At work, I have Windows XP loaded and running on my MacBook Pro laptop via VMware Fusion (v2.0.4) so I can use two Windows-only applications (both Telelogic-made).
I ran into some issues last week with my virtual machine where the good ‘ol DnD (drag & drop) functionality stopped working. I thought my install of VMware Tools was messed up so I uninstalled the instance that was running and attempted to reinstall the tools. Unfortunately XP decided that the virtual CD-ROM no longer existed on my computer so it wouldn’t let me install the VMware Tools (if you select “Install VMware Tools” from the Virtual Machine menu, all it really does is mount an ISO with the tools install file in that virtual CD-ROM).
Digging around on the web didn’t produce any useful tips that I could try, so I did some experimenting and this is what I did to get VMware Tools to install:
- The ISO that has the VMware Tools on it is located at /Library/Application Support/VMware Fusion/isoimages/. Mount the appropriate ISO (in my case it was windows.iso) to your mac via Disk Utility.
- Open the mounted drive and copy the contents to a USB stick.
- Connect the USB stick to your virtual machine via VMware Fusion and copy the files to your desktop.
- Run the setup.exe file.
Seems pretty simple, doesn’t it.