Cant get upgrade from windows 7 (VM on externaL SSD) to 10 to run to completion

[licensedtoquill]

Does anyone know how to restart a failed upgrade installation please?

I have 7 installed on an external ssd which keeps disconnecting while upgrading. It's that puny USB-C socket on my macbook which seems very unstable and it also keeps disconnecting while trying to install 83 windows updates, so this doesnt appear to be anything to do with the upgrading process from 7 to 10. 

Anyway, now,  the windows 10 install wont restart, suddenly reporting not enough space on the C drive!   Has something on the update filled up the C drive?               T he upgrade process takes effect from WITHIN the 7 VM so I am not sure why it matters that there is supposedly no space on the C drive?

For some reason, I can't just copy the 7 VM to the computer and try from there. The copy function doesnt seem to work. It starts to copy the vm to my computer, I can see the VM appear in the folder and stops within a half a second and disappears (which appears to be nothing to do with file permissions on the VM file)

[licensedtoquill]

Before we answer the question, I should report that the 83 updates to the 7 installation completed with a window activation error! So microsoft seems to have detected that, running the vm from ext ssd, the hardware has "changed"!

I suspect I should stop trying to run the vm from an external drive and start figuring out how to copy the vm to my computer. Then see how many of these problems persist.

[wila]

Hi,

Don't have an answer for your initial question (need more details and have no time to follow up atm)

But.. "the VM has new hardware on external disk" issue is due to a choice you made on opening the VM from the external disk.

When you move (or copy) a VM to your external disk, it asks "did you copy or move" on startup of the VM.

If you answer "copy" it will generate new hardware ID's for your virtual machine and thus trigger windows activation logic.

If you answer "move" it will leave those hardware ID's intact.

Seems you answered truthfully and thus ended up having to re-activate.

It's a confusing popup as it doesn't really explain why it is asking that question.

--
Wil

[licensedtoquill]

Thanks for that Wil, I think you are right but i have managed to sidestep that for the moment by starting afresh. However, it comes with its own set of problems.

Firstly, W10 wont install with all the drivers and things I am using. I have however managed to get it to install past the first few stages by re-booting the VM into a clean boot. (without any drivers/VMTools etc)

That install then gets past the initial need for 9GB if I manually delete the previous W10 install files in the ESD directory etc and subsequently proceeds all the way to the install, when it suddenly needs to install all its files and apps temporarily into a spare 10GB of space.

It helpfully recognises that the user can designate an external drive for that purpose and lets me do so!  But then I am stuck. I can plug in a USB drive for this purpose and somehow Windows recognises it and installs drivers and says that it is ready to use!

But it isn't.

i think this is because if I look at the panel above the Windows installation, there is only one USB icon (called Apple iBridge, but I think this is the USB connector I have just plugged in) and it is grayed out.  I suppose, because I have only installed a minimal set of drivers in Clean Boot?

Am I wrong or is there any way around this please?

[licensedtoquill]

Sorry about that, the ibridge wasnt the usb drive, it was called a a SCSI which also isnt seen in windows.  So I plugged in a Seagate HDD that also connects to the USB cable and IT is now seen in the VMWare panel above the Windows VM (as a seagate HDD).

But it still isnt seen in the windows (eg File Explorer) installation itself??

[wila]

Hi,

That install then gets past the initial need for 9GB if I manually delete the previous W10 install files in the ESD directory etc and subsequently proceeds all the way to the install, when it suddenly needs to install all its files and apps temporarily into a spare 10GB of space.

It helpfully recognises that the user can designate an external drive for that purpose and lets me do so!  But then I am stuck. I can plug in a USB drive for this purpose and somehow Windows recognises it and installs drivers and says that it is ready to use!

What I did in the past when I had this issue was not to add a USB drive.

Instead I temporarily shut down my VM, added a new virtual disk to it of 20GB or something, booted the VM, formatted that new virtual disk and Windows happily used that.

After the upgrade was completed I removed the new temporary virtual disk again and reclaimed that space.

edit: forgot to say that if your Windows 7 VM has a scsi virtual disk then you might bump into another issue, see my article here for details on how-to work around that.

https://www.vimalin.com/blog/windows-7-to-windows-10-upgrade/

--

Wil

[wila]

Hi,

USB disks are a pain to get to work sometimes in the latest VMware Fusion, it seems like VMware broke something there on top of an already fiddly config

Sometimes it works, sometimes not and there's a variety of possible reasons.

For example beware that Windows 7 has its own issues there as it doesn't have a USB3 inbox driver in Windows, so it only supports USB2.

