USB 3 devices not mounting in Win10 VM - Fusion 11.5.1 + Catalina 10.15.3

[9820Riverside]

I can't get any USB 3  / USB C devices to mount in a Win10 VM.  I'm not sure if this started with upgrade to Fusion 11 and/or Catalina (MacBook Pro 2018)???

I've read several articles with similar issues and no real fix.  When I plug in a USB 3 or C device it prompts to connect to Windows, It tries to mount, "bonks", several times, them the USB3 controlled shows (yellow !). I've tried uninstalling and reinstalling the controller/driver, all of them, with no luck.

Any suggestions?

[9820Riverside]

This is a problem with both USB 3.0 and 3.1 (USB C) devices.  I've tried going back to USB 2 and USB 1 mode with no luck.

[wila]

Hi,

Can confirm.

Seen that this week as well, a USB stick that I used many times in the past, now just did not get recognized by the VM.

Very frustrating.

What _did_ work in the end was the "old & ugly" workaround and put a USB2 hub between the USB3 device and the USB3 to USB-C dongle in my MBP.

Jay for the dongle fest and slower usb, but it worked.

--

Wil

[RickShu · Accepted solution]

Hi 9820Riverside,

What device are you connecting to VM? Is it a USB 3.1 gen 2 hard drive?

Also, you can try to add the following line to your vmx file and see if it helps.

usb.generic.keepStreamsEnabled = "FALSE"

Please back up your VM before you start to modify the vmx file.

Regards,

-Rick

[9820Riverside]

Yes, USB

[9820Riverside]

Yes, USB 3.1 Gen 2 (Samsung T-5 & a NVMe in a USB-C adapter).

I'll trying adding the line to the vmx and get back with results.

[9820Riverside]

IT WORKED!

Thanks!

[trillizo2]

I have the same issue the fix worked for Windows 10 but not for Linux. I get message that ""false"" is invalid and it sets usb.generic.keepStreamsEnabled "true". Still can't connect an external usb drive to Linux.

[PhilAussie]

Hi Rickshu,

I'm having same problem with USB drives.

I'm running Fusion 11.5.3 and was wondering if adding:

     usb.generic.keepStreamsEnabled = "FALSE"

into the vmx would help?

And if so, were in the file should the line of code be place? I tried one place but I had an error that said the application was corrupted. Recovered Ok but it would save me a lot of time to know exactly where the code should go.

Thanks

Phil

[PhilAussie]

Hi again RickShu,

Please ignore my original question about getting a corruption on the running of VMware Fusion 11.5.3. I obviously entered the code suggested by you incorrectly.

However, I still have a problem.

I'm trying to recover, using a Windows 10 Pro repair disk, from an image backup written on a USB connected expansion hard drives. I have actually written the backup to two drives as was having trouble with firstly a Seagate Expansion Portable drive and now a Western Digital My Passport drive.

The VMware is running on a MacBook Pro (mid 2015) under Mojave 10.14.6.

Using a Windows 10 Pro repair disk I get all the way through the recovery process to the point where Windows looks for the image copy I wish to use for the recovery.

I have tried using both drives on different trials and they are recognised by Fusion in Settings. I have requested that the drive I am using be connected to Windows.

I have modified the VM vmx file with the line of code you suggested. However Windows cannot find the drives. If I connect either drive to Windows under normal boot conditions, they do appear under Disk Management and Explorer so I believe the expansion disks are OK.

Can you offer any further suggestions?

Thanks again

Phil

[PhilAussie]

RickShu,

P.S. The Seagate data is written under NTFS and the WD data is written under ExFat. I tried both to see if this was causing a problem but as I expected it made no difference.

regards

Phil

[DepthToy]

Hi, Could you detail how you edited the .vmx file? I'm having trouble getting it to work - either within terminal, or via textedit.

Any help would be great

[MacDragon]

I've frankly been having this same issue, on last several fusion releases and also in tech preview now, with my usb c SSD's.

I've got the setting in VMX, but it seems to have no effect.

Also if I don't force the device to connect to windows in settings it seems to immiedietly disconnect and return to mac.

In windows, I get "

This device cannot start. (Code 10)

{Operation Failed}

The requested operation was unsuccessful.

"

On mass storage device driver in device manager.

[Mikero]

Your USB-C device might be USB 3.1, and Fusion and Workstation both only support up to USB 3.0 today.

This is a feature we've added to Fusion12 and Workstation 16.

[MacDragon]

I note that they behave same in current tech preview which lists as 3.1 support? So hoping it's something that been more fully added/fixed since last preview version then.. though I guess this note/query should be made more specifically made in preview forum.

[MacDragon]

Update: Had a thought, and went back and renabled that stream option that had been enabled, and then suddenly ssd showed up in preview.