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Benjaminbatwing
Contributor
Contributor

Does VMware fusion pro run on Mac M1 chip?

I recently purchased VMware fusion 12 pro and when I got the download link it was for intel based Macs. I have the new MacBook Pro M1, so do I need to return the software and purchase something else or will it run on my M1? Thanks

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Technogeezer
Immortal
Immortal

From what VMware has said, they’ve been working on an ESXi for ARM - which is what got them a head start on the Fusion for  Apple Silicon Tech Preview. 

What may be a bit more telling is a recent VMware Community Podcast available on YouTube here: https://youtu.be/4cHRlvgLPTk . Michael Roy (Fusion PM) talks about M1 Macs but does drop a few hints on how VMware  views the desktop hypervisor products. 

- Paul (Technogeezer)
Editor of the Unofficial Fusion Companion Guides
Kev19
Contributor
Contributor

 
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Kev19
Contributor
Contributor

How do I get my gns3 running using vmware fusion on macbook with m1 chip? Please assist!

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dempson
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

Based on a quick glance through the GNS3 web site and a web search, it appears that GNS3 is effectively an x86/x64 (Intel/AMD) operating system with the ability to run in a VM on multiple host platforms and VM software (including VMware Workstation, VMware Fusion and ESXi).

As such, it would run in VMware Fusion on an Intel Mac, but cannot run in VMware Fusion on an M1 Mac, because virtualisation requires that the host and guest have the same processor family. M1 is based on the ARM architecture, not the Intel/AMD x86 architecture.

Unless GNS3 do a port to allow it to run on ARM-based platforms, the only way it could run on an M1 Mac (or later Apple Silicon Mac models) would be via emulation software such as QEMU. I have no idea how well this would work, but I'm fairly confident it would be slower than running it on an Intel Mac in virtualisation, and it would not surprise me if it was missing some functionality and/or was less reliable.

Technogeezer
Immortal
Immortal

You may also want to look at this thread on GitHub https://github.com/GNS3/gns3-gui/issues/3257

As @dempson says, this is more of a GNS3 issue supporting ARM architecture processors than a Fusion on ARM issue. 

- Paul (Technogeezer)
Editor of the Unofficial Fusion Companion Guides
telecastle
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Windows 10 and Windows 11 for ARM (technical preview editions - aka free) run perfectly on M1 Macs in Parallels. You need Parallels Desktop 16 to run Windows 10, but to run Windows 11, you must have Parallels Desktop 17. For Windows 10, you can use either Parallels Desktop 16 or Parallels Desktop 17. 

And when I say it runs perfectly, I mean perfectly. I've never seen such a great performance in Windows even running X86-64 Windows on Intel hardware directly. Windows for ARM technical preview editions have built-in emulation for both X86-32 and X86-64 Windows applications, so you don't need anything to run Windows applications developed for the Intel architecture other than get Parallels Desktop (16 or 17) and download and install a free technical preview version of Windows for ARM (10 or 11). Parallels Desktop 16 and 17 has the Parallels Tools for both Windows 10 and Windows 11 ARM versions, so all the features work great. 

I can't tell you about gaming - as I'm not a gamer - but for office and engineering (non-graphic heavy) work this setup works absolutely phenomenally. 

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ColoradoMarmot
Champion
Champion

It's never been a technical issue.  It's all about licensing.

 

I'd be sure to check with my legal department before using Windows ARM on non-OEM hardware for commercial purposes.

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lensv
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Neither is Tech Preview something that I would (or anyone should) use in a production environment. ☠️

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thallam08
Contributor
Contributor

Apples Rosetta runs intel Mac on M1 Mac.  Apple has had cross platform emulation on both of its previous architecture changes (69800 -> PowerPC, PowerPC -> Intel) and has it on its latest as well.

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Technogeezer
Immortal
Immortal


@thallam08 wrote:

Apples Rosetta runs intel Mac on M1 Mac.  Apple has had cross platform emulation on both of its previous architecture changes (69800 -> PowerPC, PowerPC -> Intel) and has it on its latest as well.


