Release: VMware Workstation 5.5 released!

Thursday, November 24, 2005   |   3 Comments   |   addthis
It's finally out. One of the most expected virtualization release, Workstation 5.5 (build 18463) brings in a lot of new features and improvements:
  • Full support for 64-bit guest operating systems and improved support for 64-bit host operating systems enable users to work in a broader range of environments
  • Experimental support for two-way Virtual Symmetric Multiprocessing (Virtual SMP) enables multiprocessor virtual machines
  • VMware Player gives you greater flexibility in distributing virtual machines
  • Improved support for 32-bit host and guest operating systems
  • Workstation emulates a new Ethernet adapter type for 64-bit guests
  • Workstation 5.5 driver certification updates
  • Improved import capability lets you open and import Microsoft Virtual PC and Virtual Server virtual machines, as well as Symantec LiveState Recovery system images, directly into Workstation
  • On Windows hosts, enhancements to the user interface let you customize Workstation toolbars to suit your workstyle
  • Enhanced support for wireless Ethernet adapters used in bridged networking lets you connect your virtual machines to wireless networks on Linux hosts
  • Enhanced autodetect makes it easier to configure devices for virtual machines
  • Enhanced autoconnect automatically reconnnects manually connected USB devices
  • Enhanced snapshot management makes it easier to work with snapshots
  • Enhanced command line interface helps you manage snapshots
  • Memory page trimming can be disabled to improve performance
  • Enhanced product update checking makes it more convenient to keep your Workstation software up to date
  • On Linux hosts, the user interface has been enhanced to work better with desktop appearance themes
  • Workstation 5.5 extends the display resizing features Autofit Guest and Fit Guest Now to Linux guests
You really need to read the Release Notes to have a first overview of all these things. But there's more: with VMware Workstation 5.5 comes out a series of very useful utilities (producted by VMware but not officially supported):
  • VMware Player VMware Player is free software that enables PC users to easily run any virtual machine on a Windows or Linux PC. VMware Player runs virtual machines created by VMware Workstation, GSX Server or ESX Server and also supports Microsoft virtual machines and Symantec LiveState Recovery disk formats.
  • Processor Check for 64-Bit Compatibility This is a standalone processor check utility which you can use without VMware Workstation to perform the same check and determine whether your CPU is supported for virtual machines with 64-bit guest operating systems.
  • Disk Mount This is a Windows installer for the VMware DiskMount utility. With the VMware DiskMount utility, a VMware virtual disk file can be mounted as a Windows drive letter for read/write access to the files it contains.
  • Movie Decoder This is a Windows installer for the movie decoder. This utility is required to play movies recorded using VMware Workstation 5.
  • Virtual Machine Importer This is a Windows installer for the VMware Virtual Machine Importer. This utility allows you to convert a Microsoft Virtual PC or Microsoft Virtual Server virtual machine into a VMware Workstation 4 or 5 virtual machine.
Download everything (except the Player) here: http://www.vmware.com/download/ws Download the Player (which is still reported as beta 2) here: http://www.vmware.com/download/player

Comments

Alessandro,

I'm happy too about the early release. Have you been using it? Are there any issues with upgrade/import of existing VMs? Thanks.

Brian

By Anonymous Anonymous, at Thursday, November 24, 2005 3:17:00 PM 

Brian,
thanks for commenting!

Till now I had no problems updating VMware Tools inside a couple of Windows Server 2003 virtual machines.

I instead noticed pretty fast performances (without touching Pages Trimming option).

Obviously some more time is required on this build to really understant how it goes.
I'll open a new post if any issues would raise, so stay tuned.

By Anonymous Alessandro, at Thursday, November 24, 2005 3:54:00 PM 

Where can I found the Disk Mount utility.I ownloaded vmware 5.5 and it's not there

Thanks.

By Anonymous Anonymous, at Monday, November 28, 2005 1:14:00 PM 

Post a new comment

Virtualization Congress 2008

© 2003-2008 virtualization.info
Sitemap