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VMware Gripes VMware makes a Virtual Machine program for Windows and Unix

August 4, 2005. The Host System Requirements web page for version 5 of VMware workstation says that support for the AMD Sempron is experimental. However, the page is not dated and version 5 has been out a while, so I emailed VMware a question about the current state of Sempron support. The response from the Sales Support department: 

Yours is a unique question that I really don't have an answer for; however, I do know where you can get your answer to that and many, many, more details about VMware products. Here is your invitation to participate in the VMware Community Board. As a member, contributor to the Community, you receive current information about our products and you'll also have access to programs, events, and miscellaneous offers.

In other words, pump your own gas. 

August 27, 2004. Windows XP SP2 has recently been released. This should be a big deal to VMware. You would think there was something on their web site about support for SP2 inside a VM. Nope. Not a thing. All I could find was some questions from users in the forums looking for an answer. Why the silence? 

February 8, 2004. VMware workstation 3.2.0 in a Windows XP VM. Running the Western Digital online hard disk diagnostics from http://websupport.wdc.com/diag/dlg_download.asp  To get to this page however, you first have to register at http://support.wdc.com/dlg/onlinedlg.asp

November 30, 2003. Nero Burning Rom v5.5.10.13 in a Windows 2000 VM using VMware workstation 3.2.0.   Running the Nero Info Tool produced the warning shown here on the right. There were two instances of this warning message, the first one did not say that it was already filed internally as a bug. The command packet in the first warning was completely different.

November 1, 2003. Overhead. FYI (not a gripe): There has to be overhead to running VMware, it comes with the territory. Today, while copying hundreds of files I watched the copy operation using Task Manager concurrently in the host and guest OS (both were Windows 2000). While the copy operation was in-flight, both OSs ran at about 95% cpu or so. After, the copy finished, the guest OS flatlined at about 2% cpu. However, the host OS yo-yos with frequent spikes of about 20% cpu. Overhead. The full size image is 24k. Click on the thumbnail and it will open in a new window. The top instance of Task Manager is the virtual machine, the bottom instance is the host OS.

August 31, 2003. Not so virtual. VMware workstation 3.2.0. Virtual machine is running Windows 2000 Professional SP3. Host OS is Windows 2000 Professional SP4. Norton Anti-Virus 2003 is installed and running on the host OS, not in the virtual machine. The VM is using NAT networking and sharing an Internet connection with the host OS. 

I run the Mozilla 1.4 email program in the virtual machine and download my email. There are viruses in the email. How do I know? Norton Anti-Virus 2003 running in the host OS catches and detects the viruses in the email as it is being downloaded. To repeat, there is no anti-virus program in the virtual machine at all. Apparently these VMs are not as virtual as we are led to believe. 

Update: A reader of this site wrote to say that the reason NAV 2003 picked up the viruses in the VM is because of the shared internet connection. He said NAV monitors the Internet for any traffic going to a mail server, and controls it. This makes sense, but I don't know how to confirm it. November 4, 2003.
Update: It appears NAV does monitor the Internet for any email traffic. It recently caught a virus in the host OS while I was using an email client installed on the computer well after NAV was installed. In the old days of NAV you had to configure things to get NAV and your email program working together so that inbound mail could be virus checked. No more, configuration is no longer necessary, it just works. February 2, 2004. 
Update: A reader of this site suggested running a packet sniffer such as Ethereal in both the Windows 2000 host OS and a Linux Guest OS. February 9, 2004.

June 18, 2003. CPU Hog. VMware workstation 3.2.0. I booted a Windows 98 SE VM and left it at the desktop, doing nothing. Unlike the gripes below, it was not waiting for a password to be entered. Then I went into Notepad in the host OS (Windows 2000 SP3). After a minute, I noticed that Task Manager (running in the system tray) showed cpu usage at the max. At the right, is the CPU Usage History from Task Manager in the host OS. It spikes up to 100% for a while, dips to near zero and then spikes again. To repeat, I was doing nothing in the VM. The program hogging the host cpu was vmware.exe. Eventually, it settled down on its own.  Update: October 31, 2003. It also hogs 100% of the cpu when a new operating system is being installed in a virtual machine and files are being copied. This rendered the host Windows 2000 OS unusable. To get around this, I used Task Manager in the host OS to lower the priority of the VMware program.

