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Enabling a serial port device from a virtual machine

You can have up to four serial or COM ports in a virtual machine. A serial port may be used by the host operating system and one or more guest operating systems running in virtual machines. By default, the configured serial port is enabled when the virtual machine is powered on. These devices output to serial ports, files, or named pipes.

To add a serial connection:

  1. Select File > Open and open the virtual machine configuration file (.cfg) you want to modify.
  2. Select Settings > Configuration Editor from Workstation.
  3. Click the + sign next to "Serial Ports".
  4. Select a device node where you want to create a virtual serial port. If a slot is not currently configured, the description reads "Not Installed".
  5. In the "Serial Port" window, select the "Start Connected" option if you want the serial port device to be available as soon as the virtual machine powers on.

    Note: If the serial port device may be inaccessible to the guest operating system when the virtual machine is powered on, deselect this option. For example, a Zip drive might not be connected when the virtual machine powers on. In this case, you can enable access to the serial port after startup using the "Devices" menu.

  6. In the "Type" field, make a selection:
  7. Click Install.
  8. Click OK.
  9. Power on the virtual machine.

Note: Serial port performance in the host operating system may suffer when a virtual machine is running. This is because Workstation may disable interrupts on the host for a long period of time, resulting in host UARTs dropping characters intermittently. No corruption will occur, but retries in the software controlling the UARTs will reduce the transfer rate of the host.

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