Red Hat Linux 9.0 – Workstation 4.0.1, 4.0.2, 4.0.5, 4.5, 4.5.1, 4.5.2, 4.5.3, 5.0, 5.5, 5.5.1, 5.5.2, 5.5.3, 5.5.4, 5.5.5, 5.5.6, 5.5.7, 5.5.8, 5.5.9, 6.0, 6.0.1, 6.0.2, 6.0.3, 6.0.4, 6.0.5, 6.5, 6.5.1, 6.5.2
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SMP – 2-way experimental support on Workstation 5.5.2, 5.5.3, 5.5.4, 5.5.5, 5.5.6, 5.5.7, 5.5.8, 5.5.9, 6.0, 6.0.1, 6.0.2, 6.0.3, 6.0.4, 6.0.5, 6.5, 6.5.1, 6.5.2
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Red Hat Linux 9.0 – ACE 1.0, 1.0.1, 1.0.2, 1.0.3, 1.0.4, 1.0.5, 1.0.6, 1.0.7, 1.0.8, 2.0, 2.0.1, 2.0.2, 2.0.3, 2.0.4, 2.0.5, 2.5, 2.5.1, 2.5.2
Red Hat Linux 9.0 – GSX Server 3.0, 3.1, 3.2, 3.2.1
Red Hat Linux 9.0 – VMware Server 1.0, 1.0.1, 1.0.2, 1.0.3, 1.0.4, 1.0.5, 1.0.6, 1.0.7, 1.0.8, 1.0.9
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SMP – 2-way experimental support on VMware Server 1.0, 1.0.1, 1.0.2, 1.0.3, 1.0.4, 1.0.5, 1.0.6, 1.0.7, 1.0.8, 1.0.9
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Red Hat Linux 9.0 – ESX 2.0, 2.0.1, 2.1.1, 2.1.2, 2.1, 2.5, 2.5.1, 2.5.2, 2.5.3, 2.5.4, 2.5.5
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SMP – full support on ESX 2.0, 2.0.1, 2.1.1, 2.1.2, 2.1, 2.5, 2.5.1, 2.5.2, 2.5.3, 2.5.4, 2.5.5
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Red Hat Linux 9.0 – Fusion 1.0, 1.1, 1.1.1, 1.1.2, 1.1.3, 2.0, 2.0.1, 2.0.2, 2.0.3, 2.0.4, 2.0.5
Be sure to read General Guidelines for All VMware Products as well as this guide to installing your specific guest operating system.
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. If your VMware product supports it, you can also install from a PXE server.
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In the Mouse Selection screen, choose 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).
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This does not mean that anything is wrong with the hard drive on your physical computer. It simply means that the virtual hard drive in your virtual machine needs to be partitioned and formatted. Select the
Initialize button and press
Enter. Also note that
sda appears in the message as the device name if the virtual disk in question is a SCSI disk; if the virtual disk is an IDE drive,
hda appears in the message as the device name instead.
In many Linux distributions, if IPv6 is enabled, VMware Tools cannot be configured with vmware-config-tools.pl after installation. In this case, VMware Tools is unable to set the network device correctly for the virtual machine, and displays a message similar to
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If the file /etc/sysconfig/network contains the line NETWORKING_IPV6=yes, change the line to NETWORKING_IPV6=no.
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In the file /etc/modules.conf, add the following lines:
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VMware Workstation, VMware ACE or VMware GSX Server: The Red Hat installer might fail to read the second installation CD correctly if the CD drive in your virtual machine is set up using the defaults.
The specific failure message depends on the set of packages you choose to install. In many cases, the first package the installer tries to read from the second CD is the XPDF package, so the error message reports a problem with
xpdf-<version number>.
VMware Workstation or VMware GSX Server: On a Linux host with an XFree86 3.x X server, it is best not to run a screen saver in the guest operating system. Guest screen savers that demand a lot of processing power can cause the X server on the host to freeze.
VMware GSX Server: While installing the Red Hat Linux 9.0 guest operating system, you might notice that the guest performs poorly or slowly, or you might see
INIT errors when you first boot the guest. To work around this issue and install the guest more easily, pass the
nosysinfo option when you boot the Linux kernel at the beginning of the installation. At the
boot: prompt in the guest, type
text nosysinfo.
After you install the guest operating system, if you notice that the virtual machine runs slowly or if you still see
INIT errors, you can modify your boot loader to always use the option when the guest operating system boots. Choose the steps for your boot loader—choose
GRUB or
LILO.
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Add nosysinfo to the line like this:
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If there is no append= line in /etc/lilo.conf, add the following line:
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at the beginning of /etc/lilo.conf, before the first
image= or
other= directive.
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Run the lilo command again so your changes can take effect.
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During installation, many distributions of Linux choose a kernel that is optimized for the specific processor on which it is being installed, and some distributions install a generic kernel by default, but provide architecture-specific kernels that the user can choose to install. The kernel might contain instructions that are available only on that processor. These instructions can have adverse effects when run on a host with the wrong type of processor.
Thus, a Linux virtual machine created on a host with an AMD processor might not work if migrated to a host with an Intel processor. The reverse is also true: a Linux virtual machine created on a host with an Intel processor might not work if migrated to a host with an AMD processor.
This problem is not specific to virtual machines and also occurs on physical computers. For example, if you move a hard drive with a Linux installation from an AMD machine to an Intel machine, you are also likely to experience problems trying to boot from that drive.
When a Red Hat Linux 9.0 guest operating system tries to get a DHCP address, the attempt might fail with an error message indicating that the link is down. On ESX Server, this happens only if you are using the
vlance driver for your network connection.
To work around this problem, become root (su -) and use a text editor to edit the following files in the guest operating system. If only one of these files exists, make the change for that file only.
In both cases, <n> is the number of the Ethernet adapter—for example,
eth0.
Then run the command ifup eth[n] (where [n] is the number of the Ethernet adapter) or restart the guest operating system.
VMware ESX Server, VMware VirtualCenter, or vCenter Server: When a Red Hat Linux 9.0 guest operating system loads the
vmxnet networking driver, it reports that the driver is tainted. This does not mean that there is anything wrong with the driver. It simply indicates that this is a proprietary driver, not licensed under the GNU General Public License.
ESX Server 2.5.x: Although ESX Server 2.5.x virtual machines are compatible with Physical Address Extension (PAE), they are not optimized for it. As a result, guest operating systems with PAE enabled might experience poor performance. For best performance, VMware recommends that you disable PAE in guest operating systems. For more information and instructions on disabling PAE, see the knowledge base article at
http://kb.vmware.com/kb/2020.
