Ubuntu guest instances in VMware sometimes come up with the boot error message:

This error is being caused because VMware doesn’t actually provide that level interface for CPU access, but Ubuntu try to load the kernel module anyway.

How to fix it:

• sudo nano /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf
• add the line:
  blacklist i2c-piix4
• reboot

NOTE: for older versions use blacklist i2c_piix4 instead.
NOTE: it works both in VMWare Fusion 5 and 6, and Ubuntu LTS 12.04 and 14.04