VMware Workstation 7.0, VMware Player 3.0, and VMware ACE 2.6 Release Candidate Release Notes

Workstation Version 7.0 | 02 OCT 2009 | Build 197124

Last Document Update: 02 OCT 2009

Check frequently for additions and updates to these release notes.

These release notes cover the following topics:

What's New
Installation Instructions
Product Feedback
Known Issues

What's New

With this release of VMware Workstation, VMware Player, and VMware ACE the following new features and support have been added:

New Support for 32-Bit and 64-Bit Operating Systems
New Features in Workstation
New Features in VMware Player

New Support for 32-Bit and 64-Bit Operating Systems

This release provides support for the following host and guest operating systems in addition to those operating systems already supported:

Operating System	Host and Guest Support
Windows 7 Home Basic Windows 7 Premium Windows 7 Business Windows 7 Enterprise Windows 7 Ultimate	Host and guest
Windows 2008 SP2, R2	Guest
Windows Vista SP2	Guest
Debian 5	Guest
Ubuntu 9.04	Host and guest
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3	Host and guest
CentOS 5.3	Guest
Oracle Enterprise Linux 5.3	Guest
OpenSUSE 11.x	Host and guest
Mandriva 2009	Host and guest
SUSE Linux Enterprise 11.x	Host and guest

New Features in Workstation

To provide feedback on the new features of the VMware Workstation 7.0 Release Candidate, go to the Beta Community site. To send comments about graphics and installation, go to the Workstation Release Candidate forum and select the Graphics or Installation Discussions link in the right column. For more information on how to provide feedback see Product Feedback.

Aero Glass Support — The new Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) graphics driver, available by default for Windows Vista and Windows 7, provides support for the Windows Aero user interface. The WDDM driver also includes support for OpenGL 1.4 and Shader Model 3.0. VMware recommends that you use the graphics hardware NVIDIA GeForce 8800 and ATI Radeon HD 2600 with Aero. Post any rendering or performance issues caused by the new driver in the VMware Workstation Release Candidate Beta Community forum.
3D Graphics Improvements — OpenGL 2.1 and Shader Model 3.0 support is now available for Windows XP virtual machines. The XPDM graphics driver works with Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7. However, only Windows XP virtual machines install a graphics driver by default. The instructions to switch between graphics drivers in the guest operating system are available on the VMware Workstation Release Candidate Beta Community site in the document How to switch between SVGAII and WDDM Drivers .
vSphere 4.0 and ESX Support — Support is now available for running ESX 4.0 as a guest operating system. VMware Certified Professionals (VCPs) and technical professionals can install the latest server virtualization software and experiment with server setup, conduct training, show demos, and test production configurations. Running ESX as a guest eliminates the need for spare hardware available to run ESX natively and enables ESX to run on systems that are not listed on the ESX hardware compatibility list (HCL).

Running ESX in VMware Workstation Release Candidate works only on processors that support Intel EM64T with VT-x or on the AMD64 Family 10H and later processors with AMD-V. ESX 4.0 guests must be configured with two or more cores. VMware recommends that the host system should have at least as many cores as the guest. Only 32-bit guests can be installed to run as nested virtual machines inside an ESX guest. These virtual machines can only be configured to use binary translation. This feature has been tested on only a limited number of host operating systems, including RHEL 5.2 Desktop and Server editions, Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11, Ubuntu 9.04 Desktop Edition, and Windows Vista SP1. The nested 32-bit guest operating systems that have been tested are RHEL 5.4, RHEL 5.3, RHEL 4.8, Ubuntu 8.10, Windows 2003 Advanced Server, Windows Vista, Windows XP SP2, Ubuntu 9.04, and CentOS 5.3. Performance of ESX instances should not be compared to ESX running natively because all operations pass through VMware Workstation and the host operating system, which significantly degrades performance.

