When upgrading to the latest version of VMware Tools on one of my Server 2008 R2 VMs, I got the error message:
Error 25030. Setup failed to load a kernel driver (vmrawdks).
I restarted the server, hoping that would fix the problem, but I got the exact same error again.
I then found a post on VMware Communities saying that I needed to increase the Video RAM on the VM. I found that most of my Server 2008 R2 VMs had 8MB of Video RAM, but this one had 4MB. So I shutdown and increased to 8MB.
Same problem again…
I then tried increasing the Video RAM to 16MB. Still no luck.
Finally I upped it to 128MB, and Success.
Not sure if it needed all 128 MB, but I got sick of restarting the server.
It is having no issues now.
FYI, I am using ESXi 4.1 and vCenter 4.1. The VM was from a ESXi 3.5 installation so the Virtual Hardware was still version 4. After completing the upgrade of VMware Tools I upgraded to Hardware version 7.
