Old are the days when you had to setup a bunch of computers and a server to emulate a network environment, now you can do the same thing with just a couple of computers using VMware . In this post I will show you how to setup VMware server to host windows server 2003 which is going to act as our domain controller server, and probably a virtual workstation in our testing network.
If you don’t own a copy of windows server 2003 and are too broke to buy one, remember there are many ways to get it online for free. Check this post to give you an idea”download windows vista for free”
Starting the network process setup is very simple, you just need to download and install the VMware server which we are going to use to setup our windows 2003 domain controller and a virtual PC. You can install the VMware server on any windows machine, including windows XP home and PRO edition, is not recommended and supported by VMware, but for our testing purposes it should be fine.
Also you need to keep in mind that VMware uses the physical memory and processor on your host machine to run, so is recommended that you have enough memory on your physical machine before installing any VMware player or server. Your processor also needs to be able to handle the load. I think a 1 GB of memory on windows XP should be fine, you should get at least 2 GB for windows vista.
VMware server is free, you only need to register to get to the download link, if you haven’t registered you can do so here register. After you have registered, you should get the serial numbers for windows and Linux:
Copy and paste those two serial numbers on notepad and save it for later use. after you do that, download VMware server by clicking on the first download link “VMware Server for Windows Operating Systems”:
VMware server download size is 491 MB, it will take awhile depending on your Internet connection speed. once you download it, click on the VMware-server-e.x.p-84186 file. The setup wizard should kick off:
The “welcome to the installation wizard for VMware server” will come up next:
Click Next. Accept the license agreement on the next screen:
Click Next. Choose the destination folder where you want to install VMware server, otherwise leave the default:
Click Next. The server configuration information window will come up:
Leave it as default and click next. In the next screen, choose the places you would like to have shortcuts of the program, I don’t like to clutter my desktop, so I only have it on the Quick Launch toolbar:
Click on “Install” on the next screen. The VMware server installation should start…
After VMware wizard has finished installing the software and drivers, the registration screen should come up:
This is where you will need to enter the server code you saved in notepad earlier along with your name and company. After entering the the information above, the installation of VMware should be completed:
Click on Finish. Now VMware server should be installed on your computer, click on the “VMware Server Home Page” icon on your quick launch toolbar to access the VMware management console:
Use your local windows username and password to login to the console.
Next, we will setup windows server 2003 on a virtual machine with VMware server we just setup. stay tuned.
great artical, very helpful but please i want to know how to add a virtual workstation in our testing network (for example windows XP) and how to connect it to the domain
thank you