VMWare Workstation 16 Pro + Ubuntu 22.04.1 - VM unresponsive with high CPU

[ki81]

Hi All,

I've recently installed VMWare and Ubuntu on a new Windows 10 laptop and I'm finding that after a period of time the VM consistently becomes unresponsive and CPU usage spikes to 100%. If I suspend and awaken the VM it works for a period before the problem reoccurs.

How do I go about solving this?

[BW3]

@cb831 I'm running Windows 10 Pro standalone (not connected to a Windows Domain or patch management system).  I go to Settings > Update & Security > Windows Updates > View Update History > Uninstall Updates.   Then I find the Security update for Microsoft Windows (KB5017308) right click and click uninstall.  That is the update that seems to be breaking Linux VMs in VMware Workstation 16.2.4.  If you are not able to uninstall using the described method then I would venture a guess that your box might be part of a Active Directory Domain and or some sort of patch management system that restricts your ability to uninstall certain updates.

[cb831]

I uninstalled the monthly win10 update for September 2022 (KB5017308) and successfully mitigated the problem.

However, the monthly update for October (KBN5018410) installed yesterday presents the same issue. And I can't keep unprotecting my PC.

@VMware needs to investigate this problem and fix the vmtools (I guess) or suggest a way to circumvent this without disabling Win10 HyperV (running in user mode) or jeopardizing Win10 security.

Thanks

[TheCsWiz]

This is definitely a problem created by Micro$haft updates.

For some time now, Micro$haft has gone out of their way to make it near impossible to use any other virtualization engine except for Hyper-V.  Unlike pretty much all of the other virtualization engines, Hyper-V forces everyone else to be Hyper-V-compatible.

The update in September broke VMs (Running Linux, primarily Ubuntu 16.04 and 20.04) that have been stable for MULTIPLE YEARS.

The VMs lock up.  If I am actively using the VM, the symptom manifests as the VM quickly going from responsive to sluggish, to extremely sluggish, to unresponsive.

Suspending the VM (using the 'pause' icon on the toolbar) then unsuspending restores functionality for a bit, then everything repeats.  I have my VMs using 12G to 16G of memory, so restoring from paused takes a lot of time as the memory image is restored.

Sadly, it is unlikely we will see a fix from VMware, since it is Micro$haft that broke things and Micro$haft is GLACIALLY SLOW with respect to fixing problems they created.

[FixBug]

Same problem, stops responding after a while 😞

Ubuntu 22.04.1
VMware® Workstation Technology Preview 22H2 Pro

[craigfinnan]

After installing KB5018410 (part of the Microsoft October Patch Tuesday update, 2022-10 Cumulative Update for Windows 10 Version 21H2 for x64-based Systems) my issues with VM hangs seems to have been fixed. So it appears that the (unacknowledged) defect introduced in the September update (KB5017308) has been remedied. At least it appears that way so far. YMMV, but now I am able to reliably use Workstation 16 with the Hyper-V virtualization platform enabled.

[cb831]

That is NOT what I see on my Windows 10 21H2 x64 Pro.

When I uninstalled the september KB5017308 - everything was fine.

When I updated windows in oktober and got KB5018410 it was worse than ever.

When uninstalled KB5018410 - everything was fine

When windows reinstalled KB5018410 - nothing works more than 5-10min.

I'm now considering converting my VMWare Ubuntu 22 vm to Hyper-V.

[cb831]

I gave up on VMWare Desktop and converted my Ubuntu VM to Hyper-V which has been running my VM flawlessly all day. Unfortunately, I could only convert to gen 1 VM meaning that I lose some of all the nice things VMWare offers in terms of device handover between host and VM and the automatic resizing of the ubuntu desktop, but now my Ubuntu workplace is stable and that is more important.

[_h]

The problem didn't get better after installing KB5018410, but after I tried VMware Workstation Technology Preview 22H2 Pro the VMs seem to be running fine for a couple of hours without freezing.

Installing KB5018410+Workstation Technology Preview 22H2 might be a solution, though it sounds funny to give up using a stable build of Workstation.

[_h]

Well, my VM froze just now. The problem does not seem to be resolved.

[rlarsonil71]

Going to check the Microsoft support community to see if there are any posts on this issue that their Windows monthly updates introduced in September 2022 and are not resolved with the October 2022 Windows monthly updates.

[rlarsonil71]

Created the following post in the Microsoft Windows Community (after doing a search and coming up empty):

Microsoft Windows Community - VMware Workstation 16 Pro + Ubuntu 22.04.1 - VM unresponsive with high...

🤞

[rlarsonil71]

I was directed in my most recent reply here to post in the Microsoft Site Q&A site which is a technical community platform where most of the members are IT professionals rather than the Microsoft Windows Community (which I guess is for home users only).

The latest post in this Microsoft Site Q&A site was recently written by another user:   🤞
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/1053136/vmware-workstation-vms-unresponsive-afte...

[_h]

Well I wrote that post in Microsoft Site Q&A.

Has anyone post this question on the Windows Feedback Hub? I cannot find any related post in English after a period of search.

Actually the symptoms on my VMs seem to be relieving. The problem only happened once after updating to the VMWare Workstation 22H2 Tech Preview + Windows 10 22H2. The VMs on my computer can now run for a long time without freezing.

[rlarsonil71]

I have not.  Busy working a lot of other things this week.  Thanks.

[Eris2323]

Any updates on this issue?   I too am seeing this issue in a subset of my VMware Workstation 16.1.2 user base.   I verified that this occurs starting with the September Windows Security patches.

Are there any workarounds people are using?

I have a couple of people who seem to see the issue after their laptop comes out of sleep/hibernation so I am having them adjust their power settings to prevent sleep/hibernation when on AC power as one possible workaround.

[_h]

I've been busy with other things recently and did not use my VMs much.

I've run the VMs several times without problems since

My Current Solution:

Update to Windows 10 22H2 (10.0.19045.2130)

Uninstall Workstation 16.2.4 and Install Wokstation 22H2 Tech Preview from https://communities.vmware.com/t5/Workstation-Tech-Preview/ct-p/WS-TP 

I didn't turn off any Hyper-V related features, didn't modify any power settings.

Hope someone find this useful or find a better solution.

[ddmitric80]

Hello,

I have a user with same issue exactly. This week we uninstalled KB5018410, but it was reinstalled automatically and brought back the issue. I was wondering, since I went through all replys and they are all related to Win10 OS and Cumulative updates for Win10. But does this happen on Win11?

Regards,

Davor

[jbuck1]

This issue is not limited to Ubuntu 

I have older Redhat/CentoS 5 guests that started locking up out of the blue.  only way to recover is to hard reset.  Nothing in the Guest logs show a problem.. Just stops responding.

[boomshankerx]

Confirmed symptoms

Windows 10 22H2 Version 10.0.19045 Build 19045
VMware® Workstation 16 Pro 16.2.4 build-20089737
Kali 2022.3 Guest

Hyper-V features are not installed. I am however using WSL2
2022-10-29T03:09:02.385Z In(05) vmx Monitor Mode: ULM

I can confirm that turning off Windows Hypervisor Platform seems to mitigate the issue. 

bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype off

[mboekhold]

Struggling with this issue as well. If anybody from VMWare is interested, I can post an extract from the kernel messages with the CPU soft lockups. There is lots of information being dumped...

Note that I cannot disable Hyper-V. Corporate laptop, Hyper-V required for many things...