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Installing Novell NetWare 4.x into a Virtual Machine

Note: Support for Novell NetWare 4.x as a guest operating system is experimental at this time.

NetWare 4.x can be installed in a virtual machine using the standard Novell NetWare 4.x CD.

Before installing the operating system, be sure that you have already created a directory for the new virtual machine and configured it.

Use the VMware ESX Server Configuration Editor to verify the virtual machine's devices are set up as you expect before starting the installation. For example, be sure that your virtual machine is configured for at least 48MB of memory (which the NetWare server installation requires). VMware also recommends that you disable the screen saver on the host system before starting the installation process.

VMware recommends that you install MS-DOS 5.0 or higher in a small (50MB FAT16) partition as described in these guidelines. The rest of the free space on the virtual disk is used for the NetWare partition. Even though the virtual machine should most likely run NetWare most of the time, it is a good idea to install the DOSIDLE.EXE program, which you can download from www.vmware.com/software/dosidle210.zip.

To install NetWare 4.x in a virtual machine:

  1. Install a CD-ROM driver or CD-ROM software for DOS. If you have problems setting up the DOS virtual machine to access the CD-ROM drive, you can use the mtmcdai.sys driver, which can be found on www.mitsumi.com. Under Drivers and Manuals look for ide158.exe. Add the following modification to the config.sys and autoexec.bat files on your DOS boot floppy (along with the mscdex.exe file). If you are using a DOS boot partition, adjust the drive letters accordingly.
    config.sys
    DEVICE=HIMEM.SYS
    DOS=HIGH
    FILES=30
    rem install cd-rom driver
    DEVICE=A:\MTMCDAI.SYS /D:VMware
    autoexec.bat
    @ECHO OFF
    PROMPT $p$g
    A:\MTM\MSCDEX.EXE /D:VMware /M:10
  2. After you have configured the CD-ROM software, verify that the virtual machine can read a CD from the host system's CD-ROM drive.
  3. If the virtual machine is not running, power it on and wait for DOS finish its boot process.
  4. Insert the NetWare 4.x CD in the CD-ROM drive and run install.bat to start the NetWare server installation process. Install the software in a virtual machine as you would for a physical PC.
  5. If the virtual machine has been configured for networking (bridged, host-only, etc.), the installation program detects a PCI Ethernet adapter and prompts you with a list of possible drivers. At this point, do not select or load any LAN drivers; press the F10 key to continue installing without a LAN driver.

    Note: Once the installation has been completed, you can load and bind the appropriate LAN driver. Selecting or loading a LAN driver during the NetWare 4.x installation may hang the installation process.

  6. Finish the NetWare 4.x Server installation by following the on-screen instructions.
  7. Once the NetWare software has been installed, switch to the server console and type load edit sys:\system\autoexec.ncf. Add the following lines to the server's autoexec.ncf file, anywhere below the line that starts with file server name:
    load pcntnw slot=2 frame=frame_type
    bind ipx to pcntnw net=network_address
    load c:\nwserver\nw4-idle

    where frame_type and network_address are entered as appropriate for your network and nw4-idle is a CPU idle NetWare Loadable Module for NetWare 4.x servers (more on this below). The next time the server is started, the virtual machine's Ethernet adapter should begin working.

  8. Once you have updated the server's autoexec.ncf file with the above lines, down the server and type exit to return to a DOS prompt.

    NetWare servers do not idle the CPU when the operating system is idle. As a result, a virtual machine takes CPU time from the host regardless of whether the NetWare server software is idle or busy. To prevent unnecessary slowdowns, VMware recommends that you download the NetWare 4 CPU idle program from www.vmware.com/software/Nw4-idle.nlm and copy it to the virtual machine's c:\nwserver directory. The line added to the server's autoexec.ncf file earlier automatically loads the CPU idle program (nw4-idle.nlm) every time the NetWare server boots.

Known Issues

No VMware Tools package exists for NetWare guest operating systems; therefore, NetWare is limited to VGA mode graphics and it is always necessary to use the Ctrl-Alt key combination to release the mouse from the virtual machine.

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