After the reboot of a VMware server host machine you may receive the error message “No permission to perform this operation” when attempting to start a guest in your console inventory.

Here are the steps to solve the problem:

1. Right click on the target virtual machine in the VMware console and select “Remove from Inventory.” This will remove the virtual machine from the Inventory list in the console without deleting the guest image.
2. In the VMware server console select File -> Open -> Browse to the folder that contains the relevant *.vmx virtual machine configuration file.
3. Select Ok. The problem virtual machine will now be listed VMware Server Console Inventory.
4. You should now be able to power on (start) the guest image.

Note: If your still experiencing the same error message, navigate to the folder that contains the VMware guest images configuration files and verify that the relevant user has full NTFS permission on the folder.

For some reason, console connections to running virtual machines can be really slow on VMware Server. For example, I have experienced that doing a simple ‘ls’ or ‘cat’ in console (no X server) would require 100% CPU utilization on the host for several seconds. I could literally see each line scroll by.

Part of the reason for the low performance is that SSL is enabled by default for console connections. By disabling SSL, I got much better performance, although still not to the level of VMware Fusion.

Here is how to do it:

1. Select Host -> Settings
2. In the dialog select the Connections tab
3. Uncheck “Use SSL for Console communications”
4. Click OK

Note: by disabling SSL, you are lowering security, so please consider the implications before using this tip.