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KennDevine
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Audio not working on Windows 10 VM after v12.5.4 upgrade

I have two, 64-bit Windows 10 Pro VMs running on a Windows 10 Pro host. The host is a Dell Latitude E-6430.

One of the VMs rolled up just fine, but the other is throwing errors regarding the audio controller. The speaker icon in the system tray is marked with a red X. When clicked, Windows attempts to repair the error and fails. Device Manager does not show an entry for Sound, Video, and Game Controllers like the 'good' VM does, but rather an entry for Other Devices where the Multimedia Audio Controller is shown with a yellow triangle and the device status is listed as Code 28, "The drivers for this device are not installed".

I've rerun the VMWare tools update; first Repair, then Modify where I removed the device from both Device Manager and VMWare, rebooted, reinstalled, and the condition persists. I've tried manually installing the driver, but that fails with the message "The installation failed because a function driver was not specified for this device instance". References for this type of error harken back to Win XP and Vista days; I've tried what I've seen but nothing has worked so far.

Can anyone offer any sage advice?

Kind regards,

Kenn in Virginia

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wila
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Hi,

Not the advice I  usually give, but try installing a previous version of VMware Tools.


For the moment the link in this post here should work:

Re: Fusion 8.5.4 (5115894) VMware Tools Error

and if that one stops working you can get the bits here:

Windows.iso from VMware Fusion 8.5.3

--

Wil

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

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wila
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Hi Kenn,

You are correct in assessing that it is most likely a VMware Tools issue.

Do not try a repair install from within the Guest OS as it likely will not fix this, unfortunately the "Reinstall VMware Tools" from the drop down menu also falls in that same category.

You really need the guest OS to reboot inbetween uninstall and install to make sure that all the files from VMware Tools are in the correct locations and of the correct version.

In short follow these steps:

  • Uninstall VMware Tools
  • Reboot guest OS
  • Install VMware Tools
  • Reboot guest OS.

Follow the steps from the installer to completely uninstall VMware Tools 

  • Reboot the guest OS.
  • Then from the Virtual Machine menu select "Install VMware Tools"


--

Wil

| Author of Vimalin. The virtual machine Backup app for VMware Fusion, VMware Workstation and Player |
| More info at vimalin.com | Twitter @wilva
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KennDevine
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Appreciate the response, Wila:

Ah, were it to be that simple but alas, I removed VMware Tools and rebooted to Guest OS as instructed. After logging in, I noticed the speaker icon in the system tray is still marked with a red X. Device Manager now shows two entries for Other Devices; "Multimedia Audio Controller" and "Unknown device". Reinstalled VMWare tools using the "Typical" option and rebooted again. The red X in the system try remains, along with the lone entry for Other Devices; "Multimedia Audio Controller".

Next, I manually removed the entry for Other Devices; "Multimedia Audio Controller" and went through the VMWare Tools uninstall/re-install process. Same results; the red X in the system try remains, along with the lone entry for Other Devices; "Multimedia Audio Controller".

From the Windows troubleshooter, I was able to capture the registry settings for the [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\MMDevices] tree and subtrees, but at 35 KB, its a bit long to post in this forum. Can send under separate cover if this is the next path to take.

Many thanks again, Wila.

Kind regards,

Kenn in Virginia

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NickC_FR
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Encountering the same exact issue with Windows 10 x64 EE 1607.   The install/uninstall sequence doesn't resolve the issue and a Unknown device shows up in device manager.

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bluefirestorm
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Looks like VMWare has messed up big time in this latest update (both in Workstation Pro and Fusion).

I also lost audio in two Windows 10 Professional x64 guests (one on Windows x64 Home host and the other on macOS Sierra host on Fusion). Lost audio as well on an Ubuntu EFI guest on Fusion (and looked like also lost the ability to set display for any other resolution other than 4:3 aspect ratio).

What I had done to recover the audio on the Windows 10 guests were to update manually the driver of the "Unknown Device" or "Multimedia Audio Controller".
Assuming you have a backup (either from a snapshot or disk backup) or another unaffected VM guest, check to see if you have the C:\Program Files\Common Files\VMWare\Drivers\audio folder in the guest. On the other hand, if you have a snapshot or backup, you may also choose to not update the Tools for now (that is what I have chosen with the Ubuntu EFI guest).

Assuming, you want to go ahead with the tools update and the audio problem persists, copy this audio driver folder to the updated guest(s) and install manually the audio driver.

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wila
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Hi,

Not the advice I  usually give, but try installing a previous version of VMware Tools.


For the moment the link in this post here should work:

Re: Fusion 8.5.4 (5115894) VMware Tools Error

and if that one stops working you can get the bits here:

Windows.iso from VMware Fusion 8.5.3

--

Wil

| Author of Vimalin. The virtual machine Backup app for VMware Fusion, VMware Workstation and Player |
| More info at vimalin.com | Twitter @wilva
KennDevine
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Thanks for the feedback, BlueFirestorm:

Sad to report that re-installing the drivers manually did not work. Moreover, this version of VMWare Tools is missing the C:\Program Files\Common Files\VMWare\Drivers\audio folder :smileyalert: It is also missing on the other, working, Win10x64 guest. I matched every installed sys and inf file in their locations from the working guest to the non-working guest - both match.

KB article 2007298, updated 3/12 addresses this issue in general but does not mention the missing audio controller explicitly. However, I followed that one too and could not correct the audio.

