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shibu_nyc
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Workstation Pro 16.0 stopped booting in PopOS

I use Workstation Pro 16.0 every day on a Pop!_OS 20.10 host (similar to Ubuntu).  Yesterday when I tried to launch Workstation Pro 16.0, I got a "VMware Kernal  Module Updater" window stating "Before you can run VMware, sever modules must be compiled and loaded into the running kernal.".

Then another window with a red exclamation mark appears stating:

Unable to install all modules. See log /tmp/vmware-drk/-vmware4287.log for details. (Exit code 1)


It was working fine the previous day. I'm not sure what happened. I did have a minor OS update but I get those 2-3 times per week. I was worried about something like this happening when I upgraded from Pop OS 20.0 to 20.1 but i wouldn't have thought a minor OS update would cause this.

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6 Replies
wila
Immortal
Immortal

Hi,

Try upgrading to the new version of Workstation 16 that was released today.

https://www.vmware.com/go/getworkstation-linux

--
Wil

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

I upgraded workstation Pro 16.0 to 16.1 and it is launching again!

I did not realize the new version was released.

Thank you Willa.

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ADutta
Contributor
Contributor

Hey there! 

I also had the same issue with version 16.0 in pop os 20.10 (kernel 5.11). Followed your advice and upgraded to version16.1.0 and then 16.1.1. The player launches now but new vms are not shown in the home menu and neither can I open existing vms. Creating new vms will created all the files in the vmware folder yet no vm is shown in the home menu and neither can I open them.

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wila
Immortal
Immortal

Hi,

That sounds like your preferences.ini file is not owned by the user, but by root.
This can happen if you started vmware player with sudo.

I don't have a linux box with VMware Player handy, but IIRC then the preferences.ini file is located in:
/home/user/.vmware/

Check who owns this file and/or if your normal user can make changes to it.

Alternatively... start vmware player as root (not recommended, but it probably works too)

--
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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ADutta
Contributor
Contributor

Yes, I started the installer with sudo. But the thing is, you can't install it without root permissions and not even using fakeroot, as the installer wont let you to. And yeah, the user is the owner of the preferences.ini file inside of /home/user/.vmware

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ADutta
Contributor
Contributor

Also, running the program as root does not seem to solve the problem either.

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