October 14 patches to WIndows 8.1 64 bit breaks VMWare player 6.03

[martink_]

Just installed October 14th Windows patches on Win 81 64 bit.

After that and several reboots I get the error below

when trying to launch any of my VM's with VMWare Player 6.03.

The host has 6 GB of memory of which  4 GB is available and the guest memory is set to 700  - 1200 MB.

The log contains

2014-10-14T21:41:34.975+03:00| vmx| I120: FILE: FileCreateDirectoryRetry: Non-retriable error encountered (C:\ProgramData\VMware): Unknown error 183 (0xb7) (183)

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: FILE: FileCreateDirectoryRetry: Non-retriable error encountered (C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware Workstation): Unknown error 183 (0xb7) (183)

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: Msg_Reset:

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: [msg.dictionary.load.openFailed] Cannot open file "C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware Workstation\config.ini": Unknown error 2 (0x2).

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: ----------------------------------------

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: ConfigDB: Failed to load C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware Workstation\config.ini

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: FILE: FileCreateDirectoryRetry: Non-retriable error encountered (C:\ProgramData\VMware): Unknown error 183 (0xb7) (183)

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: FILE: FileCreateDirectoryRetry: Non-retriable error encountered (C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware Workstation): Unknown error 183 (0xb7) (183)

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: Msg_Reset:

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: [msg.dictionary.load.openFailed] Cannot open file "C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware Workstation\config.ini": Unknown error 2 (0x2).

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: ----------------------------------------

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: ConfigDB: Failed to load C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware Workstation\config.ini

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: FILE: FileCreateDirectoryRetry: Non-retriable error encountered (C:\ProgramData\VMware): Unknown error 183 (0xb7) (183)

2014-10-14T21:41:34.976+03:00| vmx| I120: FILE: FileCreateDirectoryRetry: Non-retriable error encountered (C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware Workstation): Unknown error 183 (0xb7) (183)

Restoring Windows to the state prior to the updates without any other action allows to start the VM's

Doe not happen on WIndows 7 64 bit.

My conclusion is that the patch breaks VMWare Player or the Windows configuration VMWare player is using.

[bajsal]

I had the same thing happen on my computer

It's running Windows 8.1 64 bit. It's got plenty of physical memory to spare

[a_p_ · Accepted solution]

Welcome to the Community,

see whether the workaround mentioned in Re: Windows 8.1 October rollup KB2995388 and issue with Workstation 10 will help.

André

[bajsal]

Many thanks, Andre.

I  added    vmmon.disableHostParameters = "TRUE"    to c:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware Player\config.ini

It didn't work at first.

After multiple reboots of Windows 8 and several attempts, it suddenly worked just like before.

[novafluxx]

Having the same issue. I downloaded VMware Player again and ran a repair with no change.

[Frank_de_Groot]

Same here, I resolved the issue by removing (optional) update KB2995388.

An alternative solution (in my case) was to reduce the required memory of an instance to 2GB or below.

[martink_]

Thank you all. Sorry about just posting, without searching. Never had any problems with VMWare after wireless network adapter not bein supported in Workstation 2.0.

Planned to try skip installing the problem update file, but was not fast enough.

Now I have installed the other ones, too, and player is working fine.

Added
vmmon.disableHostParameters = "TRUE"

to config.ini and will try the KB2995388 sometime later.