This configuration is intended for educational and demonstration purposes only and should not be used in production environments. To use this feature, you must download vSphere 4.0 from the VMware Web site and follow the installation documentation provided with vSphere to install ESX.
Multi-Core and Four-Way SMP Support — Support for multi-core processors and four-way SMP allows users to take advantage of the processing power of computers running multiple processors or multi-core processors like the new Intel i7. VMware Workstation Release Candidate allows you to create and run virtual machines with a total of four processor cores, which can consist of four single-core processors, two dual-core processors, or one quad-core processor.
Virtual Printing — Support for virtual printing allows you to print from virtual machines without mapping network printers or installing printer drivers in the virtual machine. If virtual printing is enabled in the virtual machine setting, all of the printers installed on the host operating system are available in the guest operating system. This functionality is enabled through a partnership with ThinPrint Inc.
On-Demand VMware Tools Download — VMware Tools integrates the guest operating system with the host operating system through drag and drop, cut and paste, time synchronization, and features like Unity. This feature downloads the latest version of VMware Tools when you create a virtual machine, start up an existing virtual machine, or start the download manually. The on-demand download capability provides the latest tools for the guest operating system. This feature is expected to allow VMware to respond quickly to the release of new operating system versions and to issues reported by customers. This feature also reduces the overall download size of VMware products by downloading only the VMware Tools versions that users need.
AutoProtect — Create snapshots at scheduled intervals with AutoProtect. Preserve the state of your virtual machine by taking snapshots at specific pre-set regular intervals.
Virtual Machine Encryption — Secure your virtual machines with AES256-bit encryption and a password that you set to prevent unauthorized users from accessing or running them. Encrypted virtual machines can run in VMware Workstation and VMware Player Release Candidates.
IPv6 Support — Support for IPv6 networks is added for bridged networking.
Advanced Linux Sound Architecture (ALSA) — Support for ALSA improves the audio for virtual machines running on a Linux host. Multiple virtual machines can run simultaneously and the sound for each operates on a separate channel mixed together on the host.
Pause a Virtual Machine — The pause feature causes a virtual machine to cease operation temporarily, without powering off or suspending. Use the pause feature when a virtual machine is engaged in an lengthy, processor-intensive activity that prevents you from using your computer to do a more immediate task.
Drag and Drop Enhancements — Support for drag and drop images, formatted text email attachments, and zip folders is available for both Windows and Linux hosts. The enhancements include new file types and extend the existing ability to drag and drop certain file types to a broader set of guest and host operating systems.
Replay Debugging Improvements — Enhancements in Replay Debugging make the feature faster and easier to use. Developers can select a particular process instance to attach to, attach to a process in the middle of a recording, and ensure that the executables and symbols on the host machine match the ones in the guest. Developers can also send the recording to another developer who can attach a debugger to view the exact state of the machine when the system failed, and replay the recording to see the circumstances that led the system to fail.
Expand Virtual Disks — Support for expanding virtual disks allows you to increase the size of the disk from within VMware Workstation. For Windows Vista and Windows 7 guests, the disk partitions can be adjusted without the use of additional software.
Fuse Mount for Linux —For Linux hosts, Workstation now provides a feature that uses Fuse to mount vmdk disks onto the file system. The Windows version of VMware Workstation already has a Map/Disconnect Virtual Disks feature, which allows users to mount a .vmdk file as a drive letter.
Virtual Network Editor Interface — Enhancements to the Virtual Network Editor user interface have simplified the design for ease of use.
Centralized Collection of Support Information — Support for centralized collection of information is a menu option that allows you to gather detailed information about multiple virtual machines and the host machine at the same time. The information is packaged in a compressed file so that you can email it to VMware support or post it on the VMware Workstation forums.
Virtual Machine Memory — The virtual machine memory limit is increased to 32GB.
Workstation License Key — Support for installation of Windows and Linux versions of Workstation using the same product license key.

