VMware Server 2.0 Beta 1 was released today. I was excited. Very excited. That is, until I actually downloaded and installed it. For some reason VMware has decided that everyone wants to use their virtual machines through a web browser. Well, guess what: we don’t. VMware Workstation is the cream of the crop, it’s just that much better than anything else on the market. VMware Server 1.0 was pretty good, although it was noticeably slower than the Workstation version it was still way ahead of Microsoft’s VirtualPC. But now this? Are they trying to convince people to switch back to VirtualPC? I use VirtualPC every day at work and I hate every minute of it. I desperately want some good VM software, but unfortunately VMware Workstation is just too expensive. I’m begging you VMware, please don’t go down the web route with VMware Server. It won’t do anyone any good. Oh, and while you’re at it, what are the chances of offering heavily discounted licenses for indie/non-profit developers? 
VMware Server 2.0: Oh Snap
Tue, Nov 13, 2007
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November 16th, 2007 at 1:58 pm
VMware Server is moving towards running small/medium business workloads and back end processes more so than user interactive desktop sessions. VMware wants to charge a ton for virtual desktops with ESX. For Server, while the management and horribly slow user console may be web-based, try running the virtual machine entirely in the background, forget the web interface and use Windows RDP (Assuming it is a Windows VM). I’ve been doing this for some time and find RDP is significantly more responsive than even running VMware Workstation natively. Love DisplayFusion BTW :-).
November 21st, 2007 at 12:35 pm
Thanks for the tip. I have gotten so used to using the console I completely forgot about RDP. It looks like it’s time to form a new habit. I’ll give it a shot without the console for a while and see how it goes.