reefsharksystem said:
I'm having similar issues. My host system is Windows 7 Home Premium on a new Dell tower. I'm using vmware Player 3. I originally created the vm using windows XP, and was able to connect to the internet to download service packs, etc. I then upgraded that virtual winXP to Win7.


  • I've downloaded the drivers for the nic and installed them in the virtual Win7 installation.
  • I have installed the vmware tools.
  • I've tried all the network configuration settings in vmware player (NAT, Bridge, etc) , but cannot connect to the Internet.
  • The virtual Win7 says that it cannot find a driver for the nic, even after installing the driver provided by Dell.


Any thoughts?
#1). Virtual machines use virtualized hardware....therefore you don't want to go to Dell and download a driver for their NIC and install that within your virtual machine as it's not seeing the Dell hardware...but rather a virtualized NIC.

If I were you, I would uninstall the VMWare Tools. Then uninstall any NIC drives that you have installed under the Windows 7 VM. Then, go into the settings of the VM (from within VMWare Player menu) and remove the NIC. Boot the machine so that it has NO NIC. Then, power off the VM. Add the NIC back to the VM hardware (within the VMWare Player menu), set it to BRIDGED then boot up. It should detect new hardware and install drivers for it. Then try and see if you have
access. If not, install the VMWare Tools.