June 17, 2003. VMware workstation 3.2.0. Windows 98 VM. I changed the name of the workgroup which required Windows 98 to reboot. The reboot process caused VMware to consume 99% of the real CPU (host OS was Windows 2000 SP3) for well over a minute. The virtual machine itself remained up, this was simply a re-boot of the guest OS.

When the same VM had File and Printer sharing enabled, it again had to be re-started. This time, the restart was fairly quick, however, when Windows 98 paused during startup at the "enter network password" prompt, I noticed that VMware was consistently using over 90% of the host CPU as reported by Task Manager. At times CPU usage was up to 99%, sometimes it dipped to a low of 72%. The only thing the guest OS was doing however, was waiting for the user to enter a password. There was only one VM running in the host OS. This is repeatable, once I let the VM wait for over minutes, VMware never stopped using 99% of the host OS CPU.  

June 13, 2003.VMware workstation 3.2.0. The floppy disk drive can not be shared by multiple concurrently executing VMs (it can be shared by a single running VM and the host OS). When you start a second VM, VMware issues a message that the floppy disk drive is in use by another VM and the second VM boots without a floppy disk drive. Update: VMware is a bit slow on the update when it comes to releasing control of the floppy disk drive after the owning VM shuts down. It incorrectly issued this message  when starting a virtual machine. At the time the VM being started was the only running VM. Another VM that had been using the floppy disk drive had been shut down. After rebooting the VM, it acquired the floppy disk without problem. June 19, 2003.

June 13, 2003. VMware workstation 3.2.0. I used to get this message (The network bridge on device VMnet0 is not running) any time the hub on my LAN was not plugged in. Okay. No big deal. If I needed the VM to do networking, I'd just turn on the hub and reboot. Then I changed my LAN and added a router. The hub is now plugged in to the router via a crossover cable. Each machine gets an IP address from the DHCP server in the router. In the old days, they each had a hard coded IP address in the 10.x.x.x range. With this new networking setup, VMware warns about this every time a VM boots up, even if the hub is on.  The solution was to change the VMware networking environment. In the VMware application, highlight a VM, then select Settings -> Configuration Editor -> Network Adapter -> Connect to the following network. Previously this was set to "Bridged, connect directly to the physical network". Changing it to "Host only, a private network shared only with the host" got rid of this error and allowed file sharing between the VMs and the host OS.  However, I wanted the VM to get on the Internet through the router, so I tried the NAT networking option, where the VM shares the host OS IP address. This worked too.  Update: February 12, 2005. I still get this problem with multiple guest OSs running different versions of Windows. The network environment is now a router connected via crossover cable to another router functioning as merely a switch. The host OS is plugged into the second router (the one functioning as a switch). The host OS is assigned an IP address by DHCP in the router. NAT still works fine, but bridged networking still suffers this error so I can't have a Virtual Machine get an IP address from the router. With NAT the VM is on a different IP subnet and is assigned an IP address by VMware.  Update: February 13, 2005. Fixed! I checked for this error message in a search engine and found the problem. In the Host OS, the VMware Bridge Protocol was not bound to the LAN connection. Oops. Fixing this allowed the guest OS to play on the LAN just like the real computers and be assigned an IP address, DNS Server and a Gateway IP address by the router.  Update: September 30, 2005. A reader of this page suggested that this can be fixed by installing the Microsoft Loopback adapter. To do this on Windows 2000: 1. Start up the Add/Remove Hardware Wizard,  2. Select 'Add a new device', Next, 3. Select 'No, I want to select the hardware from a list, Next, 4. Select 'Network Adapters', Next, 5. Select 'Microsoft', 'Microsoft Loopback Adapter', Next, Next, 6. Finish. He also said this should allow you to map network drives to local folders.

August 23, 2003. VMware workstation 3.2.0. Same VMware problem but with a different guest OS, Windows 2000. Again, bridged networking used to work fine, until my LAN configuration changed as explained above. Now bridged networking does not work at all despite my trying to reconfigure it. The error displayed when booting the Windows 2000 guest OS is shown here on the right. The guest OS can not see any other computers or printers on my network.

