VM Player. Anyone have any trouble?

Hi all,

I have been using VM Player running siemens, omron, allen bradley, automation direct and other software for a while now and every now and then I come across issues that shouldnt be issues.
So far to date they are,
1) Omron USB connectivity couldn't be achieved without modifying the vmx file. Even then the connection was buggy so i had to install into the host.
2) Allen Bradley 1747-UIC currently wont work. (Probably will need to add that part into the vmx file as well. Otherwise I will have to put linx and logix500 onto the host as well.
3) Just generally poor serial port comms. i.e. slow, intermittent comms.

I'm close to a point where choosing to run vm's is becoming a hinderance to the service I provide.
So im just wondering wether its because im running player and need to upgrade to workstation or wether i just have bad luck? Anyway, just wanted to see if anyone has never had a problem with there VMs and if there is anything i can do to improve my useage?
Any comments welcome.

Have you tried to revert it from your recent snapshot?

No. Player doesnt have snapshots.

There is a technote at AB tha describes how to set up VMware with Rockwell software.

alan_505 said:

There is a technote at AB tha describes how to set up VMware with Rockwell software.

Click to expand...

You wouldn't happen to know the technote entry id off hand would you? I have been trawling through the knowledge base and cant find anything useful so far...

I have a tech support contract. I havent logged a help desk query yet.

Do you have the programming software for the different vendors on different VM's? What OS are you using for your VM?
I have different vm's for omron,siemens,ab,ab rsview and all seems to work well.

FYI - I am running Omron from Win7 with no Problems

I have siemens in xp sp3, rockwell in xp sp3 and everything else in another general xp sp3. The host is win7 32 bit. Im hoping to move over to 64 bit soon to make use of the extra ram i have.
I had to move omron out of the general machine a while ago. The serial and ethernet connections worked flawlessly but i had a hit and miss experience with usb comms. I did make the required usb quirks entries into the vmx file to get usb comms, before doing that i had nothing at all.
My rockwell vm has been excellent up until last week when i had to use a 1747-uic. I cannot get it to work, so i will probably have to add the usb quirks entries to the vmx file aswell. But based on my experience with doing that with omron i am not hopeful that it will work flawlessly.

It annoys me that everyone else seems to have no trouble. One contract engineer i meet with every now and again also runs all his stuff inside vm's and he has no issues with omron.

There are two things that I think are different from everyone else.
1: I am running vmplayer, however that shouldnt be a problem.
2: The image i used was a real hard disk image from my old xp laptop using the vmware conversion utility. Then i unistalled everything, cleaned up windows and used that as the base image to create the other vm's before installing the respective softwares. Perhaps maybe i should create a new machine using a xp os disc instead and try that?

iant said:

FYI - I am running Omron from Win7 with no Problems

Click to expand...

@iant ,
Are you running win7x32 or win7x64? I've attached 2 screen shots of my win7x64 with CX_Prg ver 9.4
image 1 is trying to do an auto-online with com3, my pc does not have a com3 but it finds a plc and starts a transfer then fails.


image 2 is as above with com7 my keyspan usa-19hs, this is as far as it gets then i have to restart the pc, i have tried stopping processes etc, no matter what i do i cannot shutdown the pc without a hard reset.

I have VMware Workstation 8.0, but I still only run my VMs using player. I haven't experienced the exact issues you have, but I have experienced some of my own.

My VMs have been freezing my host machine regularly as of late. I have narrowed it down to two things.

1) Anti-virus (Kaspersky) was scanning the VM directories.
2) Windows making shadows of the .VMX files.

I have not froze since exclusing the VM stuff from my AV scan, although it is still too soon to tell as I also have not run my VMs much.

The biggest challenge I have faced is getting my Ethernet networking setup between the the VMs, the host, my wireless LAN and my LAN. I still find myself constantly monkeying with this.

My host is Win7Ultimate 64bit and virtually all of my guests are XPsp3.

I do HIGHLY recommend getting workstation. It is worth it for snapshots alone. For me it has already paid for itself 10 times over.

One last thing. My guest was converted from the built in XP license in Win7. I actually had to run it though the VM converter twice. It created a situation where I could not create clones and some other issues. Since you are only running player you may have this issue and not even be aware of it.

@chelton
i deliberatley run Win7 32bit CXp V9.03
However you issue with no comm 3 may be a matter of changing the usb port via device manager - advanced setup

The Technote that I was thinking of is 115299 - How to maximize VMWare images performance you need Techconnect access to see it.

Thanks alan_505
I found that. Seems as if it is geared to improving performance of the hard disk and RAM usage. Didn't see anything about USB connectivity.
I think i'll add in those entries anyway and see if it makes a difference to connecting the 1747-UIC. Won't hurt to try.

Attached is the article for everyone elses benefit. Am I allowed to do this??? I would suggest this applies to all VM's

I run Omron CX-P cold in the OS - it shuts down properly - no left overs grabbing serial ports etcetera - it is the ONLY PLC software I run in the OS - never had a problem - the rest I run in a virtual box - the key is Virtual Box - I do not run VM Player at all. Have had issues setting up Virtual Box too - particularly since the change of ownership!
I run CX-P in 64 and 32 bit Windows 7 without problems - again the only PLC software in run in the straight OS. AB, Siemens, Schneider all go in Virtual Box so that I can shut them down completly with no hangovers.

I am using VMware player some times. Have no problems with it at all. But I also only use with ethernet, never any USB devices.

For a legacy product we use VMware to run an old Win2000 application that must have access to a dongle on the parralel port. Also runs OK.