VM Workstation 15 Player and 3D driver

[BootITnow]

Hi, VMWare sales could not tell me if the free player has 3D driver support.  I loaded up a VM windows 7 x32 Pro and it has a standard windows video driver in device manager.  The Host is windows 10 with NVIDIA Geforce GTX 590.

[wila · Accepted solution]

Hi,

There's no difference in that respect between the free player and VMware Workstation Professional.

The 3D driver comes with it, but you have to install VMware Tools for being able to use it.

--

Wil

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[BootITnow]

Thanks for the clarification.  I wonder why the latest VM Tools update did not  install a driver?

[wila]

Hi,

If you ran the VMware Tools installer, then one of the steps it does, is that it installs a VMware Display driver.

There's a couple of options here.

You might expect more from the 3D driver as that is available.

Your virtual machine does not get direct access to your graphics adapter.

The graphics card that the VM sees is a virtualized piece of hardware.

A more detailed description can be found here: Frequently Asked Questions about VMware Fusion look under the paragraph "Virtual Hardware"

Another option is that the 3D is not yet selected.

In VMware Player, with the VM selected. Go To "Edit Virtual Machine Settings"

Then on the left side, select "Display".

Does it have a check in the checkbox for "Accelerate 3D Graphics"?

If not, then put one.

--

Wil