Category Archives: Fusion

Posts, tutorials, and solutions covering the VMware Fusion platform, for virtualisation on Apple mac / OSX.

ESX: This PC Can’t Run Windows 11

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KB ID 0001763

Problem: This PC Can’t Run windows 11 

When attempting to install Windows 11 on ESX (in this example vSphere 6.7) you will receive the following error;

Windows Setup
This PC can’t run Windows 11
This PC doesn’t meet the minimum system requirements to install this version of Windows. For more information, visit https://aka.ms.WindowsSysReq

The reason you are seeing this is probably not because you don’t have the RAM,  CPU, or storage requirements, it’s probably because setup can’t see a TPM 2.0 chip. So you can either bypass this requirement or install a virtual TPM 2 chip. (I could not do this, as I’ve still got ESX 6.5 in my test cluster and all the hosts need to be 6.7 or above).

VMware Fusion Note: Be aware to run Windows 11 on VMware Fusion,  you need to set the HDD to 64GB (or greater) and the RAM to 4096 GB or this error will persist.

VMware ESX Note: MAKE SURE you change the boot options to EFI and enable secure boot, in the VM properties.

Windows 11: Bypass the TPM 2.0 Requirement

Press SHIFT+F10 (or Fn+Shift+F10 on a mac) this will open a command window > type ‘regedit’ {Enter} > the registry editor will open > Navigate to;

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HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > SYSTEM > Setup

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Create a NEW KEY called LabConfig.

Note: There is a newer version of this fix you can find here

In the new key, create a new 32 Bit DWORD object.

Call the new object ByPassTPMCheck and give it a value of 1.

Close the registry editor, type exit to close the command window. Then close the error window, (as shown below).

You will be asked to confirm that you want to exit, do so, and setup will restart, and then progress normally.

 

Note: If you are in a VMwar environment, you can also (with some caveats) install a vTPM

VMware vSphere Adding vTPM

Or if upgrading, you can bypass the TPM and CPU checks.

Windows 11 Unsupported CPU

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VMware Fusion: Not Enough Physical Memory

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KB ID 0001715

Problem

I upgraded to macOS Big Sur this week, and was surprised everything still worked! That was until I tried to start up my Windows 1o Virtual machine.

“Not enough physical memory is available to power on this virtual machine with its configured settings.”

Solution

Though it took me a while to ‘fix’, the fix is quite straight forward, I was running version 11 (see Below).

As soon as I upgraded to version 12.

Everything worked correctly. Only version 12 is fully supported on macOS Big Sur.

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Windows In VMware Fusion ‘Cannot Access Shared Folders’

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KB ID 0001627

Problem

Every so often I have a problem with the Windows 10 VM that I run on my mac in VMware Fusion, last time I needed to upgrade to Fusion 11.5, before that it was a registry fix. This time I could not access any files or folders on the parent mac.

Network Error
Windows cannot access \\vmware-host\Shared Folders\{Folder-Name}
You do not have permissions to access \\vmware-host\Shared Folders\{Folder-Name}. Contact your network administrator to request access.

Solution

Removing and re-adding the share in VMware Fusion didn’t fix the problem, in the end I had to grant VMware Fusion, ‘Full Disk’ access before the problem ceased.

System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Privacy > ‘Unlock’ > Full Disk Access > Tick ‘VMware Fusion.app”.

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VMware Fusion on macOS Mojave: No Mouse or Keyboard

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KB ID 0001523

Problem

While building my new MacBook, I installed VMWare Fusion, (I always run a Windows VM, in case I have to do something on Windows). But no matter what version I tried to install, I could not interface with the VMs, (no mouse or keyboard).

I ran Fusion 11 on my old MacBook, (running Mojave). So I was a bit confused. 

Solution

Click the ‘Apple’ (top left) > System Preferences > Security and Privacy > Privacy > VMWare Fusion should already be in the list, (if not you will need to add it) > Unlock > Tick the box next to VMware Fusion > Lock.

Now you should be able to interact with your VMs.

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VMware Fusion: Guest VM ‘Lost’ Network Connectivity

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KB ID 0001450

Problem

I keep a Windows 10 VM on my laptop, and last week it lost network connectivity, (it’s set to get its IP from my mac and get network connectivity via NAT). The guest was getting a 169.254.x.x APIPA address so either NAT was down, or there was no network?

Solution

You need to ‘Restart’ the services on the Mac host machine. Execute the following two commands;

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sudo /Applications/VMware\ Fusion.app/Contents/Library/vmnet-cli --stop   
  
sudo /Applications/VMware\ Fusion.app/Contents/Library/vmnet-cli --start  

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Then check you guest machine again.

