Each virtual machine has a standard virtual hardware configuration for chip set, BIOS, ports, and so on. The amount of memory and number of processors depends on your Mac.

Processor

  • One virtual processor on a host system with one or more logical processors

  • Up to eight virtual processors (eight-way virtual symmetric multiprocessing, or Virtual SMP™ ) on a host system with at least four logical processors

  • The following configurations have two logical processors:

    • A multiprocessor Mac with two or more physical CPUs

    • A single-processor Mac with a multicore CPU

Chip Set

  • Intel 440BX-based motherboard

  • NS338 SIO

  • 82093AA IOAPIC

BIOS

  • PhoenixBIOS 4.0 Release 6 with VESA BIOS

Memory

  • Up to 64 GB, depending on the available memory on your Mac, virtual machine hardware version, and guest operating system support

  • Total memory available for all virtual machines is limited only by the amount of memory on the Mac

    Note:

    If you assign too much memory to your virtual machines and have them all running at the same time, your Mac might slow down because of heavy disk swapping. As a best practice, make sure the total memory that Fusion and all running virtual machines uses stays below 70 percent of your total Mac memory.

Graphics

  • VGA

  • SVGA

  • 128MB 3D accelerated video with DirectX 9.0c with Shader Model 3 and OpenGL 2.1 for Windows XP as the guest OS

  • 256MB 3D accelerated video with DirectX 9.0EX with Aero and OpenGL 2.1 for Windows Vista and later as the guest OS

  • 3D accelerated video with DirectX 10 with OpenGL 3.3 for Windows Vista and later as the guest OS. DirectX 10 requires OSX 10.10 or later on the host and hardware version 12 and later. DirectX 10 also requires a GPU version of Intel HD4000 or later, Nvidia GeForce 650M or later, or AMD Radeon HD 5750 or later. The VMware guest operating system OpenGL driver for Windows and Linux supports the OpenGL 3.3 core profile only. The OpenGL3.3 compatibility profile is not supported.

  • To use the GL_EXT_texture_compression_s3tc and GL_S3_s3tc Open Graphics Library (OpenGL) extensions in a Windows XP or Windows 7 or later guest operating system, you must install Microsoft DirectX End-User Runtime in the guest operating system. OpenGL is an application program interface that is used to define 2D and 3D computer graphics. You can download Microsoft DirectX End-User Runtime from the Microsoft Download Center Web site.

IDE Devices

  • Up to four devices. Any of these devices can be a virtual hard disk or CD/DVD drive

  • IDE virtual disks up to 8 TB

  • CD/DVD drive can be a physical device on the host or client system, or an ISO image file or a DMG image file

SATA Devices

  • Up to 120 SATA devices: 4 controllers and 30 devices per controller

  • SATA virtual disks up to 8 TB

SCSI Devices

  • Up to 60 devices. Any of these devices can be a virtual hard disk or CD/DVD drive

  • SCSI virtual disks up to 8 TB

  • LSI Logic LSI53C10xx Ultra320 SCSI I/O controller. For Windows XP guest systems, this requires an add-on driver from the LSI Logic Web site. On the Web site, select Support & Downloads, click the link for downloading drivers, and select the controller in the drop-down menu to find the driver to download.

  • Mylex (BusLogic) BT-958 compatible host bus adapter. For Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 guest systems, this requires an add-on driver from the VMware Web site. See http://www.vmware.com/download/fusion/drivers_tools.html.

Printers

  • Driver-free printing. Automatic replication of host printers in guest virtual machines, including PCL and PostScript printers

  • Local and network-attached printers

Floppy Drives

  • Up to two 1.44MB floppy devices

  • Virtual floppy devices use floppy image files only

Serial (COM) Ports

  • Up to four serial (COM) ports

  • Virtual serial ports support only output to a file

  • One serial port can be used for driver-free printing

Parallel (LPT) Ports

  • Up to three bidirectional parallel (LPT) ports

  • Virtual parallel ports support only output to a file

USB Ports

  • Supports high-speed USB 2.0 and super-speed USB 3.0

  • Supports most devices, including USB printers, scanners, PDAs, hard disk drives, memory card readers and digital cameras, as well as streaming devices such as webcams, speakers, and microphones

Keyboard

  • 104-key Windows 95/98 enhanced

Mouse and Drawing Tablets

  • PS/2 mouse

  • USB mouse

  • USB drawing tablets

Ethernet Card

  • Up to 10 virtual Ethernet cards are supported.

Virtual Networking

  • Three virtual hubs are configured by default for bridged, host-only, and NAT networking.

  • Support for most Ethernet-based protocols, including TCP/IP v4, Microsoft Networking, Samba, Novell NetWare, and Network File System.

  • Built-in NAT supports client software using TCP/IP v4, FTP, DNS, HTTP, WINS, and Telnet, including VPN support for PPTP over NAT.

  • Create additional virtual networks to create isolated logical networks. This feature is available only with Fusion Pro.

  • Support for IPv6 for NAT only applies to additional virtual networks, and is available only with Fusion Pro.

Sound

  • Sound output and input using the Mac default input and output settings.

  • Emulates Creative Labs Sound Blaster ES1371 AudioPCI sound card. MIDI input, game controllers and joysticks are not supported.

  • HDAudio