How does bridged networking work in Fusion?

jaw04005 · Oct 31, 2009

I just moved over to Fusion from Parallels. I’ve installed Windows 7 64-bit and everything appears fine. However, when I go to switch from NAT to bridged networking I lose my Internet and local network connection.

Windows reports the network as “public” and throws up an exclamation point which says no Internet or local network.

Once you click on the network icon and look at the network adapter it shows that the adapter has an IP address from my Apple AirPort Router, but no default gateway.

Windows 7 diagnostics reports that it can’t find the default gateway. However, if I manually set the default gateway (which I’m assuming is my router at 10.0.1.1) in the advanced network settings it doesn’t take and just disappears after clicking OK.

I’ve also tried manually setting a static IP address in network settings within Windows 7, and like before it accepts the IP address but then Windows 7 diagnostics reports there’s no DHCP server.

On the Airport Router side, I can go into logs and statistics and see that VMWare has obtained an IP address.

Both Windows and OS X’s firewalls are off. I’ve tried reinstalling VMWare Tools and Fusion 3.0. I’ve deleted and reinstalled the network adapter (in Fusion) over and over.

In Parallels, if you used bridged networking Parallels would put two new “connections” inside your Network system preference. I noticed Fusion doesn’t do that.

I don’t know what else to try. I’ve read their support forums and bridged networking documents, but nothing appears to stand out. Everything works fine with NAT.

Any ideas?

jzuena · Nov 1, 2009

jaw04005 said:
I just moved over to Fusion from Parallels. Ive installed Windows 7 64-bit and everything appears fine. However, when I go to switch from NAT to bridged networking I lose my Internet and local network connection.

Windows reports the network as public and throws up an exclamation point which says no Internet or local network.

Once you click on the network icon and look at the network adapter it shows that the adapter has an IP address from my Apple AirPort Router, but no default gateway.

Windows 7 diagnostics reports that it cant find the default gateway. However, if I manually set the default gateway (which Im assuming is my router at 10.0.1.1) in the advanced network settings it doesnt take and just disappears after clicking OK.

Ive also tried manually setting a static IP address in network settings within Windows 7, and like before it accepts the IP address but then Windows 7 diagnostics reports theres no DHCP server.

On the Airport Router side, I can go into logs and statistics and see that VMWare has obtained an IP address.

Both Windows and OS Xs firewalls are off. Ive tried reinstalling VMWare Tools and Fusion 3.0. Ive deleted and reinstalled the network adapter (in Fusion) over and over.

In Parallels, if you used bridged networking Parallels would put two new connections inside your Network system preference. I noticed Fusion doesnt do that.

I dont know what else to try. Ive read their support forums and bridged networking documents, but nothing appears to stand out. Everything works fine with NAT.

Any ideas?

I haven't tried Fusion 3.0 yet, so I can't rule out some kind of bug in its bridged mode. It should be as simple as just readdressing Windows 7 onto your home network address range instead of the NAT address range. Maybe you need to tell 7 to create a new network profile and set it as a home networking profile (I vaguely remember doing something like that when trying the release candidate in Fusion 2.x and switching from NAT to bridged).

Is there a specific reason you need to go to bridged mode (like needing to see SMB shares from this 7 machine on the local network)? If not and NAT is working, let Fusion do its thing.

aristobrat · Nov 1, 2009

If the internal network that VMWare is using for bridging is the same network that your Apple AirPort is using, it has problems.

If your Apple Airport is really using 10.x.x.x, look in your /Library/Application Support/VMware Fusion folder for a file called "locations". If the VNET_1 stuff is also 10.x.x.x, that's probably the issue.

jaw04005 · Nov 2, 2009

jzuena said:
Maybe you need to tell 7 to create a new network profile and set it as a home networking profile (I vaguely remember doing something like that when trying the release candidate in Fusion 2.x and switching from NAT to bridged).

Oddly enough, you can't tell 7 to make the network you're connecting to a "Home" network until it actually works as a "Public" network. Currently, it automatically identifies the bridged network as a "public" network. However, It really shouldn't matter as the only difference between a "public" and "home" network within Windows 7 relates to firewall and file sharing permissions. It should still be able to get on the Internet, which is can't do in bridged networking mode.

jzuena said:
Is there a specific reason you need to go to bridged mode (like needing to see SMB shares from this 7 machine on the local network)? If not and NAT is working, let Fusion do its thing.

Yes. I need the virtual machine to connect to my NAS server and XBOX 360. Neither of which will happen with NAT networking. Currently, in NAT mode, it can only talk to the Mac it's running on. Anything running outside the Mac doesn't work.

aristobrat said:
If your Apple Airport is really using 10.x.x.x, look in your /Library/Application Support/VMware Fusion folder for a file called "locations". If the VNET_1 stuff is also 10.x.x.x, that's probably the issue.

I don't follow you. Isn't that the point of bridged networking? I want the virtual machine to receive a 10.0.1.x IP address just like every other computer and device on my network. So it can talk to my other PCs and devices.

aristobrat · Nov 2, 2009

jaw04005 said:
I don't follow you. Isn't that the point of bridged networking? I want the virtual machine to receive a 10.0.1.x IP address just like every other computer and device on my network.

When you install VMWare Fusion, it grabs two "unused" subnets that it then uses internally for "host-only" and "NAT" networking.

If either of the two networks that it happened to randomly assign itself are the same subnet that your router is giving out, that causes problems.

I installed VMWare Fusion at home, where everything is 192.168.x.x ... one of the two subnets it picked for internal use was 10.10.something.x, which was totally fine at home ... no problems. But when I took my computer to work, which uses 10.10.x.x for its physical network, bridge networking didn't work in VMWare.

Probably not the case with you, but just thought I'd mention it because it took me awhile to figure it out.

jaw04005 · Nov 2, 2009

aristobrat said:
When you install VMWare Fusion, it grabs two "unused" subnets that it then uses internally for "host-only" and "NAT" networking.

If either of the two networks that it happened to randomly assign itself are the same subnet that your router is giving out, that causes problems.

I installed VMWare Fusion at home, where everything is 192.168.x.x ... one of the two subnets it picked for internal use was 10.10.something.x, which was totally fine at home ... no problems. But when I took my computer to work, which uses 10.10.x.x for its physical network, bridge networking didn't work in VMWare.

Probably not the case with you, but just thought I'd mention it because it took me awhile to figure it out.

Ahhh. I understand now.

Unfortunately, thats not my problem as it picked 172.16.x.x for NAT and host only. Although it did choose 255.255.255.0 as its netmask which seems to refer to AirPort Utilitys subnet mask.

I wonder if this is a 64-bit Windows thing? I may try installing 32-bit to see if I get different results.

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