VMware tools causing Microsoft Office 2013 products to hang on Windows 8

[vthelpdesk]

I've noticed some issues regarding the installation and use of Office 2013 (specifically, Word 2013, and Excel 2013) after and before installation of VMware tools 9.0.5 and higher versions.

Issues:

• If I install VMware tools then try to perform an Office 2013 install it will hang at around 80% and never complete the install. I've tested this with fresh installs. I've had the same results using a fresh copy of Windows 8.1 (32 and 64 bit), and Windows 8 (32 and 64 bit). You can get around this by first removing the tools and performing the install. At first glance,
• If you install Office 2013 and then install the tools, the Office products appear to function properly, but soon after playing around with saving documents on the desktop and changing/saving them, Office Word and Excel will hang (not every time, but "roughly" 30% of the time).

Some tests I performed:

• After the VMware tools install of tools and experiencing the problem, I again was able to save files again locally without experience intermittent crashes.
• Some users were having problems with "hardware acceleration" enabled in excel, located in advanced options, and was a primary source of Excel and Word locking up and crashing issues: I removed this feature as a test and the applications still crashed intermittently when I attempted to change the document and re-save it.
• Windows 8.1 appears to not have the issue; however, I use a VDI environment and VMware has not released persona management for that version, yet...

Things I'm currently looking into:

• Application logs: I had these disabled (now re-enabled) for VM trimming purposes.

Anyone having similar issues using Office 2013 and Windows 8 products with the VMware tools installed?

~Bruce

[grace27]

Hi

Welcome to the communities.

Did you updated office and windows before installing vmware tools ?

[vthelpdesk]

Yeah, because I've experienced this issue before when setting up a demo of Vmware Horizon View, I installed basic apps that were a requirement and made sure the VM was completely updated before installing the tools. The important thing here is: why can't you install MS office when the tools are installed--the bootstrapper hangs around 75%. I've had two techs from VMware on a Webmeeting observe this behavior and one of them is in the process of setting up a lab of versions that I'm currently using.

[DonalB]

Not exactly the same environment but seeing something similar in terms of office 2013 in a View environment, have started a separate thread about it here: Office 2013 high CPU usage causing session lockups

Our VMTools version is currently 9.0.5 build 1065307

I had assumed at this stage that it was Office 2013 but seeing your post I'm wondering, might explore this a bit more and if I find anything I'll let you know

[Sam239]

Hi

Did you guys ever get any success ?. Ive been struggling with a Visio thinapp for a while now thinking it was the capture process.

To rule out my bass image I built a new VM and installed VMware tools which was version 9.00 on my server hosts

I then added components in turn to mirror my image all the time the thinapp never errored once.

Moved the vm to my VDI hosts still kept working then noticed a message saying you can upgrade your VMware tools so upgraded them to 9.05 at which point my thinapp broke with the same licencing issue as my pool.

Checked my pool was also 9.05!