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hanness_rdu
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Is it possible to stretch the display of a guest OS on a shared machine like it is for a local VM in Workstation Pro 15?

In VMware Workstation Pro for Windows, when I install Windows as a guest, I use the option to "stretch" the guest OS display. In Workstation Pro Version 15, the option is called "Keep Aspect Ratio Stretch". I have to do this because I am using a laptop that has only a 15" screen but a 4k resolution. The Windows setup screens at this resolution are super tiny and almost impossible to read without a magnifying glass. Stretching them resolves this problem. I only need this during installation before the Windows display drivers get installed.

I notice that when I connect to another system running Workstation in order to install a shared VM, I have no option to stretch the display of the guest. In other words, the option to stretch seems to only be available when I am performing a local installation and not installing a shared machine on a remote system.

Is there any known workaround for this?

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jj0999
Contributor
Contributor

It would be great if they could address this issue. I hope they can fix it.

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bluefirestorm
Champion
Champion

Unlikely there can be a fix for this.

If you are viewing a shared VM or remotely, you would be using a third party application such as VNC client or an RDP client (which is software not written by VMware).

When you are viewing/running the VM locally with VMware Workstation, you are using the VMware User Interface; which is written by VMware. When you stretch or move the window in this VMUI, code within the VMUI would be able "catch" the stretch/shrink requests/events and "tell" the VM to stretch/shrink correspondingly.

With a third party viewer such as RDP/VNC, there is no way the viewer can "tell" the VM to stretch/shrink its screen. Even if it can, I don't think these kind of facility is in the RDP protocol or VNC protocol.

WIth that in mind, you can appreciate the kind of effort that VMware had to put up to make what appears to be simple feature to work but underneath there would be a lot of complexity.

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hanness_rdu
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

bluefirestorm, I disagree with the assessment that you are putting forth. I am connecting to the shared VM directly within VMware itself, no third party connection such as RDP or VNC.

As an overview, in Workstation (locally) I connect to the remote instance of VMware THROUGH THE LOCAL VMWARE WORKSTATION GUI. I perform the entire installation sitting at my local machine but it's actually being installed as a shared machine on the remote system. Note that the remote system does not even have a VNC client installed nor is RDP enabled.

In other words, the whole process is occurring natively in VMware Workstation Pro.

With that being the case, I don't see why VMware could not allow the display to be stretched.

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hanness_rdu
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Some additional information:

When I view the VM in console view it stretches the display of the VM nicely so it's very readable. The problem is that you cannot interact with the VM in console view. However, the point is simply that it must be possible to stretch the display of a shared VM because console view manages to do it.

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Stealer0
Contributor
Contributor

This issue should be fixed ASAP. Shared VMs absolutely unusable!

I went ahead and tried to use VMRC with high DPI compatibility option.

"C:\Program Files (x86)\VMware\VMware Remote Console\vmrc.exe" vmrc://Username@IP:PORT/?moid=1 (1st Shared VM = 1)

However, it breaks cursor from interacting with remote VM

Guess I'll try VNC sharing with 3rd party VNC client. But it's such a mess.

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