You can get it to use USB3 drivers by installing an intel specific driver that you have to download and install.

Then there's people trying to use usbc disks with VMs and that doesn't work either.. it's a tad confusing nowadays.

--

Wil

[licensedtoquill]

Actually I wonder if you have actually solved this excruciating problem! Is the reason 7 can't see the external drive a SIMPLE driver issue? After all the VM can see the USB connection and then Windows does react when plugged in and makes provision (without error messages) in the systray.  Yet there is no exclamation mark in device manager?   And all this while in Clean Boot.

OTOH you highlight interminable problems between VMWare, 7 and various versions of each, while I undoubtedly dont have enough space on the VM for the upgrade procedure.

Maybe, if I can solve the Disk Cleanup issues, I should just keep on trying to do the upgrade in normal boot until it runs out of reasons to fail?  I can see why it has failed a few times in event log and the reasons (expressed as arcane memory addresses) and the reasons are all different!

If i can solve the problem about why disk cleanup wont remove its temporary upgrade install files (and treefilesize cant even see them!), I wonder if this upgrade might actually work if I do it often enough?

Oh, and thank you for agreeing with me about latest updates to Fusion often making things worse: I am on 8.5.10 and dont dare upgrade to anything higher: The last thing I need is APFS introducing a whole new slew of things to go wrong!!

What is curious is that the USB connector I am using is otherwise reasonably unexceptionable.  It is just an old-fangled E-SATA HDD plug from a 4 year old backup system connected to an ordinary mini-usb cable connected to the old USB plug

[ColoradoMarmot]

Esata may very well be the issue.  Do you have a native USB connection available?

FWIW, if you're running 8.5 on High Sierra, Mojave, or Catalina, that has it's own set of risks and issues.

But in this case, it sounds like it's the same as if a physical machine ran out of disk space during the upgrade - a windows problem, not a Fusion problem.  The brute force workaround would be to restore from backup if you have one, then expand the virtual disk, then do the upgrade.

[licensedtoquill]

Thanks for that, - I have two issues and one of those tiny MacBookPro SSDs with so little space that I cant just expand the VM.

Firstly, I have about 10 GB of space in the VM, which is OK to get me to the next step. But every time the 10 upgrade fails, the install files are left 'somewhere' on the VM so the next attempted upgrade fails with a lack of space.  Disk Cleanup identifies these files but for some reason wont delete them!  Sometimes TreeFileSize can see these fileS (plural) as an ESD directory, which I can delete, sometimes it doesn't!

If it does, I can get to the next step and install proceeds with ultra-slow checking things and laboriously making ultra-slow preparations.  When it gets to the actual install of 10, it sees a 10GB want of space for apps and data and allows me to plug an external drive in.   do have native USB ports on the MBP but I "only" have three types of external storage to use. A USB stick, which I dont have in 10GB< size.          A few external SSDs which I can plug in, both of which give me an arcane NETCHIP ENVOY message, followed by a Fusion error message saying that whatever I am using cant connect to its "ideal host controller"!  And neither SSD appears in File Explorer. and a wire which plugs a 100GB SATA HDD into the VM.

This is the drive which is seen in the panel above the VM as, specifically, a Seagate RSS USB 2.0 cable!! It is helpfully marked in black not grey as "connected".  But the Toshiba SATA drive at the other end of it isn't seen by File Explorer, which I presume is why 10 Install doesn't recognise that it is there, to proceed with the install.

Shouldn't this USB2.0 be relatively unproblematic?

Curiously, on the general point, TreeFileSize just found 89,890 jpg files in some Media Player temporary directory which werent there on any occasion I looked in the past!! I'm sure I would have seen 3.51 gb of files when I was looking for these sorts of files.   This may improve the 10 installation prospects but somehow I doubt it.

(Windows strongly recommended me against deleting system files on stability grounds but I cant see how deleting jpg, files, - some of zero bytes, - from a program I never use could influence the stability of anything!)

[wila]

Hi,

Tip:

If you temporarily an additional vmdk (virtual disk) for your VM then that vmdk can be located anywhere you like.

Including an external disk. For the VM it doesn't matter that the temporary virtual disk is on an external disk as it never sees that particular "detail".

--

Wil

[licensedtoquill]

Yes, you are right but I dont trust Microsoft and if the VM is some form of windows, apparently it detects the underlying hardware as being changed and demands re-activation.  And many of us will not have retained the product key on an ages-old product. Plus auto-upgrade picks up the old product key and uses it for 10. I'm not sure I trust them to let me use a 7 product key with 10 in any actual activation!    

