Specifications

CHAPTER 6 Using Disks in a Virtual Machine
187
Adding DVD-ROM or CD-ROM Drives to a Virtual Machine
You can add one or more DVD-ROM or CD-ROM drives to your virtual machine. You
can connect the virtual machine’s drive to a physical drive on the host machine or to
an ISO image file.
You can configure the virtual DVD-ROM or CD-ROM drive as either IDE or SCSI, no
matter what kind of physical drive you connect it to. In other words, if your host
computer has an IDE CD-ROM drive, you can set up the virtual machine’s drive as
either SCSI or IDE and connect it to the host’s drive. The same is true if the host’s
physical drive is a SCSI drive.
To add a new virtual DVD-ROM or CD-ROM drive to a virtual machine, make sure the
virtual machine is powered off, then complete the following steps. You can add the
device from the console or from the management interface.
Adding a DVD-ROM or CD-ROM Drive from the Console
1. Open the virtual machine settings editor (VM > Settings) and click Add to start
the Add Hardware Wizard.
2. Click DVD/CD-ROM Drive, then click Next.
3. Select Use physical drive if you want to connect the virtual machine’s drive to a
physical drive on the host computer. Select Use ISO Image if you want to
connect the virtual machine’s drive to an ISO image file.
4. Do one of the following:
• If you selected Use physical drive, choose the drive you want to use from the
drop-down list or choose Auto detect.
If you do not want the CD-ROM drive connected when the virtual machine
starts, deselect Connect at power on.
Click Advanced if you want to specify the device node the drive should use in
the virtual machine.
On the advanced settings screen you may also select Legacy emulation. This
is necessary only if you have had problems using normal mode. The legacy
emulation mode does not support all the capabilities of normal mode. For
example, if you are using legacy emulation mode, you cannot record CDs, you
cannot read multisession CDs, you cannot extract digital audio from a CD and
you cannot read or write DVDs. For details, see Using Legacy Emulation for
DVD-ROM and CD-ROM Drives on page 172.
After you have made any desired changes in these settings, click Finish.