VMware Player 4 released

[Brandon H Supervisor]

first of all, I'm surprised someone else didn't post about this already as it was released about a week ago :p

VMware Player description

Run multiple operating systems simultaneously on a single PC

VMware Player is an easy-to-use application will offer users the possibility to run any virtual machine on their computer.

Get more out of your existing computer hardware. Use the free VMware Player application to run multiple operating systems simultaneously on a single PC.

With VMware Player, you can use any virtual machine created by VMware Workstation, VMware Fusion, VMware Server or VMware ESX, as well as Microsoft Virtual Server virtual machines and Microsoft Virtual PC virtual machines. Import third party images including Symantec Backup Exec System Recovery (formerly called Live State Recovery) images, Norton Ghost 10 images, Norton Save & Restore images, StorageCraft ShadowProtect images, and Acronis True Image images to VMware Player compatible virtual machines. Use 32- and 64-bit Windows, Linux, NetWare, or Solaris x86 operating systems side-by-side, without rebooting or partitioning your hard drive.

Here are some key features of "VMware Player":

Leverage 2-way Virtual SMP:

· Users can run virtual machines with multiple CPUs to experience improved performance when working with multi-threaded, resource-intensive software.

Use 3rd-party virtual machines and images:

· Open Microsoft virtual machines, Symantec Backup Exec System Recovery (formerly called Live State Recovery) images, Norton Ghost 10 images, Norton Save & Restore images, StorageCraft ShadowProtect images, and Acronis True Image images. In this process, the initial virtual machine or image is left untouched in its native format and any modifications are saved in a much smaller VMware-formatted file that is linked to the initial image.

Share data between host computer and virtual machine:

· Copy text and files between the virtual machine and the host PC. Drag and drop files between a Windows host PC and a Windows virtual machine. Or, enable Shared Folders to seamlessly access data on your host computer.

Broad host and guest operating system support:

· Run any of the over 60 supported 32- and 64-bit guest operating systems including Vista, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10, SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10, Ubuntu 6.10, Ubuntu 7.04, Ubuntu 8.04, and many more.

Support for USB 2.0 devices:

· Use peripherals that require high-speed performance in your VMs, such as MP3 Players and fast storage devices.

Get appliance info at start-up:

· Start a virtual appliance in the appliance view to review brief description and other relevant information provided by the appliance author.

Gain easy access to virtual machines via intuitive home page interface:

· Leverage an intuitive home page interface that lets you open existing virtual machines or browse the VMware Virtual Appliance Marketplace to download any of the over 900 virtual appliances. Virtual appliances are pre-built, pre-configured and ready-to-run enterprise software applications packaged along with an operating system within virtual machines.

Requirements:

· 64-bit x86 CPU

· LAHF/SAHF support in long mode

What's New in This Release: [ read full changelog ]

Installation Changes and Enhanced Keyboards:

· The hardware requirements to install this version of Workstation have changed. Workstation now requires a relatively modern 64-bit CPU.

Virtual Hardware Improvements:

· The display technology has been changed to provide a better experience for Unity users and users who have multiple monitors. These changes also allow you to add a projector to your laptop without restarting your virtual machine.

· Virtual machines can now support up to 64GB of memory. The host system should have more than 64GB of memory to use this feature.

· An HD Audio device is available for Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 2008, and Windows 2008 R2 guests. The HD Audio device is compatible with the RealTek ALC888 7.1 Channel High Definition Audio Codec.

· USB 3.0 support is available for Linux guests running kernel version 2.6.35 or later (Ubuntu 10.10) through a new virtual xHCI USB controller. To enable this feature, add the following line to the .vmx file: usb...

download link

[protocol7]

Does it still create a user account for itself on Windows just to be able to run?

[Brandon H Supervisor]

Does it still create a user account for itself on Windows just to be able to run?

what do you mean?

are you talking about the virtual machine easy install?

[lalalawawawa]

Does it still create a user account for itself on Windows just to be able to run?

Nope. It doesn't create the user (which was a legacy feature not needed anymore anyway), but it still creates the Users Group. It shouldn't bother you, though, as it is not used, and properly removed after you remove Player.

[acnpt]

Can you use the Windows 8 preview with this?

[Adrian0E]

Yes, I'm using it since Windows 8 Developer Preview was launched. it works great.

[protocol7]

kavazovangel: That's not so bad then. I might give this a try again, though for most things I'm happy with VirtualBox.

Brando212: When I tried Player 3 it created a new Windows account for itself which meant I had to screw about in the registry to fix login on my PC. I had just my own account and no password. After VMWare Player there was a VMWare account too which I had to hide from the login screen.

[Brandon H Supervisor]

weird, i never had that problem with 3 0_o

[protocol7]

Apparently it only happened with Windows 7. Found a page here that mentions it.

[Bamsebjørn]

The only reasons that I really loathe VMWare Player is that it uses an unchangeable skin and it has ****ty window handling (at least on Windows).

I've been using it for a while now and it works great.

[remixedcat]

Very nice. runs windows 8 fine, better support for running vms within vms as well. excellent job vmware.