But for now i have a different problem: during the install process for 10, the Upgrade checks the hardware and stops the install dead when it detects LSI adapter Ultra320 SCSI series 2000 w1020/1030    whatever that is.  And there isnt even an option to proceed in any way, - instead there is a useless REFRESH button, which is hardly going to refresh the install process out of this error message!

[wila]

Hi,

I would not expect that adding a disk triggers Windows activation mechanism.

It might do that if there have been some other changes recently.

Windows _DOES NOT_ see the underlying hardware, it just sees a new disk. It doesn't really matter that it is a disk of the brand "VMware"...

As for the SCSI controller issue that you are bumping into, I had already linked my blog post about that... but here it is again:

https://www.vimalin.com/blog/windows-7-to-windows-10-upgrade/

--

Wil

[licensedtoquill]

I tried that (in preparation for figuring out why the HDD isnt seen as anything other than a USB "Seagate cable") and didnt get very far: Would there be any reason why SHOW PACKAGE CONTENTS doesn't change to OPEN CONFIG FILE IN EDITOR when I press the OPTION key?  Maybe I can just open in finder and then open the config file in Textedit, if I can figure out which file it is?

And why is this HDD not seen any more? In the past, I had never had any trouble getting any USB device such as this seen when connected to the VM??

[licensedtoquill]

Sorry for last message, but after a few days the option to edit the config file did appear and I was able to edit it as set out in the very helpful blog

But that introduced problems of its own

Editing it as you suggest in textedit was easy and I got to the first stage and then back into the VM, where device manager showed the LSI device fie. But the second stage resulted firstly in DICTIONARY PROBLEM, followed now by VMX FILE CORRUPT.  I tried undoing whatever I had changed in that second stage but the vmx file still shows as corrupt.

this is what i have now: Is there anything obviously wrong with it please?

.encoding = "UTF-8"

config.version = "8"

virtualHW.version = "12"

scsi0.present = "TRUE"

scsi0.virtualDev = "lsilogic"

memsize = "5584"

scsi0:0.present = "TRUE"

scsi0:0.fileName = "Windows Vista x64 Edition.vmdk"

ide1:0.present = "TRUE"

ide1:0.fileName = "/Users/LicensedToQuill/Downloads/Win10_1511_1_English_x64.iso"

ide1:0.deviceType = "cdrom-image"

ethernet0.present = "TRUE"

ethernet0.connectionType = "bridged"

ethernet0.virtualDev = "e1000"

ethernet0.wakeOnPcktRcv = "FALSE"

ethernet0.linkStatePropagation.enable = "TRUE"

usb.present = "TRUE"

ehci.present = "TRUE"

sound.present = "TRUE"

sound.fileName = "-1"

sound.autodetect = "TRUE"

mks.enable3d = "FALSE"

serial0.present = "TRUE"

serial0.fileType = "thinprint"

pciBridge0.present = "TRUE"

pciBridge4.present = "TRUE"

pciBridge4.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"

pciBridge4.functions = "8"

pciBridge5.present = "TRUE"

pciBridge5.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"

pciBridge5.functions = "8"

pciBridge6.present = "TRUE"

pciBridge6.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"

pciBridge6.functions = "8"

pciBridge7.present = "TRUE"

pciBridge7.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"

pciBridge7.functions = "8"

vmci0.present = "TRUE"

isolation.tools.hgfs.disable = "FALSE"

roamingVM.exitBehavior = "go"

tools.syncTime = "TRUE"

displayName = "Windows 7 x64 Edition"

guestOS = "windows7-64"

nvram = "Windows Vista x64 Edition.nvram"

virtualHW.productCompatibility = "hosted"

ft.secondary0.enabled = "TRUE"

printers.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder0.present = "TRUE"

sharedFolder0.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder0.readAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder0.hostPath = "/Users/LicensedToQuill"

sharedFolder0.guestName = "LicensedToQuill On My Mac"

sharedFolder0.expiration = "never"

sharedFolder.maxNum = "9"

hgfs.mapRootShare = "TRUE"

hgfs.linkRootShare = "TRUE"

tools.upgrade.policy = "upgradeAtPowerCycle"

powerType.powerOff = "soft"

powerType.powerOn = "soft"

powerType.suspend = "soft"

powerType.reset = "soft"

extendedConfigFile = "Windows Vista x64 Edition.vmxf"

checkpoint.vmState = ""