While true, this does not mean that current versions of Fusion will run on M1 Macs and run Intel virtual machines. Apple states in their developer documentation About the Rosetta Translation Environment :

Rosetta can translate most Intel-based apps, including apps that contain just-in-time (JIT) compilers. 
However, Rosetta doesn’t translate the following executables:

* Kernel extensions
* Virtual Machine apps that virtualize x86_64 computer platforms

The easier task, and to date the most successful way to date to run Intel-based operating systems on Apple Silicon (ARM) processors is to use a full system emulator such as QEMU or its derivative UTM. Emulators typically do not have the performance of hypervisors. They emulate an entire Intel chip set and peripherals and function more like instruction-by-instruction interpreters than static binary translators like Rosetta. 

- Paul (Technogeezer)
Editor of the Unofficial Fusion Companion Guides
telecastle
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

VMware Fusion runs on Apple M1 Macs but it can’t run ANY VMs - be they Intel or ARM architecture VMs. Parallels 16 an 17 runs on M1 Macs and can run Windows 10 Technical Preview for ARM. Parallels 11 can run Windows 11 Technical Preview for ARM on M1 Macs. 

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Technogeezer
Immortal
Immortal


@telecastle wrote:

VMware Fusion runs on Apple M1 Macs but it can’t run ANY VMs - be they Intel or ARM architecture VMs. Parallels 16 an 17 runs on M1 Macs and can run Windows 10 Technical Preview for ARM. Parallels 11 can run Windows 11 Technical Preview for ARM on M1 Macs. 


You mis-speak about Fusion 12 running on M1 Macs. VMware states (but not as clearly as I would like) that Fusion 12.x is supported only on Intel Macs. Only the GUI will appear to run on M1 Macs under Rosetta. The core virtualization pieces which for Fusion 12 are tailored for the Intel CPU architecture do not.

But it's misleading to Imply that VMware does not have anything that runs on M1 Macs. The Fusion for Apple Silicon Tech Preview does run on M1 Macs. Yes, it's a tech preview, but it does run fairly well and stably (IMO, having used it almost since the day it was released to the public) for a preview release. And it will virtualize ARM-based operating systems on M1 Macs, not Intel VMs. Just like Parallels.

And you omit the fact that the Tech Preview will run run the Windows 11 for ARM Insider Previews without in-guest tools support. That's despite VMware having no official support for it. (that's another story covered ad-nauseum here in these forums).

Whether that works for you or not is up to you.  

Yes, Parallels does have an advantage as it has a released product on M1 Macs and it does have in-guest tools support for Windows for ARM. But please accurately reflect the situation.

 

 

- Paul (Technogeezer)
Editor of the Unofficial Fusion Companion Guides
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telecastle
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Typical fanboy rant. 

There is nothing misleading in my post. VMWare has no stable version that virtualizes guests on the M1 architecture. The preview that VMware released almost a year after Parallels had a stable release working on M1 is just that - a beta preview. 

For Windows, VMware Fusion for ARM preview doesn’t even have VMware Tools, which means that some features in Windows don’t even work. 

I deal professionally with VMware at work, so I’m not your enemy. I actually preferred VMware Fusion to Parallels for over a decade until I got the M1. 

M1 performance blows Intel out of the water in Macs, and Parallels 17 blows Fusion out ofthe water on the M1 platform. It’s not even close. 

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Technogeezer
Immortal
Immortal

Edit: I'm modifying this original post due to some recent clarification from Microsoft on their licensing.

If you want to go there. I don't believe I've said anything that can't be backed up through research or other facts. 

If by "stable", you mean "officially released" you are correct. There is no officially released version of Fusion that runs on M1 Macs, just the Tech Preview. If that's what you meant, why didn't you use that term?  Calling out VMware for not officially releasing a product for M1 is OK. Insinuating a product is unstable when there's a lot of experience that says it's really pretty stable isn't.

