VMware Workstaion 12.5 & Smartcard reader

[cristobalmx]

Hello,

I'm running the following configuration:

• Host OS: Xubuntu 16.04
• VMware Workstation Pro 12.5.2 build-4638234
• Guest OS: Win 10 Pro
• HW: Lenovo ThinkPad P50

Problem: Neither the built-in Smartcard reader nor an external one are detected by the VM.

lsusb in the console shows

Bus 001 Device 011: ID 058f:9540 Alcor Micro Corp. AU9540 Smartcard Reader

Bus 001 Device 015: ID 076b:3022 OmniKey AG CardMan 3021

Starting Win 10 in the VM works fine, but the Smartcard readers are not detected. In the VM - > Removable devices menu both Smartcard readers are not shown.

Taking a look into the vmware.log don't show the devices as well.

I searched the forum and web for a workaround, found something for older releases of VMware Workstation but nothing for the issue I'm facing.

Attached a link to my vmware.log and .vmx file.

vmware - Google Drive

Any ideas?

Thanks for your support!

Cheers, Chris

[bonnie201110141 · Accepted solution]

To be able to use the shared smart card in VM, you need to install pcsc related stuffs:

sudo apt-get install libpcsclite1 pcscd pcsc-tools

Then you would be able to use shared smart card in VM.

However, if you want to use smartcard in passthrough mode, you need to do the following:

1. Open the vmx configuration file, located at /home/username/vmware/, using a text editor.
2. Insert this entry in the vmx configuration file to enable USB smart card passthrough:
   
   usb.generic.allowCCID = "TRUE"
   
   
3. Insert this entry in the vmx configuration file to disable the virtual smart card backend:
   
   usb.ccid.disable = "TRUE"
   
4. Run this command to stop the pcscd process:
   
   sudo /etc/init.d/pcscd stop
   
   
5. Run this command to verify that the pcscd process is not running:
   
   ps aux | grep pcscd

Let me know if this works for you.

[cristobalmx]

Hi Bonnie,

thanks for your great support, it works!