This is something that happened quite a few times to me when installing a new Linux VM. While pressing a key the character gets repeated quite some times. This is quite annoying since this will result in wrong passwords, servernames,… and a lot of frustration.

To resolve this problem you can do the following (using the vSphere client):

1. Power off the specific VM
2. Right click the specific VM and select Edit Settings
3. Click Options, General and finally Configuration Parameters
4. In the new window: Click Add Row
5. Under Name enter keyboard.typematicMinDelay with a Value set to 5000000
6. Close the Configuration Parameters by clicking OK
7. Close the VM Properties by clicking OK
8. Power on the virtual machine

This will change the repeat time to 5 seconds. You can always decrease or increase it. Just keep in mind the value is set as micro-seconds.

Niels Engelen

Working as a Principal Analyst in Product Management for Veeam Software with an interest in anything virtual and cloud with a strong focus on AWS, Azure and Microsoft 365. He is also a VMware Certified Professional, a Veeam Certified Architect and gained the VMware vExpert award (2012-2022).