If you have a dual-boot system and want to use a virtual machine to boot a previously installed operating system (such as Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows NT, or Windows 2000) from an existing partition, you must set up "real" and "virtual" hardware profiles. Certain operating systems use hardware profiles to load the appropriate drivers for a given set of hardware devices. We recommend using them only if you are familiar with VMware virtual machines and the Windows hardware profiles concept. Also, if you haven't already done so, look at the tech note on dual booting before proceeding.

Each virtual machine provides a platform that consists of the following set of virtual devices:

• Virtual CD-ROM
• Virtual IDE and SCSI hard disk drives
• Standard PCI graphics adapter
• Standard floppy disk drive
• Intel 82371 PCI Bus Master IDE controller
       (includes primary and secondary IDE controllers)
• BusLogic BT-958 compatible SCSI host adapter
• Standard 101/102-key keyboard
• PS/2-compatible mouse
• AMD PCNET Family Ethernet adapter (PCI-ISA)
• Serial ports (COM1-COM4)
• Parallel ports (LPT1-LPT2)
• Sound Blaster 16-compatible sound card

This set of virtual devices is different from the set of real hardware devices, and is independent of the underlying hardware with a few exceptions (the processor itself is such an exception). This feature provides a stable platform and allows operating system images installed within a virtual machine to be migrated to other virtual machines, regardless of the configuration of the real machine.

If an operating system is installed directly into a VMware virtual machine, the operating system will properly detect all the virtual devices by scanning the hardware. However, if an operating system is already preinstalled on the real machine (for example, in a dual-boot configuration), the operating system will already be configured with the real hardware devices. In order to boot such preinstalled operating systems in a virtual machine, you will need to create separate hardware profiles in order to simplify the boot process.

Microsoft operating systems (including Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows NT 4.0) have the notion of hardware profiles. Each hardware profile is associated with a set of known devices. If more than one hardware profile exists, the user is prompted to choose between different hardware profiles at boot time.

Windows 95, Windows 98 and Windows 2000 use Plug and Play at boot time to confirm that the actual devices match the chosen hardware profile. Mismatches lead to the automatic detection of new devices. Although this operation succeeds, it can be a fairly slow one.

Windows NT does not have Plug and Play support and uses the hardware profiles to initialize its devices. Mismatches will lead to errors reported by the device drivers and the devices are disabled.

In order to set up hardware profiles for your real and virtual machines, VMware recommends that you follow the following steps:

1. Before running VMware to boot a preinstalled operating system on a disk partition, boot it natively and create two hardware profiles, which you can call Real Machine and Virtual Machine. To do this, open Control Panel > System, then select the Hardware Profiles tab. Click the Copy button and name the copies appropriately.

2. NT only: While still running natively, use the Device Manager to disable some devices from the Virtual Machine hardware profile. To do this, open Control Panel > Devices, then select the individual devices to disable. Things to disable in the Virtual Machine hardware profile include audio, MIDI and joystick devices, Ethernet and other network devices and USB devices. Remember to disable them in the Virtual Machine hardware profile only.

   Skip this step if you are running Windows 95 or Windows 98. The initial Plug and Play phase will detect device mismatches.

3. Reboot the machine into Linux (if you are running VMware for Linux).

4. Use the VMware Configuration Wizard to configure your virtual machine. See this page for more information on your partition configuration.

5. Boot the virtual machine and select the guest operating system via your existing boot manager. Choose Virtual Machine at the hardware profile menu prompt. You will encounter device failure messages and delays during this initial boot.

6. Windows 2000 only: After you log in to Windows 2000 (now running as a guest operating system) you should see a Found New Hardware dialog for the video controller as Plug and Play runs and discovers the virtual hardware. Do not install drivers at this time, click Cancel to close the Found New Hardware dialog boxes. Do not reboot the virtual machine -- click No in the System Settings Change/Reboot pop-up message. Windows 2000 will automatically detect and load the driver for the AMD PCnet PCI Ethernet card. At this point, you should install VMware Tools for Windows add-on package inside the virtual machine. Allow the virtual machine to reboot after the VMware, Inc. SVGA video driver (included in VMware Tools for Windows) has been installed. Once Windows 2000 reboots inside the virtual machine, select a new SVGA resolution from the Display Properties > Settings tab dialog to increase the size of the virtual machine's display window. If you want to enable the virtual machine's sound adapter to work inside the Windows 2000 guest operating system, finish the remaining steps on this page, then refer to the VMware and Sound technical note.

   Windows 95/98 only: You should see New Hardware Detected dialog boxes as Plug and Play runs and discovers the virtual hardware. Windows will prompt you for locations to search for device drivers. Most of the device drivers will be available in the existing operating system installation, but you may need the installation CD-ROM for some networking device drivers. Windows will also ask you to reboot your system several times as it installs the device drivers.

   In some instances, Windows may not recognize the CD-ROM drive when it prompts you to insert the CD-ROM to look for device drivers during the initial hardware detection. In such cases, you can cancel the installation of the particular device or try pointing to C:\windows\system\ to search for device drivers on the hard disk. Any failed device installations may be performed at a later time after the CD-ROM drive is recognized.

   After Windows has installed the virtual hardware and its drivers, you can remove the failed devices corresponding to the real hardware using the Device Manager (Control Panel > System > Device Manager tab). Select the device then click the Remove button. If a device appears in multiple hardware profiles, you can select the hardware profile(s) from which to remove the device.

7. Windows NT only: After the operating system has finished booting, view the event log to see which real devices have failed to start properly. You can disable them from the Virtual Hardware profile using the Device Manager (Control Panel > Devices).

8. Confirm that your virtual devices are working properly, specifically the network adapter.

   Windows 95/98 only: If any virtual device is missing, you can detect it by running Control Panel > Add New Hardware.

9. Install the VMware Tools. The VMware tools will appear and run in both hardware configurations but will have an effect only in the Virtual Machine hardware configuration.

Note: The next time you reboot Windows natively using the Real Machine hardware profile, some virtual devices may appear in the device list. You can disable or remove these virtual devices from Real Machine hardware profile in the same way that you removed real devices from the Virtual Machine hardware profile in Steps 6 and 7 above.