Knowledge Base

The VMware Knowledge Base provides support solutions, error messages and troubleshooting guides
 
Search the VMware Knowledge Base (KB)   View by Article ID
 

CD-ROM mount point "busy" when attempting to install VMware Tools in a Linux guest

Details

Why do I see an error message that says the mount point of the CD-ROM drive is "busy," or "/dev/cdrom already mounted" when I try to install VMware Tools in a Linux guest operating system?

Solution

When you install VMware Tools in a Linux guest, you mount a virtual CD-ROM that contains VMware Tools on your guest operating system's default mount point.

For example, to install VMware Tools in a Linux guest with Workstation 4 you select File>Install VMware Tools then enter a mount command at a shell prompt in the Linux guest. Once the virtual CD-ROM is mounted, you can copy the VMware Tools installation program to a temporary directory on your guest and run it.

However, some Linux desktops (such as Gnome) may automatically mount the virtual CD-ROM immediately after you select File>Install VMware Tools. When this happens, the mount command that you enter on the command line fails with a message similar to the following:

mount: /dev/cdrom already mounted or /mnt/cdrom busy
If you see this message, it probably means the virtual CD-ROM is automatically mounted by your Linux desktop. You may ignore this message from mount and continue installing VMware Tools. (In other words, copy the file vmware-linux-tools.tar.gz from the mounted, virtual CD-ROM to a temporary directory in the Linux guest, uncompress and extract the contents of the tar file, and run vmware-install.pl.)

For complete instructions on installing VMware Tools in a Linux guest, see:

For instructions about installing VMware Tools in other VMware products and releases, see your documentation and http://www.vmware.com/support/desktop/index.html (for desktop products) and http://www.vmware.com/support/server/index.html (for server products).

Keywords

1027; URLZ

Request a Product Feature

To request a new product feature or to provide feedback on a VMware product, please visit the Request a Product Feature page.

Feedback

Did this article help you?
This article resolved my issue.
This article did not resolve my issue.
This article helped but additional information was required to resolve my issue.
What can we do to improve this information? (4000 or fewer characters)
Actions
KB: