Help connect 2 linux clients on windows 7 host on 2 physical NICs

[jowuor]

I am relatively a newbie, but I have searched the forum and pulled a bit of my hair, I need some help.

I have 2 linux clients running on windows 7. I would like to bridge each Linux client to a separate physical NIC.

Here is what I have done:

I have access to the vmnetcfg utility.

Bridging: I can bridge 1 image on 1st physical NIC and this image connects successfully; the system allows me to bridge the 2nd image as well on the 2nd NIC but this defaults back to the network address on the first interface card.

I checked the VMX file and it looks like below, I could not find any entries on interfaces E0 or E1, the VMids appear to me as different (the long number?)

Client 1 Image - vmx file

Host networks: Is it possible to associate the physical NICs with the virtual vmnets? I could also connect them out as host networks with different IP addresses if that works.

Thank you in advance for your ideas, I will really appreciate your suggestions.

[AWo]

Welcome to the forums!

but this defaults back to the network address on the first interface card.

What do you mean? What is not working?

Host networks: Is it possible to associate the physical NICs with the virtual vmnets?

Yes. If you assign a physical NIC to a VMnet it becomes another bridge.

I could also connect them out as host networks with different IP addresses if that works.

What do you mean here?

AWo

VCP 3 & 4

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[jowuor]

Hi Awo,

Thanks for your reply, please find my feedback in intallics:

but this defaults back to the network address on the first interface card.

What do you mean? What is not working?

If I assign an IP address (1.1.1.1) to the first physical NIC bridged to vmnet0 and assign a different IP address (2.2.2.2) on the second NIC bridged to vmnet 2, the IP on the second NIC changes automatically to the IP address of the first NIC (1.1.1.1). This I can understand is because the 2 NICS are bridged automatically together into 1 bridged network. What I would like that I am not able to achieve is 2 separate bridged networks, one on each physical NIC

Host networks: Is it possible to associate the physical NICs with the virtual vmnets?

Yes. If you assign a physical NIC to a VMnet it becomes another bridge.

This is correct, but I would like to have 2 separate bridged networks. I have tried this but I end up with one bridged network.

I could also connect them out as host networks with different IP addresses if that works.

What do you mean here?

Essentially I would like to have 2 separate physical networks either as:

- 2 separate bridged networks or

- 2 separate networks not necessarily bridged

[AWo · Accepted solution]

If I assign an IP address (1.1.1.1) to the first physical NIC bridged to vmnet0 and assign a different IP address (2.2.2.2) on the second NIC bridged to vmnet 2, the IP on the second NIC changes automatically to the IP address of the first NIC (1.1.1.1). This I can understand is because the 2 NICS are bridged automatically together into 1 bridged network. What I would like that I am not able to achieve is 2 separate bridged networks, one on each physical NIC

To have a guest bridged over a VMnet you do not need an IP address on the physical NIC, just as an information.

You can't bridge two physcial adapters to the same VMnet (except you have a teaming driver on the host, but that will create one logical adapter which gets bridged then). You must assign one physical NIC to VMnet0 (the default) and the other one to a free VMnet (VMnet2, for example). Each VMnet is a virtual network which can hold one IP subnet, so having two physical adapters with two different subnets in one VMnet is not possible.

Host networks: Is it possible to associate the physical NICs with the virtual vmnets?

Yes. If you assign a physical NIC to a VMnet it becomes another bridge.

This is correct, but I would like to have 2 separate bridged networks. I have tried this but I end up with one bridged network.

Assigne one physical NIC to VCMnet0 and the other one to VMnet2. That gives you two bridged adapters. In the guest virtual NIC choose which VMnet (and thereby the bridge) should be used.

That is a common configuration. Find more here: http://pubs.vmware.com/ws71_ace27/wwhelp/wwhimpl/js/html/wwhelp.htm#href=ws_user/ws_net_advanced_lin...

AWo

VCP 3 & 4

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[jowuor]

Problem solved ... Thank you AWo for coming down to my level and sorting me out.

VMPlayer -> Bridge worked for me only on vmnet0, 2nd card did not work on vmnet2 even though it showed as bridged.

Swapped servers and interfaces to confirm that the server and network config was good, issue with player.

VMWorkstation -> Worked perfectly after following your instructions. I even defined IP addresses on the physical interface

to enable local browsing of the servers.

The documentation link helped!