VMware Memory Problem.

I'm trying to run Linux Mint 20.2 in VMware and I have to set the memory in the VM below 2GBs or Linux Mint will not boot. I get this error.


Is there a setting I need to change. It was working OK when I had the memory in the VM set to 4GB. Rebooting didn't help.

Need more info e.g.

How much RAM do you have?

What have you set for VMs.

Are you using dynamic RAM?

You really need 16 GB RAM to comfortably run VMS, leaving around 8GB for Host.

If only 8 GB, I would set VM to max 4 GB. You shoukd also have pagefiling set to automatic.

My laptop has 8 GBs of ram. I have only went as high as 4GBs for the VM. This use to work without a problem. I think the problem started with one of the Windows 11 updates. I rarely use the VM so I don't know when this problem started.

Winuser said:

My laptop has 8 GBs of ram. I have only went as high as 4GBs for the VM. This use to work without a problem. I think the problem started with one of the Windows 11 updates. I rarely use the VM so I don't know when this problem started.

Click to expand...

I did some tests a while back and contrary to popular perception, modern Linux distros really needed around 5 GB to run without excess paging but that was Ubuntu in enhanced mode. Sure you can use lite versions which will run in less than 2 GB but they are not really that user orientated.

In other tests, I found W10 often used less memory than W8/W7. In part memory compression helps, but in the end it is just more memory efficient. I can still run it on my 1 GB tablet albeit sedately.

Now I know how to get sound on Ubuntu in a HyperV VM, I only use HyperV now. I tend to use fixed memory assignment rather than dynamic memory, mainly as it was a bit flakey at one time but I admit I have not tried dynamic memory for a while.

As HyperV is a type one hypervisor, it does not consume so much memory overhead as well.

So although I cannot directly answer re. VMWare as I have not used it for a while, I am guessing there is a dynamic memory setting which may help, as it will use as much as it needs and if not enough, it will page.

However, as I said 8GB is barely enough to run VMs. I added 4GB to my old laptop taking it to 12GB (couldn't afford 8 GB at the time) and it made a big difference, with VMs on HyperV running fine in regards to memory usage.

I'm also not using VMWare nowadays but it seems the host consumes or reserves more memory than before where it leaves the Workstation VM with less available.
Giving 4GB out of total of 8GB to VM is on the edge and maybe risky. Depending on usage on the host, a few browser tabs would already fill quite some memory in parallel with the VM running...

You could try this in the VM settings:

Others have reported it works with 8GB on host.

To my surprise I can set the memory to 4GBs again. I can't explain why because I didn't make any changes.

My guess remains the variable memory allocation the host reserves and the fact that you are on the max reasonable limit given to the VM (4 out of 8GB).

Have you tested with the tweak I mentioned?
If not, this is still unsolved as there is no guarantee the issue won't start again.

Fingers crossed this remains up and running for you.