For best performance, it is important to have VMware Tools installed and running in your virtual machine. For more information about VMware Tools, see Using VMware Tools.

After you install VMware Tools in a Windows virtual machine, the VMware Tools services start automatically when you start the guest operating system.

If the VMware Tools icon is not displayed in the system tray, you can use the VMware Tools control panel in the guest operating system (Start > Settings > Control Panel > VMware Tools) to change settings for VMware Tools. You can also reactivate the system tray icon. On the Options tab, check Show VMware Tools in the taskbar.

In a Linux or FreeBSD virtual machine, boot the guest operating system, start X and launch your graphical environment. Then you can launch the VMware Tools background application with this command:
vmware-toolbox &

You may run VMware Tools as root or as a normal user. To shrink virtual disks, you must run VMware Tools as root (su -). To test and edit scripts, you must run VMware Tools as the root user.

In a NetWare 5.1 or higher guest operating system, you can access the VMware Tools control panel by choosing Novell > Settings > VMware Tools for NetWare.

With some window managers, you can place the command to start VMware Tools in a startup configuration so VMware Tools starts automatically when you start your graphical environment. Consult your window manager's documentation for details. For more information, see Starting VMware Tools Automatically.

An alert appears in the status bar — at the bottom left corner of the VMware GSX Server window — when your virtual machine is not running the version of VMware Tools that matches your version of GSX Server.

To launch the VMware Tools installer, choose VM > Install VMware Tools.

For details, see Installing VMware Tools.