Can't create any macOS guest VM on iMac (late 2015, 11.6.1) with 12.2.0

[franzinc]

I tried Big Sur, Monterey, downloaded the installers several times.

The host is up to date, with 11.6.1.  VMware Fusion is up to date with 12.2.0.

First, installing either Big Sur or Monterey is really, really slow.  After about 30 minutes, with little progress on the "Apple" install screen, I get a circle with a slash through it and "support.apple.com/mac/startup" at the bottom.

I've tried starting over (deleting the partially finished VM and emptying the trash).  Always the same thing.

I have plenty of free space (more than a TB).

I have 12.2.0 on my home machine and was able to install.

Ideas?

[ColoradoMarmot]

Are you just drag/dropping the installer app into the new VM wizard?

[franzinc]

No, selecting it with the file chooser.

I also made a USB installer and connected it to the VM.  Twice.  Two different downloads and two different USB drives, both known to be working last time I used them.

[ColoradoMarmot]

Try the drag drop method - that ensures that the VM is configured properly for the particular OS version.

[franzinc]

I selected "macOS 11" every time.  I cannot imagine that dropping will do anything other than that.  And, I must have installed 50+ times without dropping.  Using the same USB installer I installed successfully on another machine (Mac Pro 6,1).

[ColoradoMarmot]

Ahh, missed that.  And this machine can run Big Sur, so it's not an issue with CPU compatibility.

Can you copy over the VM from the other machine, and does it run?

[franzinc]

OK, copied a Monterey VM from the Mac Pro to the iMac and it does not start.  I see the Apple menu and the boot progress bar is barely visible.

Curiously, after updating to 12.2.1, the behavior changed, when making a new VM on the iMac, from the no symbol after a while to a complete hang about 15% into the install (it was at the same place after 4 days).

Seems like the iMac might need a wipe and reinstall.

[franzinc]

Ran Apple diagnostics, clean.  Did a wipe and installed Monterey.  Tried to make a VM from the recovery partition of 12.0.1.  It said it would take "a few minutes" but after 20 minutes or so I hit cancel.

I reset the PRAM/NVRAM.  Same deal.

I'm installing Ubuntu 20 and it's flying along.

The specific hardware is iMac (Retina 4k, 21.5", Late 2015), 16GB RAM, 2TB SSD installed by OWC.

Everything before/after the wipe/reinstall was working fine except VMware Fusion 12.  I'm starting to think this specific hardware has issues with installing macOS in a VM on this version of VMwF.

[franzinc]

Since I've really never built a VM from the recovery partition, I'm downloading yet another fresh copy of Big Sur.  If this doesn't work, then my previous comment stands and I think VMwF is broken on this hardware.

[franzinc]

Big Sur worked, Monterey failed.  The fact that "macOS 12" is not an option in the VM creation makes me think it's not supported?  Anyway, failed to copy the Monterey DMG.

So, I guess corrupt iMac + bugs in VMwF.