VMware Server

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VMware Server

VMware Server running Microsoft Windows XP Professional as a guest under a Linux host
Developed by	VMware, Inc.
Latest release	1.0.6 (build 91891) / May 29, 2008 (2008-05-29); 12 days ago
Preview release	2.0 Beta 2 (build 84186) / March 28, 2008 (2008-03-28); 74 days ago
OS	Microsoft Windows Linux
Platform	x86-compatible
Genre	Virtual machine
License	Proprietary, Freeware
Website	VMware Server

VMware Server (formerly GSX Server) is an entry-level server virtualization software suite from VMware, Inc., a subsidiary of EMC Corporation. VMware released version 1.0 of Server on July 12, 2006. Server is a continuation of the retired GSX Server product line. VMware Server can create, edit, and play virtual machines. It uses a client-server model, allowing remote access to virtual machines, at the cost of some graphical performance (and 3D support). In addition to the ability to run virtual machines created by other VMware products, it can also run virtual machines created by Microsoft Virtual PC. VMware, Inc. makes Server freely available in the hope that users will eventually upgrade to VMware ESX Server.

Users of VMware Server's internal utilities can preserve (and revert to) a single snapshot copy of each separate virtual machine within their VMware Server environment. The product does not have a specific interface for cloning virtual machines, unlike VMware Workstation.

1 Known issues
2 See also
3 References
4 External links

[edit] Known issues

Known limitations of VMware Server, as of August 2007, include the following:

[edit] Hardware support

VMware virtual machines do not support FireWire.^[1]
Older VMware virtual machines provide no direct support for USB 2.0, but make USB 2.0 devices in the host operating-system visible to the guest operating-system as USB 1.1 devices. Server version 2.0 beta 2 added support for USB 2.0 devices.^[2]
VMware virtual machines provide only experimental support for 3D hardware acceleration, via Microsoft's Direct3D 8 API.^[3]^[4] The release notes for Fusion beta 2 include a list of 3D-accelerated computer games that can run within Windows XP-based virtual machines.
Only 3 mouse buttons function inside the guest OS. Five-button mice remain unsupported.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] OS support

64-Bit Solaris 10 1/06 (Update 1) and Solaris 10 6/06 (Update 2) fail with a triple fault on Intel Pentium M-based systems Merom, Woodcrest, and Conroe. A Sun Microsystems blog has published a workaround for this issue.

As of 2008, VMware Server supports only 32-bit versions of Windows Vista as a guest OS. The kernel-mode drivers for the 64-bit VMs do not have digital signatures, so 64-bit editions of Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 prevent their installation.^[5]

[edit] Network protocols

Attempting to mount an NFS share from a NAT'ed instance of VMware Server may result in a permission-denied error. To fix the problem, switch the VMware instance to use bridged networking rather than network address translation (NAT). Bridged networking implies adding another device on a network, while NAT uses the VMware server to assign the instance an IP address, either through DHCP or through a static IP configuration. Another method of dealing with the permission-denied error involves using port forwarding, but this results in more complexity.

VMware Server can swallow CPU interrupts, making maintenance of accurate time difficult.^[6] Network Time Protocol (NTP) servers should not run under VMware.