I have found that if I enable iSight in a virtual machine, then once I shutdown the virtual machine the host no longer has access to iSight, if I do not disconnect it from the virtual machine first.
I have an iMac 24" 2.8 GHz with 2 GB RAM, (iMac7.1) bought three weeks ago (post July 2007) running OS X 10.5.2, with all the latest updates from Apple. The iSight version is 1.55.
I am using VMware Fusion 1.1.1.
The guest is Windows XP Professional OEM with service pack 2 and all the latest updates from Microsoft.
Steps to reproduce:
Power on the virtual machine (in this case Windows XP Professional w/SP2).
Click on the 'Virtual Machine' menu.
Select 'USB' - > 'Connect Apple Built-in iSight'.
Power off the virtual machine.
Other applications will no longer have access to the iSight camera.
I first noticed that the camera was no longer working when I was using Skype to talk with a friend and I powered on this virtual machine. The video stopped working at that point.
You may also want to try using the steps given above and then starting iMovie. Imovie will then crash (presumably because it cannot find the camera.
I would have expected that when the virtual machine had shutdown that it would return the use of the iSight camnera to the operating system and hence to any other applications that might want to use it. Is this expected behavior?
