The steps are pretty much the same on earlier versions of Workstation, as well as on Player and Fusion. *I’m using VMware Workstation 8 for this tutorial.
A USB key that is at least 2 GB in size.***.A system running VMware Player (FREE, runs on Windows or Linux), VMware Workstation (Free trial available, runs on Windows or Linux), or VMware Fusion (Free trial available, runs on MAC).*.You don’t even need an optical drive to do it! I’m going to show you and easy method that is platform independent (i.e. Others may only work on one Operating System, or another, and some may require hardware you don’t have handy. There are several ways to go about installing FreeNAS to a USB key, some of them can seem quite complicated, especially if you’ve never done it before. This allows you to design a FreeNAS based storage system around a chassis with more hard drive bays for maximum storage.
In fact, many modern servers come with an internal USB port, designed specifically for plugging a USB key containing an operating system into it. Booting from a USB key is becoming quite popular. The installer even makes a point of telling you this. Installing FreeNAS to a USB key is the preferred method when setting up a FreeNAS system.
