- WS: support more than 4gb of ram, since pc's nowadays can easily have that much

- WS: support for shared scsi (for evaluating oracle RAC & other clusters)

- WS&GSX on linux: make other devices besides /dev/hdX|sdX useable as RAW-devices (obsoletes 3rd party vmware-bdwrapper)

- WS: consistent suspend/resume from the CLI. resume doesn`t work the way it should work.

- WS: trigger clean(graceful) shutdown of guests from CLI

- WS&GSX on linux: a more stable vmware-diskmount

- WS&GSX: vmware-tools as OpenSource or as a non-X11 variant

GSX+WS: Better API. vmware-cmd / perl API was written in 1999 and doesn't cut it.

GSX: Live snapshots

GSX: 64-bit guest support (and 64-bit host optimization).

Re: MacOS x86 guest support, as much as I (and many other people) would like to see this, I consider it highly unlikely. After all, consider that Apple is still a hardware company, in addition to being an OS and software vendor. Virtualization technology attempts to turn hardware into a commodity (from a business perspective anyway). For VMware to support OS X x86 on Workstation would also require them to implement support for the Trusted Platform Module that Apple/Intel are implementing to prevent OS X x86 from running on any other x86 hardware platform other than Apple's. Unless Apple is willing to co-operate with VMware on implementing a TPM in software, VMware would have to reverse engineer it, and expose themselves to litigation under the DMCA (I think, IANAL).

Now a version of VMware Workstation and Player that supports OS X x86 as a HOST operating system I think we might possibly see! Given the UNIX underpinnings of OS X, the porting effort from the UNIX versions of OS X might not be so hard?

Answer to the first post:

Thank you for writing!

I disagree just on the first suggestion: as far as I know modern motherboards still supports only 4GB Ram maximum (indended as socket slots availability).


I'd like to answer all where possible: this could be simpler if you provide a name for your comments instead of staying "anonymous".

Thank you!

Answer to James Webster:

Thank you for writing!

I have different opinion on MacOS x86 virtualization destiny since I learned something unexpected about this hot topic.

You'll discover what I mean reading a new post on 9th January...
Stay tuned!

I've several IBM A-series PCs, each with Dual Opterons. They support up to 8 DIMMS, so at least 8 GB of RAM support for Workstation would be nice.

Intrigued by your OS X x86 comment, I'll look again on Monday.

-Ric

hello allesandro!

>I disagree just on the first
>suggestion: as far as I know modern
>motherboards still supports only 4GB
>Ram maximum (indended as socket slots
>availability).

there have been several requests on the vmware forum for supporting more than 4 gb of ram.

furthermore, x64 is to be expected to go mainstream and there are already workstation-class chipsets and approrpiate boards out - for example Intel 955X

see: http://www.intel.com/products/chipsets/955x/

at least vmware should offer an option to "pay for 2 workstation licenses" to make it work on systems with 8gb. There are rumors, that there has been such licensing option in the past. why should i buy 2 PCs with 4GB each if it wouldn`t be a problem (technically) to run everything on one machine. I have test-systems which need 1gb ram each - and running more than 3 of them isn`t possible on commodity hardware due to the fact, that 4gb is mostly "theoretical" and restricted to <3.5 Gb on most mainboards (due to reserved memory regions). the best i get out of an FSC scenic P (contract vendor) is 3.2-3.3 GB - even if there are 4 x 1GB inside.
so - ram limitation is a real issue for me.

regards
roland

I use VMware Workstation on my business PC. Very satisfied with its current state.

My vote for Workstation running on OS X on Intel hardware! So far I need two computers at business and at home. That makes it four. I really want to get rid of the Windows only hardware.

Virtual PC doesn't cut it even on a G5, nor do I like it as much on X86 hardware like VMware. But any vendor that lets me run Windows with native speed on OS X Intel will get my money.

Dual monitor support as two independent screens in full screen mode.

- GSX: Snapshot management at least as powerful as WS 5.5 should be included in all and any case.
- GSX: as #2 already mentioned, a better scripting API would really be appreciated.

My vote is for vmware workstation running as a host on mac os x 10.4.4 on the new X86 intel macs :)

WS: Player and Workstation running on MacOS x86.

Virtual SMP for GSX
like you write in the post
http://www.virtualization.info/2004/03/next-vmware-virtual-smp-release-could.html

Anyone have any insight into when/if GSX will be updated?

Throttling of resouces (i.e. CPU) per VM would be handy.

- WS: Enhanced network capabilties to simulate WAN/DSL connections with Round Trip Times and bandwidth limits.

workstation for OSX. There many customers out there for this product!