Apparently, the most compatible Virtual Machine software for GNS3 on Mac is VMware, but it only runs on Windows. Install GNS3 and its VM. Create a free account and download GNS3 here. Sep 06, 2020. If you use a 32 bit version of Windows, you will need to use GNS3 1.3.13 (or older). 32 bit support was dropped starting with GNS3 1.4. GNS3 Talks Mac OS with Windows 10 Virtual Machine = Mac+GNS3+GNS3 VM+Windows 10 VM+Cisco (7:51) Multiple clients sharing projects in real time, plus console session shadowing! Download GNS3 ESXi VM (1:33) ESXi configuration (2:51) Add IOS images and create a topology (4:10).
Hello and welcome back to the GNS3 section. I take it you just came from the Initial Setup article, if you missed that I would highly suggest you read it first before continuing.
Before we actually download the GNS3 VM from the website we first need to install software that can run the VM. My personal preference is VMware Workstation Player which is completely free, if you choose the use VMware Workstation Pro that’s fine too, however you will be paying for the service.
There is also a very specific version of the VMware Workstation Player that I would like you to install as I have had various issues when running some of the newer software and integrating it with GNS3, so please ensure that you are running 12.5.9 if you are following with us.
The VMware Workstation Installation
Firstly we will need to register to the VMware site by visiting https://my.vmware.com and clicking on the register button.
Now you simply have to fill in all the registration details, this will primarily just be things like your name, password, username and email address. Please ensure you fill out all the sections marked with the red asterisk (*). If you’ve completed everything you simply need to press continue at the bottom right of the page.
The only thing left for you to do is to verify your account. An email would have been sent from the VMware team with an activation link. From this mail, you will only need to click on the activate link inside the email and you will be prompted the verify your password, this will be the same password you used for the account registration.
Now you are successfully registered to the VMWare site and it is from here that you can download the VMWare Workstation Player version which we will be using, please click the link and install the download the setup files, as we are covering Windows please select the 64 bit version of Windows and wait for you download to finish.
Once you have downloaded and installed VMware Workstation Player you should see the below when running the application for the first time. We’re nearly ready to import the GNS3 VM to VMware, however firstly I want you to go back to the VMware site and download the VIX drivers, this is needed to properly integrate the API with GNS3.
Let’s get back to the VMware website and navigate to the Drivers and Tools section then download the VIX drivers compatible with our version of VMware Workstation and install the software.
Alternatively if you are struggling to download VIX from the VMware site I have copied the installation file into a GoogleDrive shared folder for you to download this from as well.
Now that you have VMWare Workstation Player and VIX installed we are ready to actually import the VM image that we can download from the GNS3 site.
Importing the GNS3 VM into VMware
To get the image of the GNS3 VM please visit the GNS3 website and login again with the credentials you’ve registererd with, if you click on the “Free Download” button again and select the download the GNS3 VM link
As we’ve installed VMware Workstation we already know that we will select this software image to import, please download the VMWARE WORKSTATION AND FUSION image.
As we’ve installed VMware Workstation we already know that we will select this software image to import, please download the VMWARE WORKSTATION AND FUSION image. When the download is complete you will have a zip file w hich you just need to unzip into any folder, I tend to leave mine in the downloads folder which will give you a GNS3 VM.OVA file.
We will now go back into the VMware Workstation Player application where we will now import the OVA file that we downloaded from the GNS3 site. To do this select “Open a Virtual machine” and Open the GNS3 OVA file.
Once you have opened the file Workstation Player will ask you a few questions such as what the name is of the VM, you can leave that as “GNS3 VM” as well as where the storage path is, think of that as the virtual hard-drive where all the files on the VM will be stored. You can most likely just press next and the import process will begin.
When the import is completed you will be able to see the new VM in the left-hand side of the window, we will not yet start the VM from VMware Workstation as we are going to integrate this into the GNS3 applicacation.
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Integrating the VM with GNS3
Now that we have VMware Workstation Player working and we have imported the GNS3 OVA into VMware can we start the process of integrating the VM with GNS3. Firstly get back into the GNS3 application. If you have not yet made any changes you should see the setup if not simply click on “Help” at the top of the toolbar and run the Setup Wizard. In the Setup Wizard select the “Run modern IOS” option and go Next.
On the next page you will find the local server settings, you do not need to make any tweeks here and can continue to the next page which will tell you if the connection to the local server is successful where we can still continue.
Finally, we’re at the last step where we can integrate the GNS3 VM which we imported earlier on VMWare. Ensure that you select the VMware option, at the “VM name” select the VM that you imported previously, if you do not see it in the list please click on the Refresh button. If this still fails to load restart GNS3 and check again, else you may need to re-install the VIX drivers.
![Download Download](/uploads/1/2/6/7/126799710/262654432.png)
![Gns3 Gns3](/uploads/1/2/6/7/126799710/724118294.png)
NB: If you have a strong computer you are welcome to add additional vCPU cores and increase the RAM size, the more resources you can allocate to your VM the more network devices you can run at the same time on your virtual infrastructure.
Once done you can click on the Next button where you should see a Summary of the GNS3 VM and you will see this starting up on VMware. Simply click on finish and wait for the GNS3 VM to start up.
When the VM has finished booting and is successfully integrated you will see this in the server’s summary with a green icon next to the server, if this is red for whatever reason simply try and restart GNS3 or your machine and boot up GNS3 again, this will from now on automatically start the GNS3 server which is where we will load our software images to emulate network devices, if you are asked to import any images simply click cancel as we will go over importing images in the next article. The below image is an example of a VM that is successfully integrated into GNS3.
Also very important, do not close the VMware application that is running the Virtual Machine if you close this you will need to restart the application in order to feed information from GNS3 again.
That’s a wrap!
If everything is working and your server is starting with the green icon next to it then pat yourself on the back. You have accomplished a major stride in your journey to emulate network connectivity. In the upcoming article, I will show you have to import various software images as well as where to retrieve the software images as well. I hope this has been informative for you and that you learned something new!
Hungry for more?
Why not check out the follow-up article which covers how to import a custom appliance into GNS3?