Fusion 12 does not "run" on M1 Macs. Period. Fact. End of sentence. It will seem to install (a complaint I have with VMware for allowing it to be installed on a platform that it won't work on) but doesn't work. I'm a bit sensitive to how this is stated. The reason is that I can't count the number of posts I and others have responded to in this forum from people that ran Fusion on their Intel Macs and have moved to M1 Macs. They expect to install Fusion 12 and run (again, using that term "run"), but then find after the fact that it doesn't work. Even to the point where they start thinking its a bug and are waiting for VMware to look into it and fix it.  Not good conversations to have after someone has shelled out good money for a new M1 Mac.

I'd rather make sure everyone knows that it definitively won't work and that means crafting the message. Maybe I'm being a stickler on this but I'd rather people know this before they make the switch so that they can plan accordingly. Which maybe includes switching to Parallels if they really need Windows on the Mac. 

I will agree that Parallels is ahead of VMware in a released virtualization product for ARM. Also that for Windows on ARM they offer what VMware doesn't with their tools on Windows. Both facts. 

But as a professional, I'm obliged to state that Windows running on M1 Macs (including under Parallels) is unlicensable and unsupported by Microsoft. (New clarification does state that it can be licensed.) And that in order to run Windows on Fusion Tech Preview or Parallels you are running unsupported Insider Previews or Beta Channel builds.  Just as there are risks in running a unsupported preview version of Fusion, there are risks in running any pre-release unsupported software (even Microsoft tells you this in their windows Insider Preview and Beta Channel releases). I understand that you and others are running these Windows versions very well and stably under Parallels. I and others say that the Fusion Tech Preview runs very well and stably. But that doesn't remove the risks in running pre-release software an unsupported configuration. 

My former employer would have had a fit demanded I remove the Tech Preview of Fusion or any Windows for ARM build on Parallels or Fusion on a company-issued M1 Mac. For those reasons.  (This argument is irrelevant now that Microsoft has clarified their licensing.)

Saying this, I understand there's nothing stopping you from running Windows on ARM as an unsupported configuration, and making the switch to Parallels should your situation dictate. If they work for you, fine. Just make sure you're doing so with eyes wide open. That's not being a "fanboy".

The following could be construed as being a "fanboy" however.

I do lose a bit of respect for Parallels due to a response they gave to TidBITS when asked about Microsoft's licensing of Windows for ARM on Apple Silicon:

  • It's the user's responsibility to comply with licensing
  • There are many configurations that users find useful but aren't supported by their manufacturers.

Which to me avoided the whole question. Gave me the impression that all they cared about was selling you a product on M1. After all, unlike VMware, Windows on Mac *is* Parallels' business and Apple's decision to switch off of Intel processors pulled the rug from under their business model. So they had to do something to survive and the ends (staying in business) justified the means (ignoring playing in the gray area of Microsoft support for the platform /licensing and hoping Microsoft doesn't come down on them for doing so).

I'm disappointed that a year and a half after the release of M1 Macs that VMware still doesn't have a released product for it. I'm also disappointed with VMware's and Microsofts decisions about supporting Windows on Apple Silicon. But I can understand VMware's  decisions on non-support of Windows for the Mac. At least they're forthcoming about why their lawyers said not to do it. That shows some respect for intellectual property that quite honestly I didn't see from Parallels. 

- Paul (Technogeezer)
Editor of the Unofficial Fusion Companion Guides
jelpesao78
Contributor
Contributor

Unfortunately due to limitations of both VMware Fusion and Parallel, I had to look other places to be able to run x86 Windows 10/11 on my M1.  I went with UTM for Mac for now until VMware or Parallel catch up.  UTM although little slow on performance for x86, it at least gives me what I need.

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telecastle
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

What exactly does UTM give you that Parallels cannot? Are we talking about the Windows 11 for ARM being a technical preview? Is this your issue? 