With Host only addressing, the guest OS could not see my print server and thus I could not print from it. The guest OS has File and Printer sharing enabled along with both NetBEUI and TCP/IP. When browsing my local network (Computers Near Me) it sees the host OS, but when you try to list the shares on the host OS, it is not accessible. Then I tried sharing the printer from the host OS and rebooting the guest. Now it sees the host OS in the list of Computers Near Me and also sees the printer being shared. But it can not connect to the printer as shown here. I deleted the old printer definition from back when bridged networking was working and invoked the Add Printers wizard. This time it worked.

Networking is supposed to be a big advantage of VMware compared to its competition, Virtual PC. For me, grief with no technical support.

May 26, 2003.VMware workstation 3.2.0. Another impact on the host OS. While my computer was connected to a personal LAN only (no Internet connection) and VMware was not running at all, my ZoneAlarm firewall asked the question shown here on the right. The source IP was that of another computer on the personal LAN. Why is program vmnat.exe concerned with this at all? I changed ZoneAlarm and put the source IP address shown here in the trusted zone.  Update: June 6, 2003. This message appeared again under the same circumstances. This time I gave the program server rights in the trusted zone.   Update: June 10, 2003. The networking scheme on my internal LAN has changed. There is now a router which runs a DHCP server to assign IP addresses to each machine. Today I did a PING of another computer on the LAN and got asked this question by ZoneAlarm. The source IP address was that of the PINGee, not the PINGer. The PING command ran fine without answering the question.   Update: June 18, 2003. The problem persists but with a new wrinkle. I had the ZoneAlarm lock engaged for a while - it blocks all Internet traffic. After removing the lock, I was again asked if I wanted to allow program vmnat.exe to accept connections from the Internet. As before, there were no VMs running and the VMware application was not running. This time, the source IP address was 192.168.189.1 which is the IP address of VMnet1 (a virtual Ethernet adapter used for basic host-only networking). DHCP and Autoconfiguration are enabled on VMnet1. Beats me what's going on.

May 22, 2003. VMware workstation 3.2.0. VMware claims their software has no impact on the host OS. It does. Here is an example. The host OS was connected to the Internet and tried to connect to the Logical Disk Manager Service. This caused the ZoneAlarm firewall to ask the question shown here. Why does VMware want to accept Internet connections when the host Windows 2000 OS is connecting to the Logical Disk Manager Service? You get to the Disk Management Service in Windows 2000 via Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Computer Management -> Disk Management. The source IP address was my IP address.

May 20, 2003.VMware workstation 3.2.0. Keystrokes are sometimes not passed to an active VM. In particular, the Print Screen key does not take a snapshot of the guest VM when pressed while the VM is active. To make a screen shot of a guest VM, focus first has to be returned to the host OS. This despite the fact that copy/paste does work between the host and guest. Also, when copying files, the keyboard shortcuts, such as Ctrl-C and Ctrl-V are not passed to an active virtual machine. Instead you have to use the mouse to select Edit->Copy and the like from within the VM.

May 19, 2003. VMware workstation 3.2.0. The VMware service crashed in a Windows 98 SE VM. The only program running at the time was Wordpad and the failure happened just after pasting text into WordPad from the host OS. Windows 98 continued to run, but for good luck I shut down the VM and discarded all changes.

May 13, 2003. VMware workstation 3.2.0. There is a bug with reading CD-ROM discs. A CD-R disc was created with Easy CD Creator. It contained folders burned on multiple days. The host OS (Windows 2000 SP3) sees all the folders. A Windows 2000 SP3 guest OS only sees one folder, the first one burned. To see all the folders from the VM, I had to map the CD-ROM drive of the host OS to the guest OS.

October 30, 2003. There is another bug with CD-ROM discs. I had a disc that could be read fine from the host OS and also another computer. However, when I used this disc in a virtual machine, it suffered I/O errors. This happened with multiple VMs. 

May 13, 2003. VMware workstation 3.2.0. While copying a large (52 MB) file from the host OS to the guest OS, it dies half way through. The error message is wrong - the network name was still available. I deleted some files in the guest OS, tried the copy again, and it worked the second time. Both host and guest were Windows 2000 SP3.  This has occurred more than once.

