Blank screen when running BootIt NG in a VMware virtual machine
When attempting to boot from the BootIt NG installation media inside a VMware virtual machine, you may see an initial on-screen message from BootIt NG and then a blank screen. Typically, the system will hang at that point and require a reboot, with the BootIt NG program never appearing on the screen. This can happen whether booting the VM from a real floppy disk or CD/DVD device, or from a floppy or CD/DVD image. It can also occur when attempting to boot a virtual machine from a real (physical) hard drive that has BootIt NG installed on it.
This happens because the VMware BIOS does not support the VESA graphics mode that BootIt NG defaults to when the installation media is created. To resolve the issue, select the "Standard VGA" video option when creating the installation media. This option is available when using either MakeDisk (recommended) or BOOTITNG.EXE to create the installation media. While this will reduce the available colors from 256 to 16, the BootIt NG program will otherwise be fully functional inside the virtual machine.
Additional Note: The same change can be made after an installation diskette has been created by locating the file BOOTITNG.STR on the diskette, opening that file in a text editor, and changing the line BOOTITNG /V to BOOTITNG /S.
This happens because the VMware BIOS does not support the VESA graphics mode that BootIt NG defaults to when the installation media is created. To resolve the issue, select the "Standard VGA" video option when creating the installation media. This option is available when using either MakeDisk (recommended) or BOOTITNG.EXE to create the installation media. While this will reduce the available colors from 256 to 16, the BootIt NG program will otherwise be fully functional inside the virtual machine.
Additional Note: The same change can be made after an installation diskette has been created by locating the file BOOTITNG.STR on the diskette, opening that file in a text editor, and changing the line BOOTITNG /V to BOOTITNG /S.