10.7.5 host and fusion 5.0.2 can't boot or update lion guest

[cookieme]

I'm trying to upgrade a 10.7.x VM guest to 10.8.2 using the InstallESD.dmg from the Mac App Store.

My host OS is 10.7.5 and I'm using Fusion 5.0.2.

I've tried upgrading several times, but after installation completes I get the message shown in the attached screenshot.

I changed the OS from Lion to Mountain Lion in the VM settings, but it had no effect!

I also tried creating a new VM and booting from the InstallESD.dmg, but the VM won't boot. I get the circle with a cross through it.

Why can't I create a new 10.8 VM or upgrade an existing 10.7 VM?

Thanks

[dariusd]

Hi cookieme,

Could you please attach the vmware.log from inside the virtual machine bundle?

Thanks,

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Darius

[cookieme]

Ok here is the vmware.log you requested.

[dariusd]

Interesting... thanks.  The log doesn't give me much of a hint beyond what we already knew... that the guest panicked.

2013-01-15T20:57:20.955+01:00| vcpu-0| I120: The guest OS panicked. The first line of the panic report is: panic(cpu 0 caller 0xffffff8025eb7bd5): Kernel trap at 0xffffff8000215540, type 14=page fault, registers:

Could I also ask you to upload Lion_Playground.nvram from inside the VM bundle?  That should contain more details of why Mac OS panicked.

Cheers,

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Darius

[cookieme]

Darius, is there any personal info contained in the .nvram?

[dariusd]

Nothing particularly personal, although it might contain some UUIDs and such.  Regardless, to allay your concerns, I'll PM you with my off-forum contact details and we'll continue that way.  (I'll try to remember to report back to this thread with the outcome, for the benefit of everyone else!)

Cheers,

--

Darius

[dariusd · Accepted solution]

Hi cookieme,

The panic is occuring because your VM still contains the VMware Tools from Fusion 4.1.1, and that release is not compatible with Mountain Lion: Specifically, the vmmemctl driver triggers a guest kernel panic during boot, as you've found.  Since you're now running Fusion 5.0.2, try restoring your pre-Mountain-Lion VM snapshot (you do have one, don't you?), updating the VMware Tools inside that Lion guest, and then proceeding with the upgrade to Mountain Lion inside the guest.

Please let us know if that solves the problem for you!

Cheers,

--

Darius

[dariusd]

Another possible option: If you press and hold the Shift key early as the guest boots (i.e. when the VMware logo is still on screen), you should be able to boot the VM in Safe Mode.  If we're lucky, that may bypass the vmmemctl driver and allow you to boot the VM and uninstall Tools.  I have no idea if that will actually work in the middle of an OS upgrade, though...  Perhaps worth a try...

Cheers,

--

Darius

[cookieme]

Darius you're the man! It took a little while to revert my snapshot to lion and then update vmware tools before upgrading to 10.8.

You were absolutely correct the VM boots fine and the culprit was outdated vmware tools! Thank you so much for your swift help and communication!

By the way maybe it would be possible in a future Fusion update to have some sort of tool that notifies the user about updating vmware tools before upgrading the OS to avoid this type of scenario. Maybe it's too complicated but just a suggestion!

Thanks again!

[dariusd]

Cool!  Glad to be able to help.

I like the idea of OS update notifications, but my immediate feeling is like yours: It would probably be quite complicated to make such a system reliable, particularly across various guest OSes.  There's no uniform and reliable way for us to find out that an OS update is about to take place, and, in the particular case described in this thread and many others, it would be too late to provide a notification when the OS has been updated.  There are a few hacky ways we could try to guess when an OS update might occur, but all the ways I can imagine right now would be prone to either false negatives or false positives.  Still, might be worth some continued pondering (when I have some available ponders).

Thanks,

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Darius