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telecastle
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Yesterday, I installed the Fusion technical preview on the M1 Mac and tried to install Ubuntu Desktop 20.04 for ARM under it. I spent about 30 minutes looking for Ubuntu Desktop 20.04 and couldn’t find it at all. It looks like the way to install the standard desktop environment in Ubuntu 20.04 for ARM is to install the Ubuntu Server 20.04 for ARM and then manually add the desktop environment. It’s all cool, since Canonical doesn’t seem to publish the Ubuntu Desktop 20.04 for ARM. Right? The only version for ARM they have with the desktop environment is for Raspberry Pi, which doesn’t use BIOS or UFI for booting but uses its one boot mechanism. 

Except, in Parallels, I can choose to install Ubuntu Desktop 20.04 as one of the pre-canned options for a virtual machine that run on M1, and automagically, Ubuntu Desktop 20.04 for ARM downloads and fully installs within 3 minutes. It’s so smooth and transparent for the user that I didn’t even realize until yesterday that Canonical doesn’t publish this version officially. Where does Parallels download this version from? I have no clue, but it’s transparent for the user, and it works like a charm. Additionally, Parallels has a full-blown package of Tools (drivers) that run under Linux VMs on the M1 platform, whereas VMWare doesn’t have Tools at all that run in VMs on the M1 platform. 

Same goes for installing Windows 10 or Windows 11. No need to create an account on Microsoft.com and manually download a technical preview of Windows for ARM. All one has to do is choose Windows as one of the pre-canned VM types in Parallels, and Parallels automagically downloads Windows Technical Preview and installs it within a few minutes. And then, it automatically installs Tools in the Windows VM, so all the virtual hardware has the proper Windows drivers under the M1 architecture. Everything works properly, including the sharing between the host and the VM as well as screen resolution, etc. unlike in Fusion, which has no option for Tools under Windows at all and must run open-source tools for Linux VMs to have these features working properly. With the open-source tools, the features like the sharing between the Linux guest and the M1 host work properly, but Fusion is not aware of it, so the Fusion GUI says that the sharing cannot be configured. 

Enough said? 

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Technogeezer
Immortal
Immortal

Yes, I get your arguments. It's easier for the end user to use. The virtual appliance idea is nice (but I do have security-related reservations about sourcing virtual appliances from sites other than the publisher but that's my personal view).

For Windows on ARM, your arguments still don't address the fact that it's unlicensed and unsupported by Microsoft which you so conveniently gloss over. But I'm not the Microsoft licensing police so that's your decision to make.  I retract this argument based on some new clarification from Microsoft (it's about time). It's a big difference between "unlicensed&unsupported" to just unsupported. 

For Ubuntu, I'd like to know where from Canonical they sourced their 20.04 Desktop build since as you say it's not easy for mere mortals to find it on Ubuntu's site. Ubuntu just doesn't seem to be completely on-board with Ubuntu Desktop on arm64 architectures. Otherwise they wouldn't make it so hard to get it. Which is also puzzling since they make Ubuntu Server easily found for arm64. It's a lot easier to find Fedora, Debian, CentOS 9 Stream, OpenSUSE, Kali, RHEL 9 Beta for ARM and others that don't have anywhere near the difficulty that Ubuntu has. 

To use your terms, It's disingenuous and "fanboy" to insinuate that VMware doesn't provide a "full-blown" package of hypervisor integration tools/drivers for Linux on M1 Macs. They do. They just provided it as open source so any distro could use it. (Parallels customers are asking them to open source their equivalent, by the way). And lo and behold, VMware updated it to compile on ARM architectures.

open-vm-tools are picked up by almost all of the Linux distros (including arm64 distros and some of the BSD variants as well) - so why would VMware have to provide it? open-vm-tools are the recommended tools for Linux on ALL of VMware's hypervisor products and have been for some time now. 

And the "VMware Tools installation not detected for open-vm-tools" issue even happens in ESXi. Is it really that important since the tools installation and upgrade can be managed by the guest OS's native software update tools?

