Red Hat Linux 9.0

The easiest method of installing Red Hat Linux 9.0 in a virtual machine is to use the standard Red Hat distribution CD. The notes below describe an installation using the standard distribution CD; however, installing Red Hat Linux 9.0 via the boot floppy/network method is supported as well.

Before you begin, verify that the following tasks are complete:

•	Read General Installation Instructions for All VMware Products.

•	You should not run the X server that is installed when you set up Red Hat Linux 9.0. Instead, to get an accelerated SVGA X server running inside the virtual machine, you should install the VMware Tools package immediately after installing Red Hat Linux 9.0.

•	With many Linux guest operating systems, various problems have been observed when the BusLogic virtual SCSI adapter is used with VMware virtual machines. VMware recommends that you use the LSI Logic virtual SCSI adapter with this guest operating system.

Installation Steps

1	Insert the Red Hat Linux 9.0 CD-ROM in the CD-ROM drive.

2	Power on the virtual machine.

3	At the boot prompt, type linux text and press Enter.

Important If you attempt to use the graphical installer, it fails and launches the text mode installer.

4	Follow the prompts to complete the installation.

5	Choose the language and keyboard.

6	In the Mouse Selection screen, choose one of the following options.

•	Generic – 3 Button Mouse (PS/2) and select the Emulate 3 Buttons option for three-button mouse support in the virtual machine.

•	If you have a wheel mouse, you can choose Generic Wheel Mouse (PS/2).

7	In the Installation Type screen, select the installation type.

8	In the Automatic Partitioning screen, allow automatic partitioning.

You might see a warning that says:

Bad partition table. The partition table on device sda is corrupted. To create new partitions, it must be initialized, causing the loss of ALL DATA on the drive.

This does not mean that anything is wrong with the hard drive on your physical computer. The virtual hard drive in your virtual machine needs to be partitioned and formatted.

9	Select the Initialize button and press Enter.

sda appears in the message as the device name if the virtual disk is a SCSI disk. If the virtual disk is an IDE drive, hda appears in the message as the device name.

10	If your computer is connected to a LAN that provides DHCP support, in the Network Configuration screen, select Use bootp/dhcp.

11	In the Video Card Configuration screen, choose Skip X Configuration.

12	Install VMware Tools.

VMware Tools in a Red Hat Linux 9.0 Guest

Do not start the X server in the guest operating system until you install VMware Tools.

When you are installing VMware Tools, the configuration program asks you to specify a resolution for the guest operating system’s display. Set the resolution to 1152 x 864 or lower. If you set a higher resolution, the guest operating system instead switches to a default resolution of 800 x 600.