1, F2, F10 and the delete keys. I admitted defeat and looked for the boot into BIOS setting that I’m sure used to be there!

A quick Google search said “Simply Press F2” when the virtual machine powers on, but despite nearly breaking my laptop’s keyboard no BIOS settings appeared.

Solution

1. I don’t know what the default “delay” is for VMware workstation 8 to display the “Press F2” prompt but to get there you need to alter it. This needs to be done for each virtual machine. Open the .vmx file for your virtual machine (it’s usually in the same folder as the virtual hard disk). Open it with notepad and append it with the following:

[box]bios.bootdelay = “5000”[/box]

Note: That’s 5000 milliseconds (or five seconds).

2. That’s better, now I can see my boot options again.

3. And after F2 I can now change my boot order.

 

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VMware Workstation – Error – ” Virtualized Intel VT-x/EPT is disabled”

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KB ID 0000540 

Problem

Seen on VMware Workstation, when attempting to virtualise a product that IS a virtualisation hypervisor (ESX for example).

Error: Virtualized Intel VT-x/EPT is disabled for this ESX VM. You will only be able to run 32-bit nested VMs.

At first I (wrongly) assumed that I needed to enable something in the BIOS on my laptop, and searched though every page to enable some virtualization setting that was turned off. But that’s NOT what it’s telling you. what it is telling you is you are trying to virtualize a virtualization product, so all the clever VT settings from your physical machines CPU will be shown to VMware workstation. But that presents a Virtual CPU to the OS you are installing as a guest (In the case above ESX) and THAT virtual CPU does NOT have Intel- VT-x/EPT enabled.

So a “Nested VM” – is a Guest VM, running Inside a Guest Hypervisor, that’s been virtualized.

Solution

Note: I’m using VMware workstation 8.

1. Right click the VM in question and select “Settings”.

2. Hardware Tab > Processors > Tick the option to enable VT-x/EPT or V/RVI > OK.

3. Restart the guest machine.

Note: You can also do this be editing the machines .vmx file with a text editor and adding the following lines;

[box]

monitor.virtual_mmu = "hardware"

monitor.virtual_exec = "hardware"

vhv.enable = "TRUE"

monitor_control.restrict_backdoor = "true"

[/box]

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VMware Workstation – Deploying Server 2012 and Windows 8 ‘Linked Clones’ from Templates

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KB ID 0000953 

Problem

VMware Workstation, is a great test tool, if i need to take a look at some new software, or plan how I’m going to do a job, and I don’t have access to the ESX server, or test bench, it’s a great tool to have on my laptop.

If you build machines form scratch, every time you need one it can take a while. To address that you can create a template and deploy machines from that. To make things even more efficient you can make then ‘linked clones’. If you use VDI you will probably be aware of linked clones, they use the hard drive of the machine they were created from, and maintain a ‘delta disk’ that holds the differences, this make them very efficient at using hard drive space, (which is good if you are running on a laptop!)

Solution

1. I’ve titled this Windows 8 and Server 2012, but this process works for just about any modern version of Windows. Build the machine that will be the template, and install all the latest updates. Locate sysprep.exe uisually in C:WindowsSyste32Sysprep, and run it. Ensure the ‘Generalize’ option is selected, and the shutdown option is set to ‘Shutdown’.

2. Once finished the machine will shutdown, in VMware Workstation right click the VM > Snapshot > Take Snapshot > Give the snapshot a sensible name > Take Snapshot.

3. Once complete > Right Click the VM again > Settings > Options Tab > Advanced > Select ‘Enable Template mode (to be used for cloning) > OK.

4. Now every time you want a new VM simply right click the template > Manage > Clone > When the wizard starts > Next.

5. Choose the snapshot name you picked in step 2 > Next > Linked Clone (if you choose full clone it creates a complete new machine and will take a LOT of system resources) > Next > Give it a name > Finish.

6. Power on your new machine and it will run the mini windows setup, and behave like a completely new VM.

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VMware – This Virtual Machine Appears To Be In Use

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KB ID 0000959 

Problem

I wanted to give a copy of a VM to a colleague, so I removed all the snapshots, and cloned one of my test VM’s. When I went to power on the original this happened;

The virtual machine appears to be in use.

