Vmx parameters behave differently if set in vmx file or config.ini

I am using VMware Player 5.0.0 build-812388, host Windows 7 32-bit, guest Ubuntu 12.04

I am used to set the following parameters to tweak VM behavior and memory usage (I have been doing this for years, as I have consistently verified much better performance on all my machines in particular due to mainMem.useNamedFile = "FALSE"):

     pref.hotkey.shift = "TRUE"

     mainMem.useNamedFile = "FALSE"
     sched.mem.pshare.enable = "FALSE"
     MemTrimRate = 0
     prefvmx.useRecommendedLockedMemSize = "TRUE"
     prefvmx.minVmMemPct = "100"

With recent versions of VMware Player hower I found out that some of these parameters work only if set into the vmx file, while other must be set in the config.ini

For instance, pref.hotkey.shift = "TRUE" work only in config.ini, while mainMem.useNamedFile = "FALSE" work only if put in the vmx file of each VM.

In doubt, I now always add all parameters in both vmx files and config.ini

Is this normal or a bug?

Thanks