Specifications

Connecting USB Devices to Virtual Machines
When a virtual machine is running, its window is the active window. If you plug a USB device into the host
system, the device connects to the virtual machine instead of the host by default. If a USB device connected
to the host system does not connect to a virtual machine at power on, you must manually connect the device
to the virtual machine.
When you connect a USB device to a virtual machine, Player retains the connection to the affected port on
the host system. You can suspend or power off the virtual machine, or unplug the device. When you plug in
the device again or resume the virtual machine, Player reconnects the device. Player retains the connection
by writing an autoconnect entry to the virtual machine configuration (.vmx) file.
If Player cannot reconnect to the device, for example, because you disconnected the device, the device is
removed and Player displays a message to indicate that it cannot connect to the device. You can connect to
the device manually if it is still available.
Follow the device manufacturer's procedures for unplugging the device from the host computer when you
physically unplug the device, move the device from host system to a virtual machine, move the device
between virtual machines, or move the device from a virtual machine to the host computer. Following these
procedures is especially important for data storage devices, such as zip drives. If you move a data storage
device too soon after saving a file and the operating system did not actually write the data to the disk, you
can lose data.
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Installing USB Drivers on Windows Hosts on page 54
When a particular USB device is connected to a virtual machine for the first time, the host detects it as
a new device named VMware USB Device and installs the appropriate VMware driver.
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Disable Automatic Connection of USB Devices on page 54
You can disable the autoconnect feature if you do not want USB devices to connect to a virtual
machine when you power it on.
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Mount the USB File System on a Linux Host on page 55
On Linux hosts, Player uses the USB device file system to connect to USB devices. If the USB device
file system is not located in /proc/bus/usb, you must mount the USB file system to that location.
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Connect USB HIDs to a Virtual Machine on page 55
To connect USB human interface devices (HIDs) to a virtual machine, you must configure the virtual
machine to show all USB input devices in the Removable Devices menu.
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Install a PDA Driver and Synchronize With a Virtual Machine on page 56
To install a PDA driver in a virtual machine, you must synchronize the PDA with the virtual machine.
Installing USB Drivers on Windows Hosts
When a particular USB device is connected to a virtual machine for the first time, the host detects it as a new
device named VMware USB Device and installs the appropriate VMware driver.
The Windows operating system prompts you to run the Microsoft Windows Found New Hardware wizard.
Select the default action to install the software automatically. After the software is installed, the guest
operating system detects the USB device and searches for a suitable driver.
Disable Automatic Connection of USB Devices
You can disable the autoconnect feature if you do not want USB devices to connect to a virtual machine
when you power it on.
Prerequisites
Power off the virtual machine.
Getting Started with VMware Player
54 VMware, Inc.