Windows 7

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Windows 7 documentation covers information on how to install the operating system in a virtual machine. For additional information about the operating system, refer to the instructions included in the installation media.

Windows 7 documentation includes the following topics:

• Installation Instructions
• Installation of VMware Tools in a Windows 7 Guest
• Knowledge Base Articles for Windows 7
• VMware Compatibility Guide

Installation Instructions

You can install Windows 7 in a virtual machine using the corresponding Windows 7 distribution CD.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, verify that the following tasks are complete:

• Read General Installation Instructions for All VMware Products.
• Read the Microsoft System Requirements for the recommended storage and memory values.
• Create and configure a new virtual machine, with the appropriate virtual storage and virtual memory to support the intended workload.

Installation Steps

1. Insert the Windows 7 CD or DVD in the CD-ROM drive.
2. Turn on the virtual machine to begin installing Windows 7.
3. (Optional) If you are using VMware Paravirtual as the default SCSI controller, you can install Windows 7 32-bit using the pvscsi-windows2003.flp driver and Windows 7 64-bit using the pvscsi-windows2008.flp driver.
4. Follow the prompts to complete the installation.
5. Install VMware Tools.
6. (Optional) On VMware Fusion, install Boot Camp drivers so that the guest operating system can access hardware devices on the physical machine.
   Windows 7 32-bit supports only Boot Camp 3 drivers and Windows 7 64-bit requires Boot Camp drivers to be installed individually.

VMware Tools in an Windows 7 Guest

For information on VMware Tools, see Knowledge base article 1014294, General VMware Tools installation instructions, at http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1014294.

Knowledge Base Articles for Windows 7

The following links refer to knowledge base articles on operating system specific issues.

• See knowledge base article 1012885 at http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1012885 for more information on how to install Boot Camp drivers in a Windows virtual machine.
• See the VMware knowledge base for a list of known issues about the operating system.

VMware Compatibility Guide

The VMware Compatibility Guide Web site lists supported guest and host operating systems and provides related support information.