vmnet0 spontaneously changes from bridged to custom

[delafrique]

Hi,

I'm running workstation 7.16 on a windows 8 home host.

Guest OS is windows XP SP3 using bridged network connection (vmnet0)

The network connection in the guest fails frequently, this can happen immediately when the guest starts up or while the guest is running.

To temporarily fix the issue I shut down the guest.

Then open virtual network editor.

Vmnet0 is configured as 'custom'.

Click RESTORE DEFAULT.

Vmnet0 is restored to BRIDGED.

Re-start the guest.

Network connection works for a while (few hours), until it fails again.

Vmnet0 is back to 'custom'.

Does anyone know how to fix this permanently?

[jsa]

Are you trying to bridge a wifi nic, or a wired nic?

[delafrique]

There are a wifi and a wired nic in the host.

I have only used one nic at a time.

Bridging is set to 'automatic', i.e. VMware should automatically pick the active host nic.

This used to work on my previous windows 7 laptop.

[RDPetruska]

Personally, I would use Custom, and specify which adapter to use... historically, the "automatic" setting for bridged has almost never worked the way one would expect it to.  Pick one NIC for bridged to switch VMnet0, and the other for one of the unused switches like VMnet2 - then specify in your VM settings which network switch to use.

[delafrique]

I've had vmnet0 bridged to a specific nic today.

It worked well for about 7 hours until vmnet0 dropped the bridge again and became 'Host-only'.

In Virtual Network Editor I tried to change from 'Host-only' to 'Bridged' but gt a message:

'Cannot change network to bridged: There are no un-bridged host network adapters.'

None of the (other) vmnet's were bridged.