New Features in VMware Player

Create Virtual Machine with Easy Install — Create a virtual machine and install any supported guest operating system with Easy Install.
New User Interface — New virtual machine library interface is now available. The interface to create virtual machines and edit virtual machine settings is also available.
Aero Glass Support — New Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) graphics driver available by default for Windows Vista and Windows 7 provides support for the Windows Aero user interface. The WDDM driver also includes support for OpenGL 1.4 and Shader Model 3.0. VMware recommends that you use the graphics hardware NVIDIA GeForce 8800 and ATI Radeon HD 2600 with Aero. Post any rendering or performance issues caused by the new driver in the VMware Workstation Release Candidate Beta Community forum.
3D Graphics Improvements — OpenGL 2.1 and Shader Model 3.0 support is now available for Windows XP virtual machines. The XPDM graphics driver works with Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7. However, only Windows XP virtual machines install the graphics driver by default. The instructions to switch between graphics drivers in a guest operating system are available on the VMware Workstation Technology Preview Beta Community site in the document How to switch between SVGAII and WDDM Drivers .
Multiple display Support — Virtual machines can now take advantage of multiple monitors.
Advanced Linux Sound Architecture (ALSA) — Support for ALSA is now available in VMware Player Technology Preview to improve the audio in virtual machines running on a Linux host.
Drag and Drop Enhancements — Ability to drag and drop images, formatted text email attachments, and zip folders is now available for both Windows and Linux hosts. The enhancements add support for new file types and extends the existing ability to drag and drop certain file types to a broader set of guest and host operating systems.
Virtual Printing — Support for virtual printing allows you to print from virtual machines without mapping network printers or installing printer drivers in the virtual machine. If virtual printing is enabled in the virtual machine setting, all of the printers installed on the host operating system are available in the guest operating system. This functionality is enabled through a partnership with ThinPrint Inc..
On-Demand VMware Tools Download — VMware Tools integrates the guest operating system with the host operating system through drag and drop, cut and paste, time synchronization, and features like Unity. The latest version of VMware Tools is dynamically downloaded you create a virtual machine, start up an existing virtual machine, or start the download manually.
VIX API for VMware Player — Software vendors can use the VIX functionality to add their own interface to the VMware Player menu bar. VMware Player and VIX API documentation and additional information is available on the Beta Community site.

Installation Instructions

Before installing the VMware Workstation 7.0 Release Candidate or the VMware Player 3.0 Release Candidate, you must read the known installation issues. Ignoring this information might lead to an unsuccessful install or loss of configuration information.

In the previous releases of VMware Workstation, VMware Tools were included in the initial download of the product. For this release, an on-demand download capability is added. To test this feature thoroughly, the VMware Tools .iso files have not been included in the VMware Workstation 7.0 Release Candidate. You can download either the Standard or Full installation. For more information, about the on-demand download capability, see the New Features in Workstation and VMware Player section.
The first time you run VMware Workstation 7.0 Release Candidate you receive a prompt to purchase or register the software. Participants in the Beta release are not expected to do either, so you can ignore this message.

Product Feedback

Your comments, suggestions, and questions are crucial in this stage of the program and are greatly appreciated. Go to the Beta Community site to provide your feedback by starting a new discussion or replying to an existing thread. If you uncover a reproducible bug, submit it through the appropriate link in the right column of the Beta Community site to the developers focused in these areas.

To access these feature specific forums, visit the Beta Community site and look for the links to the installation and graphic discussions in the right column. The forum based system helps us to track the reproducible issues and to ensure that they are fixed before our next release.

Known Issues for Workstation and VMware Player

The known issues for Workstation and VMware Player are grouped by topic in the following sections.

Installation, Upgrade, and Compatibility

If you installed VMware Workstation Technology Preview on a Windows host and uninstalled it to install the VMware Player Technology Preview release, an upgrade to VMware Workstation 7.0 Release Candidate fails.
Workaround: Uninstall VMware Player Technology Preview using the Add or Remove Programs control panel before installing VMware Workstation 7.0 Release Candidate.
On Linux hosts, attempting to reinstall the same version of Workstation over an existing version does not work, because all the components already exist on the host.
Workaround: To reinstall the same version of Workstation, uninstall Workstation, select Yes to save your configuration files, and reinstall.
When you reinstall or upgrade a previously installed version of Workstation, you cannot change the directory path. For example, if you use the --custom command to change the Eclipse location, modify the Eclipse path only.
When you install Workstation on a supported Linux host the first time, you can provide a valid Eclipse path. If you reinstall Workstation, you are not prompted to provide a path for Eclipse again. The path you provided during the first installation becomes the default.
Workaround: To provide a different Eclipse path during installation, use installer with the --custom command.
When you upgrade Workstation from the Workstation Technology Preview release on a Windows 7 host, one of the vmnet host virtual adapters might not be properly configured with a static IP address. After rebooting, ipconfig displays the adapter IP address as 169.x.x.x, instead of 192.168.x.x.
Workaround: You can use either the Windows 7 diagnose option or assign the vmnet a new IP address using the virtual network editor.
To use the Windows 7 diagnose option to configure the virtual adapter
1. Select Start > Control Panel > Network and Internet > Connections.
2. Right-click the VMware Network Adapter from the list and select Diagnose.
You cannot map a virtual disk if the Workstation installation path contains characters from a non-system language. In this case, the error message Failed to initialize library for mounting and unmounting virtual disks appears and the Utilities > Map selection becomes unavailable.
Workaround: Install Workstation 7.0 Release Candidate in a directory path that contains only characters from a local-system language.
If you attempt to install Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, or Windows 7 on a guest with an invalid product key or a key that does not match with the release version of the operating system, the virtual machine restarts and the install fails with the following error message Windows could not parse or process the unattended install file for pass [specialize]. The settings in the answer file cannot be applied. The error was detected while processing settings for component [Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup].
Workaround: Use the correct product key to re-create the virtual machine, or when you create a new virtual machine, select the I will install the operating system later option in the New Virtual Machine Wizard.

