Issues with Workstation 14 Pro "Not Responding"

[chrisff87]

I am having issues with Workstation Pro 14 "Not Responding" from time to time. I have noticed that it usually happens when I am switching between VMs, or when powering ON/OFF a VM. Sometimes Workstation enters a "Not Responding" state for up to 5min, in which time the whole console freezes and I can't do anything.

I don't believe it is a resource issue, as both my CPU and RAM stay below 50% utilization while the issue is happening.

Any suggestions as to what could be the cause?

My system/hardware is:

Windows 10 Build 1709

Intel i5 7500 CPU

24GB DDR4 RAM

Thank you.

[Christian2VMwar]

I'm experiencing the same behaviour using VMware Workstation 14.1.

Host: Windows 10 64bit Professional

Guest: Windows 7 64bit Professional

Intel Core i7 7820X

32 GB RAM

It's definitely not a resource issue. Host utilization 20%; Guest untilization 20% (1 Processor / 4 Cores allocated to the guest).

I see this about every two hours since I'm working with the guest almost exclusively.

Is there any logging that can be activated / checked to nail the root cause of this?

Regards,

Christian

[DodgeDeBoulet]

Are either of you running Webroot Antivirus?

I was running it, and discovered that it would cause my VMs to freeze for a few minutes at random times  throughout the day. The source of the issue was a bug in their schedule randomization feature, which is supposed to schedule the scan randomly within an hour of the time specifically scheduled in Advanced Settings. Un-selecting the randomization feature made the scans run at exactly the scheduled time (in my case, 3am) and my VMs no longer entered a "Not Responding" state during work hours.

[chrisff87]

I'm not. I just have the default Windows Defender that comes with Windows 10. I can try changing its schedule and see if it helps.

[Christian2VMwar]

No, I'm not running that anti-virus software.

In order to run my VMs unaffected by securiy software I've excluded all VMware processes and data files from surveillance.

[Christian2VMwar]

I think I've found the cause for the freezing VMs. The vmware.log file contains the following entries

<<

2018-01-01T13:39:10.976+01:00| vcpu-0| I125: sata0:1: Command *UNKNOWN (0x4a)* took 60.159 seconds (ok)

2018-01-01T13:39:11.017+01:00| vcpu-0| I125: AHCI-VMM: sata0:1 Port COMRESET requested.

2018-01-01T13:39:11.017+01:00| vcpu-0| I125: AHCI-VMM: sata0:1: Moved to COMRESET state.

2018-01-01T13:39:11.017+01:00| vcpu-0| I125: AHCI-VMM: sata0:1: Exiting COMRESET state.

2018-01-01T13:39:11.029+01:00| vcpu-0| I125: AHCI-SHARED:Not posting RFIS on port: 1, since FR bit is not set.

>>

As you can see there is a failed sata operation logged that matches exactly to the time where the vm freezed. I find this entry around once per hour.

Is this a VMware Workstation 14.1 bug or does someone see a solution by configuration?