[NBLUG/talk] Ubuntu 8.04 and VMWare

[Steve Johnson]

Hi Lug'ers,

I recently installed the new Ubuntu (8.04) and so far I like it..  But
I ran into one issue.. I downloaded the latest VMWare, and downloaded
the latest any-any patch (This is requred to get it to run in ubuntu),
and got it all compiled and running all nice and happy.   So I went to
install XP Pro into a 8Gig Virtual Machine, and it seemed to be okay,
until it tried to format the virtual disk, this took FOREVER, I even
rebooted and trued the fast format option.. and it took just as long..

So I tried to move on forward.. Well it seemed any time the installer
was writing to disk it would take forever.. The progress bar would
move real slow, and things just took way to loong.. It took about an
hour to get from start of install to first reboot, and then when it
was loading the XP Pro splash screen, you know how the screen fades in
nice and smooth, and the loading progress bar zips on by.. This was
REAL REAL slow, like several seconds for each gradient of the fade in
process and the progress bar was barely moving..

Next after a couple minutes it finally gets to where it is installing
drivers and such, and the little progress bar in the lower right
barely moved.. So, I clicked into the virtual machine, and noticed
that when I moved my mouse around (USB Logitech Trackman trackball)
that it would cause the progress bar to advance, and seemed to make
the disk I/O work faster.. still not fast as I expected..  But it did
make a major difference..

After about 2 hours of this BS, I just shut the VM down and deleted
it, and tried again, thinking maybe something was screwy, and also
wondered if there was an issue between reading from the CDRom and
writing to the disk, so I made an ISO image of the CDRom and mounted
that as the CD Drive in VMWare.. Same exact results..

Anyone have any ideas why this would be happening?  I have VMWare
installed on my Ubuntu 7.10 box, and installed XP Pro from the same CD
just the other day with out ANY problems (Not pirated here, my work
has a site wide license, I can legally install the same copy on 2
machines.) the disk I/O was fast, and I'm quite happy with it..  The
only difference is that this machine is Ubunto 7.10 and the new
install in Ubuntu 8.04, oh and I think the VMWare versions are
different.. It's been so long since I installed it on the 7.10 machine
that I am not sure if I did it from the VMWare download, or if I
installed it via apt.  I'm thinking it is an apt install..   There is
no package for 8.04 for vmware anymore, so I had no choice but to
install it from the vmware's download site.

Any help on this would be greatly appreciated.  I rarely need Windows,
but I do need it for school and work at times, and my goal was to not
have to duel boot anymore.

The computer having the problem is  Dell XPS M1210,  Core2 Duo, 2Gigs
Ram, 130G HD (or 120G i cant remember) NVidie 7400Go Video card.  It
runs Linux like a champ!  it runs Windows like a champ! :)

Thanks.

-Steve


-- 
"Knowing others is wisdom; Knowing the self is enlightenment;
Mastering others requires force; Mastering the self needs strength." -
Lao-Tzu