I had another Win10x64 guest installed that I had not run for while (pre v12.5.4) . I sparked that up with the hope of capturing the contents of its C:\Program Files\Common Files\VMWare\Drivers\audio folder on a flash drive and bringing it into the non-audio working machine. Unbeknownst to me, the VMWare update began during startup and when I drilled down to the C:\Program Files\Common Files\VMWare\Drivers\ folder, I watched the Audio subfolder disappear while the remaking folders; dates updated to 2/17/2017, automagically.C:\Program Files\Common

Wonder how I can get my hands on the C:\Program Files\Common Files\VMWare\Drivers\audio folder from the previous version.

--> Insert groans here as I reveal that I have no backups or snapshots of the rogue guest 'cuz I'm an idiot . . .

Kind regards,

Kenn in Virginia

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bluefirestorm
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KennDevine,

You can change the settings for the VMWare Tools in Preferences - Update so that the tools does not get installed automatically.

Perhaps all is not lost as you can extract the drivers also manually.

https://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=20321...

Just do a re-install and use the /a /p options as specified in the KB article.

I tried it and it will prompt for a folder to extract to. Let's say you specified C:\Extract you should be able to find the audio folder in C:\Extract\VMware\VMware Tools\Drivers\audio\Vista

KennDevine
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I extend my gratitude to you, Wila, for providing me a solution that works, along with a valid working link to the VMware Tools iso from Fusion 8.5.4. But, caveat emptor, I needed to TURN OFF automatic VMware Tools update; when I rebooted after reinstalling the old tools, the new tools slid back in and made themselves at home. Two more reboots later, and everything is good.

Much obliged for the fellowship  on this forum.

Kind regards,

Kenn in Virginia

WhiteKnight
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Same thing here.

Strange: of 8 VMs I'm currently running on my machine (mainly Windows 10/64, v1607), only one shows the audio driver error.



[VMware]: Workstation 17 Pro; --
[host]: Windows 10x64 host; --
[guests]: Windows 10x64, Windows 8x64.
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zahik1
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Same problem for me.
But also installed today ver. 12.5.5 of workstation with updated vmtools and the same error (i saw they claim to fix this- but not).
Moving back to the old 8.5.3 fusion version solution here.....

zahik

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rmuncrief
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After some investigation it appears VMWare is using an audio device that isn't supported by Windows 10, and it appears not even Vista. The hardware id is VEN_1274&DEV_1371&SUBSYS_13711274&REV_02 which is an old Creative Sound Blaster card from the Windows XP days. I searched for Windows Vista/10 drivers for it on the Internet and there weren't any legitimate drivers available. By the way, there are a lot of shady driver websites out there and they're all dangerous so don't download anything from them.

Even more odd is that there doesn't appear to be any audio drivers in the VMWare Tools package. I extracted the package to my C: drive and there's no "audio" driver directory at all. So it appears that VMWare purposely released the tools package without audio drivers. Which, if you've used VMWare products for a long time, isn't surprising.

By the way, once you allow Player 12.5.4 or 12.5.5 to "upgrade" VMWare tools you're toast. I have a backup of the previous VMWare Tools ISO that worked, but after reinstalling there still wasn't any sound. Curiously when extracting the package to my C: drive it didn't have any audio drivers either.

So who knows, maybe the Anniversary Update of Windows 10 changed something that hammered whatever scheme VMWare was using. In any case, given my past experiences with VMWare I wouldn't expect a fix anytime soon. If it's less than a year I'll be shocked. Oh well. The fact is that VirtualBox has even worse problems, so there really isn't much end users can do.

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zahik1
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Thanks for the info rmuncrief​.
For me, (after installing also 12.5.5 and not working as at you) , I installed the solution here
ver 8.5.3 and it's working....

Best Regars.
zahik.

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gendrol75
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Wila's suggestion also worked for me.

I'm on 12.5.5 and my audio device stopped working today (after I installed the big Win10 creators update on my host). Uninstalling Tools on the guest and reinstalling the version from Fusion 8.5.3 fixed my issue.

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sramabadran
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Is there any update on this issue ?

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Tfid
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Hello all,

Thank you for this post which helped me a lot !

Today I find a way to have the latest vm tools installed with the sound ok.

A few days ago, I was following this article https://blog.bryansmart.com/2012/02/16/low-latency-sound-for-vmware/

With sound.virtualDev = "hdaudio"in the vmx file, I had sound in my win10 guest (linux host) but with problems (the sound crackles due to latency problem, see article)

When I wanted to disable HD audio and use the old virtual sound device with sound.virtualDev = "es1371", I had no more sound at all.

Then I find this subject with google, as I finished with the same problem.

Willa solution worked for me too.

I made several test and in fact, it seems that the driver for "es1371" (WDM audio) is no more available in vmware tool since VMware-tools-10.1.X

I tried with many of them from 10.1.0 to 10.1.7, and it didn't worked. (Index of /45848/tools/releases )

With 10.0.9, the driver are here and it works.

So I copied the drivers after the installation of vmtools-10.0.9

All you need is in C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\ (All is here, .sys and .inf files)

Get a copy of the directories vmaudio.inf_amd64_30933caaaa23abee/ and wdmaudio.inf_amd64_bf7ec511830b3442/

Copy them in a vmaudio directory.

Then I installed the latest tool and installed the vmaudio driver. And all is working again Smiley Happy

Open the device manager, find the device undetected and choose to update the driver manually.

Select your vmaudio dir you created before and all will be fine.

Tell me if it works for you too.

Have fun.

kingofbytes01
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This worked - I went back to version 12.3 and have success!

Just don't forget to go into VMware workstation preferences and de-select the "Automatically update VMware Tools on Client" checkbox.

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nicitforum
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Thanks you !

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vmesxi201110141
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Wila's suggestion also worked for me also with the second link he provided.

Thank you Wila

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