VMware Communities
AntoineLefrevre
Contributor
Contributor
Jump to solution

Does VMWare Player 3.1 support 6 cores processor?

Hello all,

Sorry for the beginner question. When creating a new VM using VMware Player the number of cores displayed in the scroll down list are 1,2,4 and 8 cores but not 6 cores (even if the hosting system is running a 6 core processor). Is there any way to create a VM with 6 cores? Thanks in advance for your time!

Reply
0 Kudos
1 Solution

Accepted Solutions
WoodyZ
Immortal
Immortal
Jump to solution

While it's doable nonetheless I wouldn't do it.  As a general rule I've found that with Hosted Virtualization Products assigning more then 1 vCPU often degrades performance in the Guest and on the Host unless the Guest OS and Guest Applications are capable of utilizing the additional processors and even then there can be degraded performance however if you really want to do it as a test then look at the image below.

Number_of_processor_cores_Custom_6.png

View solution in original post

Reply
0 Kudos
6 Replies
a_p_
Leadership
Leadership
Jump to solution

Welcome to the Community,

I don't know whether you can tweak the VM to use 6 cores, however it most likely is not supported and may cause issues. Disregarding the number of cores supported, you may consider NOT to assign all cores to a VM. You may end up with an unstable and slow system because the host OS itself does not have enough resources to manage the guest with such a configuration. As a best practice, assign only as many cores as really needed to a VM.

André

WoodyZ
Immortal
Immortal
Jump to solution

While it's doable nonetheless I wouldn't do it.  As a general rule I've found that with Hosted Virtualization Products assigning more then 1 vCPU often degrades performance in the Guest and on the Host unless the Guest OS and Guest Applications are capable of utilizing the additional processors and even then there can be degraded performance however if you really want to do it as a test then look at the image below.

Number_of_processor_cores_Custom_6.png

Reply
0 Kudos
AntoineLefrevre
Contributor
Contributor
Jump to solution

Thanks a lot Andre & WoodyZ for the prompt reply.

I edited the vmx file as suggested by WoodyZ, and as he indicated now I do see the "Custom:6" message listed in the scroll down list for number of cores.

Unfortunately the VM fails to start and displays the following VMware Player error message:

     "The Virtual Machine is configured to run with 6 CPUs, but VMware Player supports up to 4 CPUs. The virtual machine can not be powered on."

I did not see that constraint in the user documentation, but probably it is somewhere. The error message indicates only up to 4 cores are supported on VMware Player 3.1. Hope 6 cores are supported in future releases.

I tried other values of cpuid.coresPerSocket just in case ( value 6 works also, 1 does not), but the same error message is displayed.

Thanks again for the feedback received, really.

Reply
0 Kudos
WoodyZ
Immortal
Immortal
Jump to solution

That's interesting that it shows 8 cores in the list box but gives a message that it only allows 4.  Oh well, it was worth a try.

mrgrew
Contributor
Contributor
Jump to solution

I notice VMware Player 4 is available.  Can you use that and does it work better in your situation?

Reply
0 Kudos
continuum
Immortal
Immortal
Jump to solution

on hosted platforms I thinkl that a feature that allows to use 6 or 8 cores is a pure marketing gimmick - not useful at all - but for the marketing guys it sounds great ...


________________________________________________
Do you need support with a VMFS recovery problem ? - send a message via skype "sanbarrow"
I do not support Workstation 16 at this time ...

Reply
0 Kudos