Hi,
I'm using qemu for the vmware playground described in the wiki
(http://cm.bell-labs.com/wiki/plan9/vmware_playground_for_plan9/index.html).
Although I found some flaws in the wiki page (aux/timesync _-n_ <host>,
for instance, or ip/dhcpd ip/tftpd in the same line), I think I got the
9pccpuf kernel running fine - I explain here some of the problems I had.

I had to change the ether2000.c file for the pxeload loader in order to
get a working pxe boot (qemu has a pnp or pci ne2000). I attach the new
ether2000.c file for /sys/src/boot/pc/ether2000.c. I simply took the 9
kernel's ether2000.c, corrected the locations of the include files,
removed the 'static' of ne2000reset(), and removed the function
ether2000link() (if I recall everything). I really got surprised when
the new 9pxeload worked.

In order to get the "9pccpu" kernel in a second host working, I had to
use a qemu floppy image together with the zero-filled small hd. I
manually created an msdos filesystem there, with a file "plan9.nvr"
(thanks 20h@#9fans) with silly data on it (using mkfs.msdos in Linux).
If I didn't have that floppy, and only had a hard disk WITHOUT a plan9
partition/nvram part, the 9pccpu kernel hanged after asking for the
root. After getting the first boot done, I partitioned the hard disk,
prepared the nvram part, and took off the "floppy" on the next boot.
Although the author says the HD vmware file could be 1KiB long, I needed
at least 512KiB long, because that's the size of a cylinder according to
disk/fdisk (and less than that is not allowed as I experienced).

Among my many unsuccesful tries to get everything done as described in
the wiki, it was dark for me the "Set up the nvram", because I thought I
should write the lines suggested into the nvram partition. And I also
expected that to work, so the rebooting's "error in nvram key" made me mad.

There are other details that I didn't understood at first from the wiki
page, but it would be too a matter of opinion. As an example: what's
"First boot"? Should I reboot? As 'bootes'?

So, here you have comments from a 'newbie'. I hope they help in some sense.

Thanks!