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MCaseyM
Contributor
Contributor

Mac Catalina and Fusion Has Black Screen

When will this be fixed? I'm unable to use the software on my laptop and to continue production of files.

The screen turns black when Fusion launches and cannot open any files.

Casey

143 Replies
jonmason
Contributor
Contributor

Running 8.5 on Mac 10.15 Catalina... Black screen issue only resolved by enabling screen recording...was only able to get the prompt when installing 11.1.1  then reinstalled 8.5 and screen recording stayed and vm's now show the screen ie not black

SPECIFCALLY 11.1.1 was the version i gleamed from this thread.. after some trial and error..

EcoEric
Contributor
Contributor

Thank you so much. This got VMWare Fusion 8 working on macOS 10.15 Catalina!

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Tank1252
Contributor
Contributor

How do you do this. I do not see it is an option to check.

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Tank1252
Contributor
Contributor

How do you reinstall the original version? I don't have any discs.

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lidra
Contributor
Contributor

I have Fusion 10.1.16 that was working fine before upgrade to Catalina. After upgrade had the same black screen issue. I downloaded 11.1.1 and that version made VMware Fusion to show up in the Security & Privacy -> Privacy -> Screen Recording. After enabling the option VM screen showed up ok. I removed 11.1.1 and re-installed Fusion 10.1.16 and now that works without issues. Thank you everyone for help on this issue. 

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dkass
Contributor
Contributor

This works.

The issue here that I've found is that vmware10 (for those of us who don't want to shell out money for a bug that they should be fixing) doesn't ever prompt you for screen capture. So you have to manually add it with sqlite3. Sort of a PITA but confirmed to work.

Tank1252
Contributor
Contributor

EDIT:- Tried again & this time it worked. Originally I copy & pasted the commands into Terminal in 1 lot instead of 4 separate commands (Noob!). I now can see my VMWare again. I checked the Screen Recording out of interest & VMWare is listed (& ticked). Thanks a heap!

This did not work for me. I'm still not getting an option to add VMWare to Screen Recording.
Has anybody got a solution? Hugely frustrating.

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ColoradoMarmot
Champion
Champion

Fusion 10 wasn't even supported on Mojave.  Folks hacking around the issues should be very careful and make sure they have a good backup strategy in place.

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pepi_par
Contributor
Contributor

how did you do that???

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wila
Immortal
Immortal

Hi,


Higher up in this thread and it is a REALLY BAD IDEA unless you know very very well what you are doing.

If you insist on wanting to run an obsolete version such as VMware Fusion 8.5 on macOS Catalina then instead look at the workaround I posted here:

Re: Fusion 10.1.6 and MacOS CATALINA?

Also not recommended if you ask me, but please do not mess with your sqlite TCC database.

--

Wil

| Author of Vimalin. The virtual machine Backup app for VMware Fusion, VMware Workstation and Player |
| More info at vimalin.com | Twitter @wilva
bhelmick
Contributor
Contributor

In my case I got the black screen to disappear immediately by right-clicking on the vmwarevm file in Finder, selecting Open With, and then VMware Fusion

Open opening I got the alert that security preferences needed to be updated but then Windows finally opened anyway

When I went back to System Preferences it was already open but with a different screen - i.e. Security and Privacy which indicated that "System Software from VMware was blocked from loading"

Checked off "Allow" box and all was well

aliengin
Contributor
Contributor

VMware Fusion (10.1.6) never asks for Screen Recording permissions. There is no "+" button to add anything myself either. This is so frustrating.

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hellachow
Contributor
Contributor

If you don't see Fusion in the screen recording it's because you downloaded the latest v11.5.0. Whereas you need 11.0 or 11.1 to see it. It worked fine for me.

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kevmcgowan
Contributor
Contributor

Worked like a charm. thank you

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Charliegian
Contributor
Contributor

I have opened "screen recording" in System Preferences, but it is blank.  VMWare Fusion has not requested to be added to it, and it does not appear that one can add an app to the screen recording preference independently.  I am running Fusion 10.0.1.

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JohnAschenbrenn
Contributor
Contributor

That worked for me thanks.

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derekbrowne
Contributor
Contributor

I installed the latest Catalina OS official release and the black screen issue started immediately.  i hate to say it but... i went from 10.x to 11.5.0 and the problem went away for me.  i was going to upgrade anyway so no great loss and VMWare recently saved my butt in auto-recover of a corrupted vm file so i was happy to get working again

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pcwiz1102
Contributor
Contributor

Here's what I found that worked from.  Depending on your version of VMWare Fusion, I had to upgrade the program to version 11.5.0 and that removed the black screen issues that I was having after upgrading to MacOS X Catalina.  Its might be something that you can try to see if it works for you.

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KatueDavison
Contributor
Contributor

SOLVED

Black Screen now gone and Windows opens normally!

Running Fusion 10 having just upgraded to Catalina.

I found my License Key from VMWare > License and copied it to my clipboard.

Deleted VM Ware App (not the windows file)

Installed the trial version (v.11.1.1) from the VMWare Website

Opened the app and the Mac asks for permissions (including screen recording) to which I said Yes!

Closed the app.

Re-installed v.10.1.6 (again, on the VMWare Site) and re-entered my License key

App opened normally with my Windows file, like nothing ever happened!

Deleted the v.11 files and double checked, all is well

Smiley Happy

Katie

h4x354x0r
Contributor
Contributor

I've been fighting this problem for a couple weeks now. It started working once, after I was messing around in the Display prefs, but then I had to reboot my Mac for something else and the black screen came back. No amount of futzing with display prefs would bring it back. Part of my problem is that the licenses I'm getting through my institution are actually 365-day Evaluation licenses, not real licenses, obtained through a 3rd party, and there's absolutely ZERO support for them, and I can only get version 11.0 from there, not 11.1 or 11.5. I spent hours installing, uninstalling, reinstalling, upgrading, messing with settings, etc. to no avail.

Here's what I ended up doing to fix the black screen problem on my Mac when trying to upgrade to VMWare 11 and Mac OS Cortana:

1. Search my mac and delete every file with "VMWare" in it. There are quite a few of them in other places than what's listed in the KB Article on how to un-install Fusion 11. In particular, I found a VMMON file in /Library/PrivilegedHelperTools that I hadn't previously deleted. There were even a couple way down in /Private/etc/path.d, and a couple in [user]/Library/Application Support/com.apple.sharedfilelist/com.apple.LSSharedFileList.ApplicationRecentDocuments I deleted ALL of them.

2. Rebooted

3. Downloaded and installed version 11.5

4. VMWare wouldn't let me open my VM from inside the app, but I could right-click on my VM and say "Open with..." and open it up, and it worked.

I never had to do anything with screen recording settings, or anything else, once I really truly deleted ALL the VMWare files from my computer before rebooting and reinstalling. I had downloaded and installed the 11.5 version on top of my existing 11.0 installation, and it gave me an error that some vmon file was the wrong version, and wouldn't boot. I don't remember the exact text of the dialog, but I think it was referencing the VMMON file mentioned in point 1 above.

My VMWare is now up and running again, I can see the screen, I can work in it.

Huzzah!

I've got a blow-by-blow angry rant of all the other things I tried that didn't work posted on Twitter. Shoutout to the rep on twitter tonight who helped me out even though I'm not supposed to get any support. For the most part I had already gone through all the KB articles he pointed me to, but he tipped me off to the fact I could download the 11.5 version straight from VMWare, and the license I got from my cheesy licensing portal would work on it. That's what finally got me over the hump.