May 13, 2003. VMware workstation 3.2.0. Sometimes, when I start a VM there is a message from my firewall (ZoneAlarm). The example shown here is from a Windows 2000 VM. I don't think a VM or Windows 2000 tries to access the Internet during startup. The destination IP address of all zeros is not a normal IP address. The VM and guest OS seem to start  fine and run fine whether I allow this access to what ZoneAlarm thinks is the Internet or not. Another time, the IP address was that of the DNS server of my ISP.  May 14, 2003. While using NetMeeting Remote Desktop to access my computer (Windows 2000 SP3) from a Windows XP machine, this ZoneAlarm alert was issued while resuming a VM that had been suspended. It proved fatal to the remote access. VMware wanted to connect to port 53 of the DNS server of my ISP. With NetMeeting I could not click on either the yes or no button and although I could tab to the buttons, pressing the Enter key did nothing. The mouse was able to move but no mouse clicks were transmitted to my computer. Using NetMeeting, I sent my computer a Ctl-Alt-Delete and used that to invoke Task Manager which in turn I used to cancel ZoneAlarm. VMware however was hung for good. Even without ZoneAlarm the VM would not start up. I had to cancel VMware using Task Manager. After restarting VMware and trying again to resume the VM in question, there were multiple error messages from VMware (which I didn't save) and the VM would not resume. The messages had something to do with files being locked. Fortunately rebooting the host OS cleared up the VMware problems. I gave up and granted program VMware unlimited access to the Internet in ZoneAlarm.

April 29, 2004. I tried to run a VMware defrag (not a Windows defrag) of  Windows XP VM. After running for over 30 minutes and appearing to finsih, VMware issued this error: "Not enough free space to create temporary file "WinXPPro-02.vmdk.tmp". Do you want to choose another location for the temporary file?". Despite the work VMware did t this point, the size of the .vmdk files did not change. 

May 5, 2003. VMware workstation 3.2.0. VMware is wasteful in terms of file sizes in the host OS. I have a Windows 2000 Virtual Machine whose files consume 2.08 GB as seen from the host OS. There is a .vmdk file of 739 MB and a -02.vmdk file of 1.35 GB. This seems wasteful, because the C disk in the virtual machine says it is using 869 MB of disk space. That leaves about 1.2 GB of space used in the host OS that is not being used in the guest OS. Besides wasteful, it is confusing. The VMware configuration editor says that there is 1.84 GB of system free space (as shown here). I can't even guess what this might mean. 

A defrag run inside the VM had no effect on the size of the .vmdk files in the host OS. A defrag run from the VMware Configuration Editor (clicking on the Defragment button shown here) also had no effect on the size of the .vmdk files in the host OS. Worse, it caused the following two errors during the next startup of the virtual machine. 

The only available option is clicking on an OK button. This is the sort of internal product error that you would normally contact technical support for. However, VMware charges $90 for tech support.  Despite these two errors, the guest Windows 2000 OS was able to start up and a check disk of the C disk produced no errors. The were also no errors in the event log of the guest OS. 

Product Limitations: There is no FireWire support in virtual machines. There is also no USB 2.0 support, however USB 2.0 devices in the host OS are made visible to the guest OS as USB 1.1 devices. A virtual machine only supports one cpu. You can run the product on a multi-cpu machine, but a single VM will only use one cpu. The company has future plans for VMs that support multiple cpus.  VMware workstation 3.2.0. May 13, 2003.

When you insert a CD while using a VM, the mouse pointer freezes for a bit. VMware workstation 3.2.0. May 2, 2003.

