rh9 install failures under vmware

[Sorens, Michael]

(1) Attempting to install under VMware on WindowsXP, I got just a few steps into the installation and was asked for mouse type. I selected USB wheel mouse, which I have, clicked Next, and then my mouse did not work. I tried several other mouse types and could never get the mouse back.  (During initialization, the installer seems to think I have a PS/2 wheel mouse, but that choice also fails.) My workaround was to simply use keyboard navigation to attempt to complete the install, so this is less important than item (2), but any thoughts on what is happening here...?

(2) I downloaded shrike-i386-disc1.iso, shrike-i386-disc2.iso, and shrike-i386-disc3.iso, ran an MD5 checker and confirmed they were complete,
 loaded each onto a CD, and began the install (still under VMware). Everything went fine for 70% of the installation, until it got stuck on xpdf-2.01-8 on disk 2. The installer complained that the package could not be opened, and is probably due to a bad CD. So I burned a second CD--same problem! I repeated this situation using both the graphic install and the text install--same problem. So either I need to know how to cure this problem, or what to specify in the initial list of packages to install so it will not try to load this particular package.

(VMware, for those unfamiliar, is a tool that lets you build virtual machines on top of your physical machines; an alternative to partitions, in a way)

Thanks!
~~Michael Sorens