Display

3D benchmarks, such as 3DMark '06, might not render correctly or at all when using Windows Vista or Windows 7 virtual machines on certain host configurations.
When a Windows 7 virtual machine is in Aero mode and you use RDP to connect to a Windows XP host, Aero mode is disabled and the virtual machine becomes unresponsive.
Workaround: To use RDP, disable Aero mode in the guest.
On low-end hardware, switching between three to four monitors or to Unity mode causes the Windows 7 guest to fail. For example, task bar thumbnails, Windows Flip, and Flip 3-D stop working. The same behavior is observed when resizing applications to span multiple monitors on the host in Unity mode.
Workaround: Switch between two monitors instead of three or four. Restart Unity mode.
If you are running both a 32-bit Windows 7 host and guest you might experience graphics problems when running 3-D applications in a virtual machine with high memory allocation.
Workaround: Reduce the virtual machine memory allocation to 1GB or less.
Windows 7 and Windows Vista guest consoles turn black if 3-D acceleration is disabled. This occurs due to a limitation with the Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) on both Windows 7 and Windows Vista.
Workaround: To avoid this issue and take full advantage of high resolution (1600x1200 and higher) in the guest, set the guest VRAM size to at least 32MB when 3-D is disabled. To set the guest VRAM size set the svga.vramSize configuration option in the virtual machine .vmx file. For example, svga.vramSize = 33554432(32MB).
On Ubuntu 9.10 Alpha 6 hosts, the icons for for all the menus do not appear.
Workaround: On Ubuntu 9.10 Alpha 6 hosts, the icons for for all the menus do not appear.
Workaround: Select System > Preferences > Appearance > Interface > Show icons in menus.
On VMware Player, if you play a powered off virtual machine, set the display to full screen mode, and select VM > Power > Reset, the virtual machine fails.

VMware Tools

Attempting to shrink a virtual disk through VMware Tools causes the virtual machine to fail with the error message Lock rank violation. This problem occurs after the shrink preparation process is complete, after you answer Yes to the prompt Do you want to shrink the disk(s)?
Assigning low memory to a Windows NT 4.0 SP6a virtual machine might cause VMware Tools installation to fail with the error message 0x0000001E (0x800000003,.... KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED.
Workaround: Set the RAM to at least 128MB for a Windows NT 4.0 SP6a virtual machine.
If your virtual DVD/CD-ROM device is set to use the Use physical drive option, when you upgrade VMware Tools on a Linux guest the virtual device switches to Use ISO image option. After the VMware Tools installation is complete, the virtual device does not switch back to the original option.
Workaround: Set the virtual device to the Use physical drive option manually.
If you install VMware Tools in a path that contains pure unicode characters, the Suspend and Resume operations from Tools Properties > Scripts > Script Event fail.
Workaround: From the command prompt, run the commands: vmip.exe -renew to Resume and vmip.exe -release to Suspend operations.

