I have been using Fusion 1.1.2 with a Ubuntu 7 VM that has been working perfectly for months.
I recently installed Mac 10.5.3 update, and my Ubuntu VM seems to be sort of broken, although not all the time. The main symptom is that on start up, it sometimes fails to resize properly (e.g., cliching the + bubble to mazimize). The drag sizer only sort of works. If I reboot the Mac, and then start Fusion/Ubuntu, it seems to work better, but I wouldn't swear to that.
It also seems that Ubuntu is now running MUCH slower. Noticible on the boot. It now behaves like Windows - takes forever to be ready to do anything after a boot.
I haven't upgraded to 1.1.3 yet, nor upgraded to Ubuntu 8 (There are VMtools issues for that version - I'm not ready hand compile the tools yet...).
Anyone else seen issues with 10.5.3?
Check by uninstalling and re-installing VMware Tools in Ubuntu VM
If this doesn't work, try upgrading Fusion 1.1.3
I am convinced that Fusion 1.1.3 / Ubuntu 7 / Mac OS 10.5.3 is broken, and unfortunately, in a non-reproducible manner - but it reliably quits functioning after a while.
Steps to reproduce: Take a Ubuntu 7.latest.revision VM, install Fusion 1.1.3, reinstall VMWare Tools, install Mac OS 10.5.3 update.
Run the VM. Use it for a while - anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours. At some point, the VM simply quits responding - seems like most often when I'm popping up a menu selection. But it hangs - can't get back to the desktop, switch desktops - no mouse/keyboard input recognized - anything. The X gui is broken. But I think the underlying Linux is still there because a Fusion->Quit command brings up the power-down option, which does stop X and get the normal text shutdown messages from Linux.
Sorry I can't be more specific, but this happens reliably over and over again, but not reliably on any given task or anything else - it is just a matter of time.
Again, this NEVER happened when I had 1.1.1, or 1.1.2 under OS X 1.5.0->1.5.2. Unfortunately, the upgrades to 1.1.3 and 10.5.3 happened at almost the same time. I think I suspect 10.5.3, however.
This is quite annoying since I am doing real work on my Ubuntu VM, and have lost file edits. Wish I could be more explicit, but at least I'm pretty sure this is a real issue.
I have a similar issue with Ubuntu 8.04 on Fusion 1.1.3/2 (yes, I tried both) under Mac OS X 10.5.3. The VM seizes up randomly, requiring a reboot. This seems to happen most often during network traffic, such as subversion checkouts, downloads, or OS X/Ubuntu network interaction. A colleague of mine has never had this problem with the same actions while under Mac OS X 10.5.2.
Anyone else?
I also had similar problems while downloading and installing updates on brand new Ubuntu 8.04 VMs. I finally got it to complete, but I had plenty of problems on 2.0b1.
FYI, this post solved my problems: http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?cmd=displayKC&docType=kc&externalId=1004384&sl...
Without the fix, my VM ran fine on a single core and locked up quickly on dual cores. With the fix, my VM runs fine on both a single core and dual cores. Hope this helps!
Just for the record, the fix described in GlassSpyder's link worked for me too. I'm running Fusion 2.0 (release / build 116369) on my 8-core Mac Pro, with Ubuntu 8.04 (64 bit desktop version), running on 4 virtual processors. Before doing GlassSpyder's clocksource=acpi_pm thing, the guest was freezing up every half hour or so. Now it seems more responsive, and (so far) quite stable. Many thanks GlassSpyder and VMWare!
-Jeremy