Cannot open vm images after move to M1 MacBook

[krmayo]

I had Fusion 10 and after moving to the new M1 Mac I could not open any of my vm images.  I understand the architecture was probably not supported in 10, but after a year I've decided to try again.  My Fusion 10 upgraded to 11 then 12 and still, I get errors: First I get the "New Features are available" popup box.  The error then shows: "Failed to power on /volumes/.../***.vmx"

VMware Fusion 12.1.2.

Any help appreciated as I need to access these suspended volumes.

[scott28tt · Accepted solution]

Fusion cannot power on or resume any VMs on the M1 processor, hopefully you still have your Intel Mac.

[a_p_]

Moderator note: Moved to VMware Fusion Discussions

[krmayo]

Well, that is sad to hear.  No, it went belly up so I am stuck for now. 

Does anyone know if I could install a trial version of fusion on a windows pc and then open my images then close the image?  I could just try it, but if someone has a quick answer...

[a_p_]

You can usually run Fusion VMs on a PC using VMware Workstation and vice versa. However, resuming suspended VMs does only work on the original system, so you will need to "cold boot" (reset) the suspended VMs.

André

[scott28tt]

Windows PCs run VMware Workstation, not VMware Fusion.

[krmayo]

Any suggestion how to 'cold reboot' my images if I cannot open them on my original Mac system?

[wila]

Hi,

Hold down the option key while going to the Virtual Machine menu. The option "Shut Down" then changes into "Power Off".

edit: Just to be clear, the above is for VMware Fusion, on VMware Workstation you have the "Power Off" menu option already.

--
Wil

[krmayo]

Thank you for that.  I have 3 images and went in as you said and powered them down (using Fusion).

However, I am unable to start them.  VMWare states "Failed to power on /volume/..."

Should I be able to start them using Fusion 12.1.2?

[scott28tt]

What system are you trying to perform the power on operation on?

[krmayo]

On a Windows 7, Windows 10 and an old Windows XP VM.

[scott28tt]

I wasn't asking about your VMs, I was asking about the HOST system on which you were trying to power on your VMs.

[krmayo]

It's the same one I stated at the beginning of this thread.  M1 Macbook.

[ColoradoMarmot]

Then you're out of luck.  Fusion doesn't run at all on M1 machines right now.  The upcoming version that will run, will not emulate an intel processor, so there's no way to run existing windows VM's on that hardware.  

[djarami]

Any updates on when VMWare Fusion Pro 12.2.1 will support Apple Macs with M1 processor when I try to open my Win10 VMWare image

"I get a Transport (VMDB) error-14: Pipe connection has been broken" error message.

[a_p_]

I doubt that Microsoft will release a Windows 10 version for M1 processors. VMware Fusion is a Hypervisor (not an emulation) which runs the VMs on the underlying hardware.

Anyway, there's a separate community Fusion for Apple Silicon Tech Preview Discussions for questions related to M1 MacBooks, and the Fusion version for those.

André

[Technogeezer]

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@djarami wrote:

Any updates on when VMWare Fusion Pro 12.2.1 will support Apple Macs with M1 processor when I try to open my Win10 VMWare image

"I get a Transport (VMDB) error-14: Pipe connection has been broken" error message.

---

VMware hasn't said when they'll release an official version of Fusion that will run on Apple Silicon (M1, M1 Pro, M1 Max) Macs. For the time being that means the Tech Preview is the only version that runs. But that's only half the story.

Any VM that is built and running on an Intel processor can not run on M1 Macs under Fusion or Parallels. That's ultimately why you're getting the error message. Even when Fusion officially supports an M1 Mac, you would need Windows for ARM to run a Windows virtual machines on your M1 Mac. 

I'd suggest running Windows 11 for ARM instead of Windows 10. Microsoft provides a x86_64 translator to run Windows applications from PCs on ARM processors (similar to macOS's Rosetta 2), but it's only available on Windows 11.

See the discussions in the Tech Preview Discussion board that @a_p_ pointed to. Also see Running Fusion and upgrading from an Intel Mac to an M1 Mac? Read this first. which is a slightly more detailed explanation on what's possible today with Fusion on the M1 Macs, and how that meshes with Microsoft is doing.