VMWare Fusion 4.x not running on MountainLion

[donbachi]

Hi there,

VMWare refuses to launch on MountainLion giving an annoying "you can't use this version of the application vmware fusion with this version of mac os x".

So, if you want to test how good ML is a host to VMWare, it's tough luck at the moment.

Bye,

    donbachi

Addition by VMware Fusion Team:

VMware Fusion 4 works with Mountain Lion. The details can be found in the Team Fusion blog here:

http://blogs.vmware.com/teamfusion/2012/07/vmware-fusion-and-os-x-mountain-lion-faq.html

Thanks for contributing to this thread.

[87racer]

dlhotka wrote:

Keep in mind that 10.8 may very well be 64-bit only in a future iteration, so don't do this for production work.

Yes this is a very temporary fix.  A real soltuion will definitely have to come from the VMWare team.

111linuxer111 wrote:

Thanks that workaround works  But do not try to run the guest vm into fullscreen view -  os x 10.6 will freeze hopefully the 64 bit mode gets fixed....

My Windows 7 works good in Unity and Fullscreen.  Also just noticed all my button graphics came back.  Maybe it was a Mountain Lion glitch.

[111linuxer111]

Yes this is a very temporary fix.  A real soltuion will definitely have to come from the VMWare team.

Hopefully vmware will fix it soon. Does anyone know how long it takes for Lion ?

[jw02144]

Agree.  This works for now.  My Win7 x64 VM is running fine this way.  I can live with it for now as I rarely need it.  I was able to enter and exit Full Screen mode and also Unity as well.

[Technogeezer]

IMHO

The chances of VMware releasing a fix "soon" for today's version of Fusion running on a developer preview of an operating system that isn't listed as supported is probably somewhere between 0 and none. VMware didn't get access to ML before almost eveyone else did. If past experience is any guide, any "fixes" will probably at or after the time that ML actually ships and they announce Fusion support for ML.

Developer previews are just that - to give developers a chance to look at the new technologies and begin tooling for support of the OS and its new features.

They're buggy and given that Fusion has to reach into areas of the OS mere mortal applications never tread (e.g kernel drivers) it's no surprise that at this stage of the game there are issues.

[RMansfield]

I don't know--they came out with a fix pretty quick to allow for the developer preview of Windows 8 to run as a guest. Maybe they will surprise us with an update to VMWare that will allow it to run inside ML.

[87racer]

RMansfield wrote:

I don't know--they came out with a fix pretty quick to allow for the developer preview of Windows 8 to run as a guest. Maybe they will surprise us with an update to VMWare that will allow it to run inside ML.

I have to agree with Technogeezer,  getting Windows 8 to run is far easier.  There were very minor changes required from Windows 7 to Windows 8.  With Mountain Lion the IOKit.framework, which is used for all IO operations (WiFi, Ehternet, USB, SATA, Power, Video, and pretty much everything in OS X), has drastically changed along with IOPCIFamily.kext and IOACPIFamily.kext.  So much so that a complete rewriting of VMWare kexts is likely necessary and they aren't going to spend time rewrtiting code when Apple will likely make more changes before 10.8GM.  They will be able to use some of the code but a lot has changed.  This much of a change is likely to show up in a major upgrade to VMWare Fusion.

You never know though.  Maybe they recognize the potential for making a lot of developers happy by fixing the issue asap.

[ColoradoMarmot]

And there's also indications that Apple will migrate to OpenGL 4.1 in a future preview, which will also trigger re-writes for Fusion.

In a few months we might see Fusion 4.2, with preliminary support for 10.8.  Production support will likely not come until we see a 10.8 GM.

[rmmathe]

Odd, this worked for the last few days just fine now it seems to be broken. Now every time I run the launcher VMWare starts up then causes a kernal panic. Any ideas as to why this worked and now doesnt? Nothing has changed...

EDIT: Just realized that its because of the 32 Bit thing. Forgot that step!

[red_smeg]

If VMWare are looking for some seed testers for a version that will run on top of Mountain Lion I would be happy to oblige.

[jaybagley]

Parallels just released an updated version of 7 that supports Mountain Lion and Windows 8. VMware needs to get on the ball, or I might just switch.

[Teovmy]

Any word from VMware yet?

[ColoradoMarmot]

VMWare policy is to not release information on products until they are available.  In the past, we've seen 'experimental support' in advance of production support.

[koi]

jaybagley wrote:

Parallels just released an updated version of 7 that supports Mountain Lion and Windows 8. VMware needs to get on the ball, or I might just switch.

If staying on the bleeding edge is that important to you, you should go ahead and switch.

I have no special knowledge of VMware's plans, but based on previous behavior, maintaining compatability with an unreleased, unsupported OS where there's no schedule (e.g. the next release could come out and break things at any time) and no early access (e.g. they get it the same time everyone else does) is not at the top of VMware's priority list. I would not expect (but would be happy to be pleasantly surprised) to hear anything until much closer to Mountain Lion/Windows 8 GA.

Personally, I'll take a slower release cycle if it means more testing. I'm happy as long as it works soon after Mountain Lion/Windows 8 is actually out (and even then, I'm probably not going to be using ML/Win8 right away).

[red_smeg]

I agree who heartedly with this post. Fusion is a great product and works well with the current release of OS X.  I can't believe people are getting so bent out of shape about ML support, I guess some folks don't really understand the industry very well.

That said, if VMWare would like a seed community for any testing they have a list here of  people that would no doubt install at the first opportunity.

Also, I think some of the onus lies with apple they should be coordinating with the big software developers they know that sophisticated virtualization platforms are tied in tightly with the OS and is more likely to end up broken afterward.  I guess they may well be but it would be nice to have some transparency or a plan.  Those of us that are independant developers well we just have to get in line like everyone else and if we stick to the published API's we normally do ok with new releases.

All the best.

[ColoradoMarmot]

That pretty much sums up the difference between the two:  more stable, but slower both in features/releases and in performance versus less stable, faster in releases/performance.

For what I do, I'll take the former. 

Oh, and for those folks who are complaining because they installed 10.8 on their production machine as the host....I have absolutely no sympathy.  Maybe gold master, maybe even an RC, but Dev1?  That's Nuts.

For those who want to be able to use a VM to play/test/work with it, yep I understand the desire and am pretty sure that we'll see 'experimental' support in a few months.  To be fair though, I don't see much in 10.8 that makes it a compelling upgrade, or new features that would need to start a development cycle right now.  If I've missed them, then, well, a Mac-mini is about $500.

[HPReg]

Fusion Technical Preview 2012 ( http://communities.vmware.com/community/vmtn/beta/fusiontp2012 ) seems to work just fine with Mountain Lion DP2 (12A154q), both host or guest.

[Critforce]

Beautiful!  I haven't really used it yet but it's at least launching and starting my Win 7 x64 VM now.  Thanks VMware!

[haralds]

I would recommend running Preview 2 as a guest. It is not ready for prime time, and you have to format the partition to go back to Lion. I had more issues with Preview 2 than Preview 1, and just trundled away a day on my second laptop, because it was not usable. As Apple points out, it's an early build not for production systems.

XCode 4.3 does not run on the Preview, and you cannot submit to either store (OS X, iOS) from XCode 4.4.

[Joseph_Jackson]

In case this wasn't obvious, VMware Fusion 4.1.2, released on April 10th, runs on the latest developer preview build of Mountain Lion. You no longer need to run the VMware pre-release version.

Joe.

[red_smeg]

I am trying to fidn 4.1.2 but when i go to downlaods it shows only 4.1.1   where can you downlaod 4.1.2 from.  is it the tech preview as i have that.