If this virtual machine is not in use press the “Take Ownership” button to obtain ownership of it. Otherwise press the “Cancel” button to avoid damaging it.

Configuration file: {path-to-vmx-file}

And when I attempted to ‘Take Ownership’ of the machine, that failed also;

Could not open virtual machine: {path-to-vmx-file}
Taking ownership of this virtual machine failed.
The virtual machine is in use by an application on your host computer.
Configuration file: {path-to-vmx-file}

Solution

I knew it was not in use, as there was only me using my laptop. So I figured VMware had some files ‘locked’. Navigate to the folder that holds the VM’s files, (Note: The path is on the error message above).

.

Locate any folders that have a .lck extension appended to their name (as above), and move them to another folder. Then attempt to power on your VM.

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Windows 8 Wont Run in VMware Workstation

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KB ID 0000506 

Problem

When attempting to power on a VM built with the Windows 8 (Developer preview) you will see the following:

Error:
*** VMware Workstation internal monitor error ***
vcpu-0:NOT_IMPLEMENTED vmcore/vmm/intr/apic.c:1903
Please report this problem by selecting menu item Help > VMware on the Web > Request Support
, or by going to the Web page”{URL removed”}.
Please provide us with the log file (C:Users{username}Documents
Virtual MachinesVMvmware.log) and the core file(s)
(C:Users{username}DocumentsVirtual MachinesVMvmware-core.gz, C:Users{username}
DocumentsVirtual MachinesVMvmware64-core.gz, C:Users{username}DocumentsVirtual Machines
VMvmware-vmx-9120.dmp).
If the problem is repeatable, please select ‘Run with debugging information’ in the Options panel
of Virtual Machine Settings. Then reproduce the incident and file it according to the instructions.
To collect data to submit to VMware support, select Help > About and click “Collect Support Data”.
You can also run the “vm-support” script in the Workstation folder directly.
We will respond on the basis of your support entitlement.
We appreciate your feedback,
— the VMware Workstation team.

Solution

1. After some fiddling, it seems the problem is related to Workstation version 7, (See below):

2. Once swift upgrade to Workstation version 8 and the problem is gone.

Note: If this is not a path you want to go down you can also run Windows 8 in Virtual Box

 

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Connecting GNS3 to VMware Workstation

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KB ID 0000996 

Problem

A while back I got an email “Here is a suggestion for an article. ‘How to link GNS3 with VMware Workstation'”. Sorry it’s taken me so long to get round to it, here you go Daniel Newton.

Solution

Before we start I’m assuming you have installed VMware Workstation, and you’ve installed and configured GNS3.

1. Launch VMware Workstation > Edit > Virtual Network Editor > By default there will be three networks, the one we are concerned with is the ‘NAT‘ one. I change the default IP range, (in the example below to 123.123.123.123 255.255.255.0) > Apply > OK.

2. NAT Settings > Set the default gateway for the network (Tip: Don’t choose .1, I’ve had problems with that in the past) > OK.

3. DHCP Settings > Even if you’re not going to use DHCP, enter a range of IP addresses on your network > OK.

4. Windows Key + R > ncpa.cpl {Enter} > Notice there’s two new network connections, one for the NAT network, and one for the ‘Host only’ network.

5. To avoid confusion, I rename them.

6. So they are easily identifiable, (you will see why later).

7. In GNS3 drag a ‘Cloud’ onto your workspace.

8. Right click > Configure > NIO Ethernet > Select the Network drop-down box > Select your VMware NAT interface.

9. Add > Apply > OK.

10. Note: If you are working with Cisco ASA firewalls, you cannot simply connect it to the cloud, you need to put a hub/switch or router in between them, or you will see this error message;

Dynamips error
Device does not support this type of NIO. Use an ETHSW or
hub to bridge the connection to the NIO instead.

11. With a switch in between you can connect them together.

12. Now if you give the outside of the firewall an IP on the correct network range (you configure in step 1), and set its default route to point to the gateway address, (you configured in step 2). You will have public Internet access, (assuming the host computer has Internet access).

13 Working with routers (and switches) you can connect them directly to the cloud.

14. Again set the interface IP correctly, and the default route, and you will have public Internet access.

 

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