This is the part two of the series in  VMware Server installation. Please find the part one here.

In the last post we have installed the VMWare Server 2. Now it’s time to create a Datastore where the virtual disks will be created.  Virtual disks are like hard disks and by creating this you create kind of ‘hard disk’ which will exist as separate hard disk as far as VMware is concerned. With respect to the guest operating systems these are no more than a differnet kind of encrypted files.

Step 12: Select Create Virtual Machine from the commands section. In your original hard drive, select a location

Step 13: Select the OS you wish to install. This will optimize the virtual disk for the selected operating system. If you cannot find the operating system you want to install, select the one nearest to the one available.

Step 14: Next is the memory and processors. Choose equal to or more than the minimum recommended memory. Selecting number of processors works only for the host operating system. This means the applications running inside the Virtual machine cannot use the second processor. But if you choose the right number of processor, the guest operating system can use it for other resources and the virtual machine will get more share of the other processor and run much faster.

Step 15: In the Hard Disk section, I recommend you to create a Virtual Disk if you already don’t have one. Otherwise you should always boot the OS using a disk and also you will not be able to write commit anything using the guest OS. This means if you install new application in the fguest application, if you login and log out you will get only the default setup and all your applications and files will be erased during the next boot.

Step 16: In the next properties section of hard disk, you have two options.

1. Your hard disk (of course virtual) can be made growable. This means as you install more and more applications, it will increase in size, but initially with only the minimum needed size. But the speed at which your operating system(guest) works will be less here.
2. If you choose the second option of allocate full space initially, then though there is no data the allocated space will be demarcated for the virtual disk from your actual hard drive and you will not be able to use it. Here speed will be more.

Choose whatever fits depending on your choice.

Split disk is for FAT16 file systems. These file systems cannot handle any files of size more than 2 GB and so you should choose this option if you have such file systems.

Step 17: In the Disk mode, you can choose independent and then you will have two options. Information straight from the manual is:

If you select Independent Mode, also select one of the following:
Persistent — Disks in persistent mode behave like conventional disk drives on your physical computer. All data written to a disk in persistent mode are written out permanently to the disk.
Nonpersistent — Changes to disks in nonpersistent mode are discarded when you power off or reset the virtual machine. Nonpersistent mode enables you to restart the virtual machine with a virtual disk in the same state every time. Example uses
include providing known environments for software testing, technical support, and demonstrating software.

What is snapshot in a Virtual machine?

In certain virtual machine configurations, you might want to revert some disks to a  snapshot while other disks retain all changes. For example, you might want a snapshot  to preserve a disk with your operating system and applications, while always keeping the changes to a disk with your documents and data.

When you add a new virtual disk, set the Disk Mode to Independent Mode if you do  not want it to be affected by snapshots.

Step 18: VMware will choose the correct virtual device node. So pass on. If you get struck up here for example while using SCSI disks in a 32 bit Windows XP guest which you want to install get the special driver needed here –> Http://www.vmware.com/download

Step 19: Again I think, you need certain explanation in choosing the network type. Here it is from the manual:

Bridged
Configures your virtual machine as a unique identity on the network, separate from and unrelated to its host. Other computers on the network can then communicate directly with the virtual machine. If your host computer is on a network and you have a separate IP address for your virtual machine (or can get one automatically from a DHCP server), select Bridged.

„ NAT
Configures your virtual machine to share the IP and MAC addresses of the host. The virtual machine shares the host’s public network identity, and has a private identity that is not visible beyond the host. NAT can be useful when you are allowed a single IP address or MAC address by your network administrator.
You might also use NAT to configure separate virtual machines for handling HTTP and FTP requests, with both virtual machines running off the same IP address or domain.

„ HostOnly
Configures you virtual machine to communicate only with the host and other virtual machines in the hostonly network. This can be useful when you want a secure virtual machine that is connected to the host network, but available only through the host machine. In this configuration, the virtual machine cannot connect to the Internet.

Step 20: CD/DVD drive you can change anytime from the Virtual machine homepage. Still for the first installation you can choose according to your choice.

Step 21: I had ISO images of Linux -Debian 5.0 (Lenny) hence I choose ‘choose an ISO Image’ and also browsed the location of the .ISO image file.

Step 22: If Floppy image is needed, select this else choose ‘Don’t Add a Floppy Drive’

Step 23: If you want more hardwares to be added you can do so from the links available. Sound Adapter may be a good option if you prefer to play media files.

Step 24: On successful completion of creating or installation of VMware virtual machine you will get the following screen.

Step 25: In order to access your virtual machine as a FINAL step you need to install the VMware Console Plug-in. It will be automatic pop up in Internet explorer. In Firefox you will get this information in the alet bar at the top. Watch out !

Step 26: Now you are ready to access your dream machine. You can start the virtual machine (called power on) in three ways as shown below:

Step 27: Click anywhere to reach out to your Guest operating system. If you are installing for the first time then Boot Menu will be displayed ELSE you can directly access your Guest operating system after clicking on the console window.

Step 28: Here in the below picture Debian Boot Menu shows up for first time installation. You can choose any operating system. Garnish your installation by creating virtual machine shortcut to desktop, VMware tools etc. And now it’s time to enjoy

~The End~

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