FYI: April 25, 2003. I own VMware workstation version 3. Now that version 4 has been released, I could not find information on their web site about version 3. The main page for their desktop products only mentions version 4. I emailed the webmaster who responded very quickly and pointed out these URLs for archived information on version 3: 
  www.vmware.com/support/ws3/doc/ 
  www.vmware.com/pdf/ws32_manual.pdf 
  www.vmware.com/support/kb/enduser/std_alp.php  for the Knowledge Base

April 19, 2003. They offer free presentations over the Internet. However, when you register for one, you are not warned that it requires the installation of WebEx software (an ActiveX control for something called OnStage v3.6). Any time you install software there is a risk, so they should warn people up-front about this. If you later register for another seminar, even on the same computer with the same web browser, they still install OnStage software, again with no warning or explanation. 
Update: Attending an online presentation. Just before it started, the WebEx Meeting Manager notified me that "Your host has started an Internet Phone session. Do you want to participate?" There is no explanation at all about what this is. Before the online WebEx meeting, VMware sent an email message with instructions about how to join the meeting. They were wrong. A URL was provided for the meeting which is supposed to have a "join" button to join the meeting. There was no join button and no link for tech support. After hunting around I somehow stumbled on an email address for tech support from WebEx. I wrote them and they responded that "The enroll button will turn into a join button only after the event has started. please refresh your screen to see this. It has a Join button now". There is an 800 phone number to dial and listen to the presentation. After entering the passcode, you hear music. You don't get any feedback about whether the passcode was correct or not or which meeting you joined. April 30, 2003.
Update: The WebEx software caused messages from my ZoneAlarm firewall. I have a printer defined on my computer called ActiveTouch Document Loader. I didn't define it. Searching the net, it seems that others have said this is from WebEx. The firewall often reports that the print spooler subsystem wants to connect to the Internet, specifically to a DNS server. For more, see my ZoneAlarm gripes. June 9, 2003.  

April 5, 2003. Problems with USB devices not being inherited and being inherited. VMware 3.2.0. Windows 2000 SP3 is host OS. 

Using VMware with a standard PS/2 connected keyboard was fine. However, when I switched to a USB keyboard in the host OS, the virtual machines sometimes saw it and sometimes not. A Windows 2000 SP3 VM did inherit the the USB keyboard.  

I Start with a host OS connected to the Internet via a cable modem plugged in to the USB port. Then I stop the cable modem, unplug it from the USB port and shut down my firewall. Then I start a VM and a firewall program. With the VM active (having focus), I plug in the cable modem and the VM sees the USB port activity and uses the cable modem to get onto the Internet. Fine. When I'm done, I again stop the cable modem, stop the firewall and shut down the VM. Unbeknownst to me however, the cable modem is now activated in the host OS! VMware does not tell me this. I end up connected to the Internet without a firewall. It would be nice if VMware notified users when an OS inherits a USB device from another OS. 

I had a network connection between a VM and the host OS. From the VM I could copy some small files from the host OS to the guest OS (both Windows 2000). However, copying a large (51 MB) file failed. Twice. I didn't note the error message. The file itself was fine, it was a .zip file that could be opened by a Zip program on the host OS.

This one really hurt. 

January 2, 2003. Their VMware Workstation product comes with 30 days of free technical support. However, there is a catch - the first day. Normally, the first day of technical support entitlement is either: the first day you install the product, the first day you register it or the first time you make a tech support request. Not VMware.

In a tactic that even Microsoft would be ashamed of, their first day of technical support is the day the mailman gives you the box with the software. If the box sits unopened, tough luck.  

Needless to say, a software company can set whatever tech support policy they see fit. The real gripe with VMware is that they don't tell you upfront what their support policy is. Without my knowledge, my tech support period dwindled away while the software collected dust in the box.

Whose fault is this? 

1. VMware offers their software at educational discounts for students and teachers through resellers. My copy was purchased from a reseller whose web site said nothing about the fact that the clock starts with the handoff from the mailman. Later I checked three other VMware reseller web sites and they too say nothing about this. For example see: Creation Engine,  Journey Ed and Programmers Paradise
2. There is no warning on the box that the clock is ticking on technical support. 
3. I even RTFM (read the Users Manual in the box). It says nothing about the tech support entitlement period. Page 26 says: "Be sure to register your serial number. You may then report your problems by submitting a support request at www.vmware.com/requestsupport". Nothing about the fact that the clock is ticking as you are reading this.  

In addition to resellers, VMware sells their software on their web site. On a page describing their free tech support policy they say: "You may request support from VMware Customer Support for 30 consecutive calendar days, starting on the day that you receive your VMware software and license". Fair enough. That's the deal, take it or leave it. Except, that customers who buy from their resellers, never get this warning. As such, I got screwed out of the expected 30 days of technical support.   

