Comment 2 for bug 152769

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. Can you please answer this question:
Which processor do you have in this PC?

The problem you describe is a known issue with vmware running on processors using speedstep (or the amd equivalent). Vmware recommends to switch off speedstep when running vmware. Unfortunately, I don't know how to do that in Vista. If your processor indeed has speedstep, you can find support on http://communities.vmware.com/index.jspa