ide1:0.startConnected = "FALSE"

ethernet0.addressType = "generated"

uuid.location = "56 4d b6 ba 86 ef 5e 0c-73 8b e4 dc 41 12 8a 90"

uuid.bios = "56 4d ce 92 57 66 ff 0f-1d ae 4c 65 61 51 f3 63"

scsi0:0.redo = ""

vmotion.checkpointFBSize = "8388608"

pciBridge0.pciSlotNumber = "17"

pciBridge4.pciSlotNumber = "21"

pciBridge5.pciSlotNumber = "22"

pciBridge6.pciSlotNumber = "23"

pciBridge7.pciSlotNumber = "24"

scsi0.pciSlotNumber = "16"

usb.pciSlotNumber = "32"

ethernet0.pciSlotNumber = "33"

sound.pciSlotNumber = "34"

ehci.pciSlotNumber = "35"

vmci0.pciSlotNumber = "36"

usb:1.present = "TRUE"

ethernet0.generatedAddress = "00:0c:29:51:f3:63"

ethernet0.generatedAddressOffset = "0"

vmci0.id = "-45820427"

usb:1.deviceType = "hub"

ide1:0.autodetect = "FALSE"

usb.autoConnect.device0 = ""

gui.fullScreenAtPowerOn = "FALSE"

gui.viewModeAtPowerOn = "fullscreen"

usb.autoConnect.device1 = ""

usb.autoConnect.device2 = ""

usb.autoConnect.device3 = ""

usb:8.present = "TRUE"

usb:8.deviceType = "hub"

proxyApps.publishToGuest = "TRUE"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder.maxNum = "6"

sharedFolder1.present = "TRUE"

sharedFolder1.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder1.readAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder1.writeAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder1.hostPath = "/Users/LicensedToQuill/Documents"

sharedFolder1.guestName = "My Documents"

sharedFolder1.expiration = "never"

sharedFolder1.shareTags = "auto,documents"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder0.name = "desktop"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder0.enabled = "FALSE"

sharedFolder2.present = "TRUE"

sharedFolder2.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder2.readAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder2.writeAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder2.hostPath = "/Users/LicensedToQuill/Music"

sharedFolder2.guestName = "My Music"

sharedFolder2.expiration = "never"

sharedFolder2.shareTags = "auto,music"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder1.name = "documents"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder1.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder3.present = "TRUE"

sharedFolder3.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder3.readAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder3.writeAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder3.hostPath = "/Users/LicensedToQuill/Pictures"

sharedFolder3.guestName = "My Pictures"

sharedFolder3.expiration = "never"

sharedFolder3.shareTags = "auto,pictures"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder2.name = "music"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder2.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder4.present = "TRUE"

sharedFolder4.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder4.readAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder4.writeAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder4.hostPath = "/Users/LicensedToQuill1/Downloads"

sharedFolder4.guestName = "Downloads"

sharedFolder4.expiration = "never"

sharedFolder4.shareTags = "auto,downloads"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder3.name = "pictures"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder3.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder0.writeAccess = "TRUE"

hpet0.present = "TRUE"

usb.vbluetooth.startConnected = "TRUE"

sound.virtualDev = "hdaudio"

cleanShutdown = "TRUE"

replay.supported = "FALSE"

replay.filename = ""

usb:1.speed = "2"

usb:8.speed = "2"

tools.remindInstall = "FALSE"

printers.matchDefault = "TRUE"

sound.startConnected = "TRUE"

sharedFolder5.present = "TRUE"

sharedFolder5.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder5.readAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder5.writeAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder5.hostPath = "/Users/LicensedToQuill1/Movies"

sharedFolder5.guestName = "Movies"

sharedFolder5.expiration = "never"

sharedFolder5.shareTags = "auto,movies"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder4.name = "downloads"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder4.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder6.present = "TRUE"

sharedFolder6.enabled = "FALSE"

sharedFolder6.readAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder6.writeAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder6.hostPath = "/Users/LicensedToQuill1/Documents/Documents/OLD"

sharedFolder6.guestName = "OLD"

sharedFolder6.expiration = "never"

sharedFolder6.shareTags = ""

hgfs.redirectShellFolder5.name = "movies"

hgfs.redirectShellFolder5.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder7.present = "TRUE"

sharedFolder7.enabled = "TRUE"

sharedFolder7.readAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder7.writeAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder7.hostPath = "/Users/LicensedToQuill/Music/iTunes"

sharedFolder7.guestName = "iTunes"

sharedFolder7.expiration = "never"

