Fusion 13.0.1 randomly drops network connection - M2 Ventura 13.2

[Thuckemeyer]

Hi,

I was able to get my M2 Ventura 13.2 machine running Windows 11 ARM (Insider Build 22598) and everything seems to be working as intended. I don't have Administrative access and am unsure if that's normal, however that's not my issue.

I'm running this Windows machine as a 24/7 media server and it's working intermittently. The network is bridged between the Mac host and windows machine using AutoDetect (I'm using ethernet). The network is fine throughout the day and seems to randomly disconnect in the middle of the night. The network on the host machine is completely fine. The guest Windows machine shows it's connect to ethernet but there is no internet. To fix this, I just reboot VMware and it works again - until it doesn't).

Any ideas on how to fix this? Or even setup some kind of terminal command to reboot the VM machine upon network failure?

I'm new to this so if I need to attach any logs/files please let me know where I can obtain them from.

[ColoradoMarmot]

So right off the bat, avoid the insider builds if you can.  Get one from uuddump instead.  Instructions for doing that, along with getting it configured properly are well documented in the unofficial guide to fusion (in the documents section of this forum).

To your specific question, there's two thoughts:

- Your access point may not like issuing multiple IP addresses to a single MAC address.  Try NAT instead

- In power preferences set the machine to never sleep, and also set 'prevent sleep when screen blanks'.  Apple has gotten overly aggressive on sleeping machines, and for all that Fusion is supposed to be well behaved at sleeping guests when the host does, there can be race conditions that prevent things from working properly.  

[Thuckemeyer]

Thanks for the reply! 

The ARM versions on uudump are also labeled insider builds - are these any different? 

The machine is already set to never sleep. How would I go about changing my NAT settings? 

Also, if I do need to do a reinstall of a new VM how would I go about keeping the IP the exact same (everything is already mapped to 192.168.1.xx)?

[ColoradoMarmot]

There are public releases on uupdump - but you'll need an older one if you're going to build it on the mac.  The unofficial guide has specific directions on how to do that.

In network settings you change from bridged to NAT, which will get a local IP address from the VMWare network stack.  I haven't done custom IP ranges with the NAT server, but maybe someone else can chime in.  Note that with NAT you may not be able to access the VM from outside that specific machine.

[Thuckemeyer]

Are there any pros/cons to running this as NAT rather than Bridged? Now I am thinking when my IP renewed each night while bridged it reset itself - maybe NAT will fix that? 

Another odd question - I run my host with a VPN. While the connection was bridged my VM machine actually used my normal connection and now while NAT is uses the VPN connection. I'm assuming this is as intended? 

Thank you again for you help so far - I'll give this a shot and see what happens tonight. 

[TheWaterbug]

I have similar/related symptoms where my WinARM11 installation (via the Parallels-downloaded ISO) on Fusion 13.0.1 on macOS 13.0 will unexpectedly change its Ethernet/Bridged/Auto-detect connection from Domain with full functionality to Public with zero functionality. 

Disabling/re-enabling doesn't fix it, nor does rebooting, and there's no way (that I know of) to edit the settings from within Windows to fix it.

But switching the Network Adapter in Fusion from Bridged to NAT, allowing that to connect as Domain, and then switching back to Bridged, seemed to work. This has happened 2-3x times now, and toggling the connection type in Fusion has worked every time.

I hope this helps someone!

[ColoradoMarmot]

That's correct on the VPN.  VPN's can be configured to disallow other connections, so that might be part of the issue.  The other piece is that your router may not like giving multiple IP's to a single MAC - either on purpose, or accidental (e.g. it gives the same IP to both host and guest when the lease renews.  

[sarvos]

Try setting the Windows network driver's link speed manually to "100 Mbps Full Duplex".  I was experiencing the same issue as mentioned in this thread and this setting has resolved the issue.  The connection has been stable without any disconnection.