There's one function that open-vm-tools doesn't provide I will admit - virtual printer support. But Drag/drop, suspend, graceful shutdown, shared folders - all there. And it even supports things that VMware Fusion and Workstation do not take advantage of - quiesce of a virtual machine during the snapshot process comes to mind immediately. 

I get it. You like Parallels. For good reasons.

Forgive me though if I take issue with posts that appear to promote it on VMware focused (and hosted) board that's discussing a pre-release version of VMware software.

Enough said.

- Paul (Technogeezer)
Editor of the Unofficial Fusion Companion Guides
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Technogeezer
Immortal
Immortal

@telecastle In the interests of fairness (and the pointer to this article https://getwired.com/2022/02/03/can-you-run-windows-on-arm-on-an-apple-silicon-mac-after-all-it-depe...provided by @jweisbin ) it looks like Microsoft has finally clarified their licensing stance for Windows on ARM. Who knows why it took them so long.

It appears that Microsoft will let you buy a retail key for Windows 11 and apply it to Windows for ARM. It's just that they won't support running it on Apple Silicon. That's an entirely different situation than their statements that they only sell it to OEMs. Maybe the rumored Qualcomm agreement is coming to an end quicker than we thought...

I modify my viewpoint based on this new information. One would hope that VMware will modify theirs and get this mess behind us.

I have a couple of edits to stuff I've posted given this new information.

- Paul (Technogeezer)
Editor of the Unofficial Fusion Companion Guides
telecastle
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

So, before the Microsoft clarified their stance on the licensing of Windows for ARM (technical preview) to run as a VM (including under Parallels on M1 Mac), my point was that all I needed to do is click "Install Windows". As an end user, I didn't even care if Windows was licensed for ARM or not. I bought a license for Parallels, and I have an "easy button" to install Windows. And once I push that button, Parallels grabs a Windows for ARM download somewhere and installs it for me. I trust Parallels not to install some sort of spyware because Parallels has done virtualization on Mac years before VMware tried to get a piece of that market. So, I trust Parallels more than I trust a lot of other software companies - even though Parallels is a Russian company and [mod edit, no politics here please]. 

Ten minutes after I pressed the "Install Windows" button, Windows 11 was installed and every piece of virtual hardware had a proper driver automatically installed (via the auto-install of Parallels Tools). In Fusion (technical preview), there is no option to install any drivers for the virtual hardware in a Windows VM running on the M1 Mac. It's not that the open tools can be installed (like they can in a Linux for ARM VM). They can't be installed right now in a Windows for ARM VM running in Fusion. Period. Full stop. 

The second point I was making that a semi-technical person who barely understands what virtualization is can have a number of different Linux for ARM VMs or Windows for ARM installed with a click of one button. They don't need to understand the difference between Ubuntu Server for ARM and Ubuntu Desktop for ARM. They don't need to understand what the desktop environment is in Linux or how to install a desktop environment on an Ubuntu Server VM that comes without any GUI. All they have to do is click on the button that says "Install Ubuntu" and in less than 5 minutes (more like 3 minutes) everything gets installed, including the desktop environment. That's how easy personal computing should be for non-technical users. This is the way that Apple always strived for macOS to work and this is exactly the way Parallels Desktop 17 works. 

I do not like Parallels more than I like VMware in general. I utilize ESXi for work, and I would prefer to run Fusion on my M1 Mac. I've preferred VMWare Fusion to Parallels on my Intel-based Macs for years. All I'm doing here is stating the simple truth that Parallels Desktop 17 is way ahead of VMware Fusion when it comes to virtualization on M1 Macs at this time. And I'm saying this from a technical user perspective who has had experience with the ESX/ESXi virtualization for over 10 years now and who has more affinity to VMware than to Parallels (I also have a VMware ESXi lab at home, by the way). When it comes to non-technical users. one can't even draw any comparison between Parallels Desktop and VMware Fusion when it comes to M1 Macs. It's not even close.