Integrated Virtual Debuggers

C++ programs that frequently raise C++ exceptions might have poor reverse execution performance. The poor performance occurs because many replay debugging operations might be required to satisfy a single reverse execution request.
With the Eclipse C/C++ plug-in, debugging might fail if you attempt to debug a snapshot that was taken using the Workstation AutoProtect option.
Workaround: Debug standard snapshots instead of AutoProtect snapshots with Eclipse C/C++ plug-in.
Visual Studio might fail when you select a thread from the Debug Location toolbar during replay debugging multithreaded applications.
Workaround: Use the Threads Window in Visual Studio instead.
If you have a Windows Vista virtual machine, you cannot start a Remote Debug Monitor process after a live debugging session.
Workaround: Restart the Windows Vista virtual machine and start live debugging.
If you attempt to remote attach to a process in a recording, Workstation might attach to a process in a recording set to the Local option instead.
Workaround: Select VMware > Attach to Process in Recording. From the Local or Remote drop-down menu select the Local option first and then re-select the Remote option.
The latest in-product help for the Integrated Virtual Debugger for Eclipse is not available for the current release.

Converter

When non-ASCII characters are used in the install path, the TMP/TEMP environment variable(s), or the user name that is associated with the VMware Agent Service, the Import or Export wizard displays the message Unable to connect to VMware Converter Agent on the local machine, and VMware Agent Service does not start.
Workaround: Use Converter Standalone 4.0.1, or change the TMP/TEMP environment variable(s) and run VMware Agent Service as a user whose name does not include non-ASCII characters.
To change to a different account, go to services.msc and select VMware Agent Service > Properties > Log On. Change Log on as from Local System account (the default value) to a different account.
Converting an encrypted virtual machine fails.
Workaround: Remove encryption from the virtual machine before converting.

Miscellaneous

Pre-recording and debugging commands fail when scripts are specified in Windows guests.
Workaround: Run the script command processor and provide the script as an argument.
Uploading a custom SSL certificate for an ACE Management Server using Internet Explorer fails.
Workaround: Use Internet Explorer 7.
A long recording (for example, 13 hours) on a 32-bit Windows 7 virtual machine causes the Workstation user interface on some operations to enter a non-responsive state for 1 to 5 minutes and the host indicates high CPU activity.
Copy and paste or drag and drop for formatted text containing images might not work if you are using different operating system versions.
Copy and paste or drag and drop for images is limited by the size of the internal buffer. The size limitation for image copy and paste or drag and drop is the internal buffer size, not the actual image file size. As a result, you might not be able to move an image file that is larger than the limit of 4MB because the internal buffer exceeds that limit.
Copying and pasting files from the host to an Outlook email message on the guest and vice versa fails. This behavior only applies to files. Copying and pasting other types of data from the host to a guest Outlook email message or vice versa works.
Workaround: Copy files from host to the guest desktop. Then paste files from the guest desktop into the Outlook email message.
Taking a snapshot of a suspended virtual machine causes the virtual machine tab to close. A message appears indicating that the virtual machine tab has closed but the snapshot has been taken.
The same behavior occurs when you delete a snapshot. The tab closes but the snapshot has been deleted.
On Fedora 11 guests, while you are logging in as a user and the desktop start up plays the log in sound the window manager Metacity fails, which causes the guest to become unresponsive.
Workaround: Select the Other user option to log in the guest.
A Sun Microsystems bug causes a kernel panic on OpenSolaris 2008.11 and later guests using LSI SAS on Workstation 7.0.
Workaround: Do not use LSI SAS with OpenSolaris guests.
The virtual machine crashes when you attempt to run games by selecting Start > Programs > Games in a virtual machine running on an OpenSUSE 11 host, with the following error messages:
Workaround: Disable PulseAudio on OpenSUSE 11 host or upgrade from OpenSUSE 11 to 11.1.
The automatic setting of the processor execution mode is not updated for Workstation 7.0. To run ESX 4.0 as a guest, you must modify the virtual machine settings and change the processor execution mode to Intel VT-X or AMD-V. If your processor supports EPT or RVI, select the VT-X/EPT or AMD-V/RVI processor and manually edit the .vmx configuration file and specify: monitor_control.restrict_backdoor = "TRUE"for best performance. If you select the VT-X/EPT or AMD-V/RVI option and your processor does not have EPT / RVI support, the system defaults to binary translation and ESX 4 as a guest fails.
On Windows guests, the Japanese version of the in-product help does not work on Internet Explorer.
Workaround: Copy the English version of the in-product help files under the .../workstation/help directory to the .../workstation/messages/ja/help/ directory.