ethernet0.startConnected = "TRUE"

migrate.hostlog = "/Users/LicensedToQuill/Documents/Virtual Machines.localized/Windows Vista x64 Edition.vmwarevm/./Windows Vista x64 Edition-d61129bc.hlog"

monitor.phys_bits_used = "42"

vmotion.checkpointSVGAPrimarySize = "67108864"

softPowerOff = "TRUE"

toolsInstallManager.updateCounter = "33"

svga.guestBackedPrimaryAware = "TRUE"

gui.fitGuestUsingNativeDisplayResolution = "TRUE"

serial0.startConnected = "TRUE"

sharedFolder8.present = "TRUE"

sharedFolder8.enabled = "FALSE"

sharedFolder8.readAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder8.writeAccess = "TRUE"

sharedFolder8.hostPath = "/Volumes/Macintosh HD 1"

sharedFolder8.guestName = "Macintosh HD"

sharedFolder8.expiration = "never"

acpi.smbiosVersion2.7 = "FALSE"

acpi.mouseVMW0003 = "FALSE"

numa.autosize.vcpu.maxPerVirtualNode = "2"

numa.autosize.cookie = "20001"

toolsInstallManager.lastInstallError = "21004"

gui.exitOnCLIHLT = "TRUE"

vmx.buildType = "release"

numvcpus = "2"

cpuid.coresPerSocket = "2"

hard-disk.hostBuffer = "disabled"

gui.lastPoweredViewMode = "fullscreen"

svga.vramSize = "134217728"

floppy0.present = "FALSE"

scsi0.present = "TRUE"

scsi0.virtualDev = "lsisas1068"

scsi1.pciSlotNumber = "160"

scsi1.sasWWID = "50 05 05 62 57 66 fe 00"

usb:0.present = "TRUE"

usb:0.deviceType = "hid"

usb:0.port = "0"

usb:0.parent = "-1"

[wila]

Hi,

Next time please use the attach button at the bottom right of the reply window (only available in the forum, not in the inbox) as that will help making sure I can actually test what is wrong.

What I see in the .vmx file you posted is this near the top:

scsi0.present = "TRUE"

scsi0.virtualDev = "lsilogic"

and then later on in the file:

scsi0.present = "TRUE"

scsi0.virtualDev = "lsisas1068"

That's conflicting, so I can imagine that VMware Fusion complains about that.

Also make sure that TextEdit isn't set up to use "smart quotes" as those quotes are not understood by VMware Fusion.

PS: re. that last message. I did not quite follow your issue there and was very very busy with work, so did not have the time to follow up and understand the issue.

--

Wil

[licensedtoquill]

OK Great! Thank you very much, that did the trick.  I moved all those lines together and now have

csi0.present = "TRUE"

scsi0.virtualDev = "lsisas1068"

memsize = "5584"

scsi0:0.present = "TRUE"

scsi0:0.fileName = "Windows Vista x64 Edition.vmdk"

ide1:0.present = "TRUE"

ide1:0.fileName = "/Users/LicensedToQuill/Downloads/Win10_1511_1_English_x64.iso"

ide1:0.deviceType = "cdrom-image"

My other issue was with the VM seeing the Seagate USB cable but not the SATA HDD on the end of it, which all VMs I have ever had could see in the past.

This problem is getting curiouser and curiouser! now I can boot up into the VM with the cable connected and it boots fine. I can subsequently plug in the HDD and suddenly I get the normal message asking me if I want to connect the CABLE :smileyalert: to the Mac side or the windows side. When I say WINDOWS, the SEAGATE RSS USB 2.0 CABLE appears in the panel above the VM (and shows as being connected),- but the HDD still isnt seen in file manager!!

[licensedtoquill]

Actually this was quite disastrous: Windows IS now asking for activation and wont accept the actual product key! The one which has worked in the upgrade process in the past

[wila]

Hi,

I'm not sure what has gone wrong on your VM as I lost track of all what happened to it.

You should normally not have activation and product key issues.

Restore a backup and try again?

--

Wil

[licensedtoquill]

OK Wil, that is probably the best idea but I am worried that I will just run up against this same problem again.

The present position is that the 10 upgrade picks up the 7 product key, while inserting the 7 product key into the upgrade process fails. So I will just activate windows in 7, with this new config file and see if the upgrade then picks up the old product key as before.

BUT the original problem with the VM not seeing the contents of the USB drive still persists.

I will try a Gembird USB-C dongle with a 32gb sd card in it and see if it lets me use that to install the apps and data