Install VMware-workstation-full-17.0.0-20800274 as the main OS on a PC with no OS

[Bov4]

Regarding VMware-workstation-full-17.0.0-20800274.

I have a Gigabyte Z590 AORUS MASTER motherboard with an Intel Core i7-11700K processor, but with no installed OS. I want to install VMware as the main controlling OS on this machine before installing any other OSes that will then run under VMware. To do that, I need to create a bootable VMware ISO DVD. From where can I download a VMware ISO image from which I could then burn to an installation DVD and make it bootable, so as to install VMware as the main controlling OS on an 'empty' machine? Obviously, I need to check that this can be done before I purchase the licensed version of VMware. Thanks.

[Alfista_PS]

Hi,

VMware Workstation is an application which run only on a OS, you can't install it or use without OS on bare-metal.

When you will use VMware for you virtualisation on a host directly, the you can use ESXi (vSphere) which is OS with included virtualisation system.

When you still only plan to order VMware I will suggest you the VMware vSphere Essentials Kit

https://store-us.vmware.com/vmware-vsphere-essentials-kit-5653279100.html

Its the cheapest version of the vSphere which is possible to install on 2 PC's (hosts) and also include the vCenter application for managing.

[RWSchlatter]

I am unaware that VMWare offers a standalone version (but check the prior reply for a special case).

As for a single user standalone solution, may I suggest you install the AlmaLinux derivate in its mininalistic verson. AlmaLinux is a direct descendant of CentOS that itself is a Red Hat free duplicate, but no linger supported.

Links:

the organisation that supports AlmaLinux: https://almalinux.org/ 

for the minimalistic no-frills version please follow the search resutls of https://www.google.com/search?q=almalinux+minimal+iso+download&newwindow=1&hl=en (sorry - I could not locate a direct link at the moment)

[Bov4]

Hi, 

Many thanks for that. I want to install a native VM OS on an empty 'bare-metal' machine, but was unaware that VMware could not be installed except under a pre-installed OS. This is not what I want to do. I had seen that IBM had installed VM on an AS400 mini-[mainframe]-computer in early 2000, and had then successfully ran the following OSes - MVS [a standard mainframe OS], Linux and Windows, and all concurrently - executing under VM. That is the VM OS platform I am trying to build, well at least in part. The VMware vSphere Essentials Kit is priced at $576.96, which is quite expensive for a piece of software that will not necessarily work as intended on my machine. But thanks again for explaining to me how VMware needs to be installed. 

Best regards, 

Chris Poncelet, IBM Systems Programmer.

[RWSchlatter]

Small add-on to my prior post. It looks to me that you would only need the suggested Linux to "bootstrap" into VMWare, it would then appear as if you were running it standalone. The underlying platform appears hidden. Sometimes this is called a Kiosk Mode.

May I point you to this Red Hat discussion of how to achive your goal
https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-us/red_hat_enterprise_linux/7/html/desktop_migration_and_... 

[Bov4]

Many thanks for that. I have downloaded the AlmaLinux-8.7-x86_64-dvd ISO and tried to install it 'as is' - but, unsurprisingly, that didn't work. It needs to be 'burnt' as a bootable ISO file for that. So, my next step will be to buy the licensed copy of PowerISO to try to fix this (my trial version of PowerISO supports burning only up to 300MB ISOs, whereas the downloaded AlmaLinux ISO file to be burnt is 10.9GB.) Hopefully the ISO will then be installable, after which I'll be able to install the VMware OS. However there seems to be an inherent problem with my Gigabyte Z590 AORUS MASTER's BIOS and with its not recognizing or installing any OS other than Windows 10 or 11. But I'll check whether the licensed version of PowerISO can fix this. If it doesn't, I'll have to get back to Gigabyte technical support. Thanks again for all your help. 

Chris Poncelet, IBM Systems Programmer

[Bov4]

Thanks again. I'll try the Red Hat Linux route if the AlmaLinux one does not work. Cheers.

[Bov4]

Just a heads up. I have now managed to install the AlmaLinux OS as follows. Downloaded AlmaLinux-8.7-x86_64-dvd.iso. Downloaded and then purchased the full licence of PowerISO8-x64 (cost about $40). Next, I created a bootable USB flash drive from the downloaded AlmaLinux-8.7-x86_64-dvd.iso as input, and using PowerISO8-x64 to create a bootable USB (this took about 10 minutes to complete.) I then plugged in the bootable USB flash drive, powered up the PC and its BIOS now immediately recognized and offered to install the AlmaLinux OS - which it did and AlmaLinux is working all OK. Problem solved. I can now proceed to install the VMware OS. Thanks a lot to everyone in this group who helped me to get this problem fixed. 

Chris Poncelet, IBM Systems Programmer