Installation guide

6 If you are connecting two virtual machines, you must configure a serial port as a named pipe in two virtual
machines: a server virtual machine and a client virtual machine.
a For the server virtual machine, select Server in the Near end list.
b For the client virtual machine, select Client in the Near end list.
c Select A virtual machine in the Far end list.
7 If you are connecting to an application on the host, do the following:
a Select Server or Client in the Near end list. In general, select Server if you plan to start this end of
the connection first.
b Select An application in the Far end list.
By default, the serial port is connected when you power on the virtual machine. You might deselect the
Connect at power on check box (optional).
8 Under I/O Mode, decide whether to configure this serial port to use interrupt mode or polled mode.
Polled mode is of interest primarily to developers who are using debugging tools that communicate over
a serial connection.
Polled mode causes the virtual machine to consume a disproportionate share of processor (or CPU) time.
This makes the host and other guests run sluggishly. To maintain best performance for applications on
the host, select the Yield CPU on poll check box. This forces the affected virtual machine to use interrupt
mode, which yields processor (or CPU) time if the only task it is trying to do is poll the virtual serial port.
9 Click OK to save your changes and close the dialog box.
Change the Virtual Processor or CPU Configuration
You can configure more than one virtual processor or CPU for a virtual machine using VMware Virtual SMP
for ESX.
If the virtual machine is on an ESX/ESXi host, you can configure a virtual machine to have up to eight virtual
processors or CPUs. Virtual machines cannot have more virtual CPUs than the actual number of logical CPUs
on the host—that is, the number of physical processor cores if hyperthreading is disabled or two times the
number of physical processor cores if hyperthreading is enabled. For more information about using SMP,
consult the VMware Knowledge Base.
NOTE Not all guest operating systems support SMP, and some that do require reinstallation if the number of
CPUs changes.
Procedure
1 In the Virtual Machine Properties Editor, click the Hardware tab.
2 Click Virtual Processor or CPU in the Hardware list.
3 Select the number of virtual processors for the virtual machine.
4 Click OK to save your changes and close the dialog box.
Virtual Machine Options
The virtual machine options define a range of virtual machine properties such as name, vApp functionality,
its behavior with the guest operating system and VMware Tools, and other Advanced options.
vSphere Basic System Administration
150 VMware, Inc.