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VMware Fusion: Windows 10 ‘Lost’ Mapped Drive to the Host

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KB ID 0001394

Problem

My Windows 10 VM decided it was going to do a major update last night, so I let it get on with it. However today I can no longer access the ‘shared’ drive that it had back to the host (my MacBook).

Solution

I’m pretty sure this is the second time this has happened, so after berating myself for not documenting the fix last time, this is the fix. Run Regedit (Windows Key+R > regedit {Enter})

Navigate to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > SYSTEM > CurrentControlSet > Control > NetworkProvider > Order

Locate the PROVIDERORDER entry;

Move the ‘vmhgfs‘ entry, so that it is the first one in the list > OK > Exit the registry editor.

That’s it, no reboot or anything, your drive should start working again.

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Linux – Install VMware Tools

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KB ID 0001330 

Problem

Note: This is to install the VMware Tools NOT the OPEN-VM-TOOLS.

I’ve had to do this a few times now, and every time I Goolge how to do it, I get pages of instructions on how to install the open vm tools. When what I really want is to install the VMware Tools.

Solution

I’m using vSphere ESX, but even if you are using VMware Workstation or VMware Fusion, you can still select ‘Install/Upgrade VMware tools’, this presents a DVD image to the virtual machine.

The install for VMware tools uses Perl, so you will need to have that installed.

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yum install perl

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Now we are going to mount the virtual CDROM/DVD drive into a folder, (called/mnt). Then when we have a look inside this folder, you will see the VMwareTools-{version}.tar.gz (take a note of this).

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mount /dev/cdrom /mnt
cd /mnt
ls
TAKE NOTE OF THE VERSION!

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Unzip those files into the /tmp directory, then run the installer.

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cd /tmp
tar zxf /mnt/VMwareTools-9.10.0-2476743.tar.gz
cd vmware-tools-distrib
./vmware-install.pl

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Keep pressing {Enter} to accept the defaults, when complete the mounted VMware tools DVD will be ejected.

 

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CentOS / Redhat / Fedora – VMware VMXNET3 Adapter Not Working

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KB ID 0001329 

Problem

This has tripped me up a couple of times, and if you Google the problem, you find a load of posts saying ‘Just install VMware tools that will fix the problem’

It Wont!

And I’ll tell you why, run ifconfig

You will notice you have a network card, but you will also notice that it’s got a strange name ‘ens160’ not eth0 as you would normally expect? Anyway let’s prove it’s not a driver issue by issuing a dhclient -v command. This basically forces the NIC up and makes it get a DHCP address, (assuming your NIC is connected to the correct network, and you have DHCP running of course!)

So this tells me it’s not a driver issue, and that installing VMware tools probably wont cure the problem.

It Didn’t!

Also if you reboot, you will find it’s not working again!

Solution

I’m going to use nano in a minute, (other editors are available), so I’ll install that first. (I’m logged in as root, you may need to prefix the following command with sudo if you are not).

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yum install nano

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Remember my network card had a ‘funny name’, well change directory to the /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts directory, and you will see it’s config file, so let’s edit that, (change the text in red, to reflect your interface name, from the ifconfig command earlier);

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cd /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts
nano ifconfig-ens160

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Make sure;

BOOTPROTO=dhcp

ONBOOT=yes

Now if you reboot your VM, it should come back up with networking enabled.

 

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Convert a Virtualbox VM to a VMware Fusion VM

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KB ID 0001169 

Problem

I have a bunch of VM’s that I use with GNS3 that are in Virtualbox. I also run VMware Fusion, and since my upgrade to version 1.4.4 I need to run the GNS3 VM in VMware, (I could not get the Virtualbox version to work). So I decided to copy over the remainder of my VMs as well.

Solution

Within Virtualbox > File > Export Appliance.

Select the VM in question > Continue.

Important: Ensure you have selected OVF Version 1.0 (if you use version 2.0 it wont work) > Take a note of where the OVA file is going to be saved > Continue.

There’s no need to add anything else unless you want to  > Export.

The VM will export (depending on the size this can take a few minutes).

When complete, open VMware Fusion > File Import.

Browse to, and select the OVA file you just exported > Continue.

Choose a name of the new VM > Save.

Don’t panic! This is normal, simply click retry.

The VM will import.

Finish.

When you first boot the VM it may be a little sluggish (it’s just had its underlying hardware changed after all).  If it wants to try and install drivers, cancel the procedure and install the VMware tools.

Now you can remove the original VM from Virtualbox.

Delete all files.

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