How To: Install VMware Tools on CentOS 5.3

The first step after a fresh install of a CentOS 5.3 server is too install the packages gcc and kernel-devel. When these packages are installed, update them and reboot of the VM:

yum install gcc kernel-devel –y
yum update –y
reboot

Now we have to create a new folder so we can mount the VMware Tools cd-rom.

mkdir /media/cdrom –p

Start the VMware Tools Installer via the GUI:

Mount the cd-rom:

mount /dev/cdrom /media/cdrom

create a folder and copy the tar.gz file from the cd-rom to the folder:

mkdir /root/tarz –p
cp /media/cdrom/VMwareTools-4.0.0-xxxxxx.tar.gz /root/tarz/

Open the folder and extract the tar.gz file:

cd /root/tarz
tar zxvf VMwareTools-4.0.0-xxxxxx.tar.gz

Open the vmware-tools-distrib folder and start the installer:

cd vmware-tools-distrib
./vmware-install.pl

You can change the vnic to vmxnet via the following commands:

/etc/init.d/network stop
rmmod pcnet32
rmmod vmxnet
modprobe vmxnet
/etc/init.d/network start

The final step is to reboot the VM.