Standard operating procedure in the computer industry is that the support period starts with either the first reported problem or when the product is registered or installed. If VMware chooses a different policy, they should go out of their way to make potential customers aware of what they are getting into.

Not to nitpick, but as noted above their web site says the support period starts on the day the customer receives the software. An email on this subject from someone at VMware said: the "30-day complimentary support starts from date of purchase..." Another email on this from someone else at VMware said:  "VMware offers complimentary Workstation support for the first 30 days after date of shipment..." 

The date of purchase, the day it ships or the day the customer gets it? Which is it? Doesn't matter to me any more. :-(  

Is there a pattern here?

Another email from a third person at VMware: "As far as the start date for support, our policy has always been to offer tech support from the day the product ships. This is not unreasonable, since customers may hold the product for a long period of time before registering.

Update: January 9, 2003. Someone changed their mind at VMware. After a number of VMware employees insisted they were right, one of them decided that I was entitled to a real 30 days of support. They extended my support period another 30 days. By this time, however, they had worn me out. 

This and That 

November 23, 2005. To run Windows on a Mac, Al Fasoldt likes Guest PC. It comes from www.lismoresystems.com and sells for $70. See After Microsoft's Virtual PC, are there other ways to run Windows on a Mac? Yes, and one of them is worth trying

Xen lures big-name endorsements February 18, 2005  CNET News.com. Xen lets multiple operating systems run on the same computer. Xen web site.

Microsoft Program Lets Macs Run Windows, Easing Switch to Apple By Walter Mossberg in the Wall Street Journal October 14, 2004. About Virtual PC for the Mac from Microsoft. 

VMWare Workstation 4.5.2 reviewed by Jim Lynch on ExtremeTech July 15, 2004 

FYI: There is competition in the Virtual Machine area. 

Connectix has a history of emulation software that, for example, lets Mac OS computers run Windows software. In late 2002 they introduced virtual machine software called Virtual PC. Supported guest operating systems include Windows, Linux, Unix and OS/2. Supported host operating systems include Windows, Macs and OS/2. VMware does not support either Macs or OS/2. Connectix also has a Virtual Server product. 

Virtual computing: real benefits, real changes By Rupert Goodwins ZDNet (UK) April 30, 2004

FYI:  April 10, 2004. The latest release of Virtual PC does not support USB or SCSI devices form within a guest OS. It does support Linux and Mac OS despite the lack of mention of this from Microsoft. 

Vexed by Virtualization By Oliver Rist in InfoWorld.  April 2, 2004. To compete with VMware, Microsoft must give Virtual PC users some elbow room

Testing begins on Microsoft's Virtual Server February 18, 2004, CNET News.com

SWsoft makes Virtuozzo that lets several copies of Linux appear to run simultaneously on the same Intel server.  It doesn't actually run several copies of Linux though, it runs only one, but the software makes it available to users as several independent copies, each of which can be customized and restarted independently. They are expected to have Windows software sometime during 2003. 

NeTraverse makes Win4Lin a VM product that can run Windows 9x or ME in a window under Linux. It does not support Windows 2000 or XP. There are two flavors of Win4Lin, a standard desktop version and a terminal server version.

There is a free, open-source Bochs (pronounced "box") IA-32 Emulator project. Quoting from their web site "Bochs is capable of running most Operating Systems inside the emulation including Linux, Windows® 95, DOS, and Windows® NT 4."

The Wall Street Journal November 16, 2000 had an article in the Under the Radar column about a company called Ensim which sells a product similar to VMware. Ensim sells to ISPs however, not to consumers. The Ensim product costs $25,000. 

Emulation.Net is a web site devoted to PC emulation and Virtual Machines on the Mac OS. It includes a page listing PC emulators on the Mac. 

Before using the product, I also had gripes about VMware. 

FYI: VMware unveils software, plans IPO CNET News.com  July 2, 2003

FYI: Computer-in-a-computer idea gains ground CNET News.com November 10, 2003.  Microsoft and VMware are bringing closer to mainstream use a technology for running multiple instances of an operating system on a single Intel-based computer.