VMware

I’ve been struggling with this error message for moths and I’m not the only one. Duncan Epping over at Yellow-Bricks has experienced similar problems.

When using PXE and kickstart on ESX 4.x, the ESX boots from PXE but the installation fails and in the DHCP server logs there is a new unauthorized client requesting an IP. VMware has released a knowledge base article with the resolution for this problem.

During the installation of ESX 4.x, the VMkernel starts and it boots the service console in a virtual machine. As such, the service console is using a virtual MAC address that is generated randomly at runtime. During the install, the MAC address is written to disk and becomes persistent, but each time you boot the installer, the COS MAC is different.

If you are using MAC address based access control in DHCP, deny unknown-clients, you cannot authorize the service console to get an IP from DHCP. There is no way to predict what the vswif0 MAC address will be.
 
In large deployments, specifying static IP addresses is not convenient. You would need to create a separate PXE configuration for each host. To workaround this, put the IPAPPEND 1 parameter in the PXE configuration for the host.

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/search.do?cmd=displayKC&docType=kc&externalId=1012248

The VMware Player 3.1 Release Candidate includes most of the same great features added to VMware Workstation including all of the graphics, performance and virtual hardware improvements. Some release highlights include:

• OpenGL 2.1 support for Windows 7 and Vista guests: The addition of hardware accelerated OpenGL 2.1 support to the WDDM driver enables many more graphics applications to run inside of your virtual machines.
• Improved graphics performance: Significant enhancements have been made to the VMware WDDM driver that have produced benchmark results that are up to 80% faster. The updated driver also produces smoother video playback and addresses many reported rendering issues. Of course games run better as well!
• 8-way SMP support plus virtual disks up to 2TB in size: The virtual hardware continues to become more powerful to meet the needs of Workstation customers who are running server class applications.
• OVF 1.0 support: Including the OVF Tool with this release enables users to easily import or export virtual machines and vApps and move them to vSphere or up into the cloud.
• Direct Launch: Blur the distinction between running native and virtual applications by launching an application installed in a virtual machine directly from the start menu or taskbar of the host system.
• Automatic software updates: These VMware applications can now detect when a new version is released and are able to update at the click of a button.
• Fedora virtual machines: VMware is excited about finally offering support for running one of the most popular Linux distributions on the planet!

http://communities.vmware.com/community/beta/player