Networking – select the adapter to bridge separate for every network adapter in VMware

network-adapternetworkingvmware-player

I have a host computer running Windows7 with a wired network and a wireless network. These are two separate networks with two separate dhcp servers.

I created an Ubuntu virtual machine in VMware Player with two network adapters. Now I would like to bridge the two network adapters with my two physical networks. Then I encounter a very nasty problem.

I selected the first virtual network adapter and I clicked bridged & replicate physical network connection state. Than I click on the "Configure Adapters" buttons and select the host adapter I want this virtual adapter to bridge to.

I selected the second virtual network adapter and I clicked bridged & replicate physical network connection state. Than I click on the "Configure Adapters" buttons and I see the host network adapter I selected earlier for my first bridge is selected already. I do not want that so I deselect that one, and select the other physical adapter. Before I start the machine I check the first one if I did not make any mistake, and I see the second physical adapter is selected!!! It seems to be a separate application that is not linked to separate adapters, but does the overall bridging…

Is what I want even possible? I can not bridge them both, because they will autoselect the physical adapter that has the connection up&running.

Best Answer

FOUND IT! It is not a pretty one, but is works.

In older versions of vmware workstation an player there was a tool for configuring network adapters. It is called vmnetcfg.exe. In the newest version of vmware workstation it is still in the install package, but not installed anymore. To get it to work in my vmware player id did this:

Get the Program

I downloaded the latest version of VMware Workstation (400+MB). When it completed I opened up CMD and extracted the installer:

> cd \path\to\installer\
> vmware-workstation-versionyaddayadda.exe \e extractedfolder

Then I went to the extracted folder and opened core.cab with winrar. Somewhere in there hides a vmnetcfg.exe. I extracted it and copied it to my VMware Player install folder.

Running te program

I started the program. I had a VMnet0, VMnet1 and VMnet8 listed. I selected VMnet0 in the list, then clicked bridged and selected my wireless network adapter instead of automatic.

Then I clicked "Add Network..." and called it VMnet2. I selected VMnet2 in the list, then clicked bridged and selected my wired network card instead of automatic.

Adding the card to the VM

First I added the second virtual network adapter in the VMware player's machine settings. The first one I kept on bridged, and configured the wireless adapter as the preferred bridge adapter (my wired adapter is not clickable anymore).

I needed to add the card to the VM by hand. This meant I had to open the VMX file in Notepad or in my case another preferred editor.
In the VMX file I added two lines (if they already exist, replace them.)

ethernet1.connectionType = "custom"
ethernet1.vnet = "vmnet2"

I saved the file and started vmware player. In my network settings I see this now:

Network Adapter: Bridged (Automatic)
Network Adapter: Custom (vmnet2)

I started the Virtual machine, and it worked!

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