VMware Workstation lets you use your virtual machines to run Windows, Linux and a host of other operating systems side-by-side on the same computer. You can switch between operating systems instantly with a click of a mouse, share files between virtual machines with drag-and-drop functionality and access all the peripheral devices you rely on.
Besides bridging to existing host network adapters, CD-ROM devices, hard-disk drives, and USB devices, VMware Workstation also provides the ability to simulate some hardware. For example, it can mount an ISO file as a CD-ROM, and .vmdk files as hard disks; and can configure its network adapter driver to use network address translation (NAT) through the host-machine rather than bridging through it (which would require an IP address for each guest-machine on the host network).
VMware Workstation also allows the testing of Live CDs without first burning them onto physical discs or rebooting the computer. One can also take multiple successive snapshots of an operating system running under VMware Workstation. Each snapshot allows you to roll back the virtual machine to the saved status at any time. The ability to use multiple snapshots makes VMware Workstation useful as a tool for sales-people demonstrating complex software products, and for developers setting up virtual development-environments and virtual test-environments.
Major changes in VMware Workstation 6.5
New Features
- Enhanced VMware ACE authoring - Use ACE (Assured Computing Environment) features to package and deploy Pocket ACE and desktop virtual machines with encryption, restricted network access, and device control. VMware ACE authoring features are now fully integrated with Workstation, and no special ACE Edition is required. In addition to the new features listed here, be sure to read about new ACE-specific features in the VMware ACE 2.5 beta release notes.
- Unity mode - Integrate your favorite guest applications with your host. Open the application window, enter Unity mode, and the Workstation window is automatically minimized. The guest application windows look just like host application windows, but with color-coded borders. You can access the virtual machine's Start menu (for Windows virtual machines) or Applications menu (for Linux virtual machines) by placing the mouse pointer over the host's Start or Applications menu, or by using a key combination.
- Accelerated 3-D graphics on Windows XP guests - Workstation 6.5 virtual machines now work with applications that use DirectX 9 accelerated graphics with shaders up through Shader Model 2.0 on Windows XP guests. Hosts can be running Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, or Linux.
- Virtual machine streaming - You can now download a virtual machine from a Web server and power it on without waiting for the download to complete. Use the command-line startup command (vmware for Workstation or vmplayer for VMware Player) with the URL of the virtual machine. The download can also be paused and restarted. Note that this feature is not available for ACE instances.
Performance Improvements
- Networking performance using NAT - You will see significant improvements in networking performance if a virtual machine is configured to use NAT. Performance is ten times better than in the previous release in some cases.
- Folder sharing and dragging, dropping, copying, and pasting text and files - Transferring files between virtual machines or between host and guests using these features is up to 25 percent faster.
- USB devices - Several optimizations have reduced latency of I/O to USB devices by as much as 50 percent.
- I/O performance - A new asynchronous I/O manager boosts performance on Windows hosts under heavy I/O loads.
- VMCI performance - Applications that make use of VMCI will see a significant increase in throughput. Several optimizations have been added.
New Platform Capabilities
- New virtual hardware version - This new hardware version lets you use the following new features if the guest operating system supports them: Add or remove some virtual devices while the virtual machine is powered on ("hot-plug"). Use LSI Logic SAS (serial attached SCSI) adapters in the virtual machine. Hot-add virtual CPUs and memory to guests that support this functionality. For virtual machines with this hardware version, 3-D graphics capabilities are enabled by default for Windows 2000 and later guest operating systems and most Linux guests.
- Support for smart cards in virtual machines - You can plug a smart card reader into a host and insert your smart card to authenticate yourself on your host or on a guest. Smart cards can be shared between the host and guests or between guests.
- Replicate the physical network connection state for mobile users - If you use virtual machines on a laptop or other mobile device, enable this new link state propagation feature if you use bridged network connections (not NAT). As you move from one wired or wireless network to another, the IP address is automatically renewed.
- Text copy and paste enhancements - On Windows guests, you can copy and paste text in rich text format, and copy up to 4MB of text. (On Linux guests, the old limitations still apply. You can copy and paste up to 64K of plain text.)
(5 X 99.5 MB + 1 x 45.2 MB)
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2 September 2008 
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