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CesRo
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After Windows Update, Workstation 14 and now Workstation PRO 15 wont load VMs

Hello guys!

Have some issues..

First.. my specs:

AMD Threadripper 1950X @ 3.95Ghz 16/32

ASUS PRIME X399

32GB Corsair BDIE DDR43600 Ram @ 3466

ASUS XONAR DX

Gigabyte Gaming G1 1070GTX

1x NVME 250Gb ( Corsair MP500 )

1x SSD (Crucial MX300 512GB)

1x HDD ( Seagate 4TB )

OS: Windows 10.

Now The problem..

Before the updates of October.. I could run my VMs with no issue on Workstation 14.

After the update, I'm getting 2 errors constantly with zero additional information of whats going on.

The errors in player :  "Error While Powering on: cannot find a valid peer process to  connect to"

The error in Workstation: "Cannot find a valid peer process to connect to"

And sometimes "Internal error".

Doesnt matter what option do I select, all VMs, new and old cannot boot with this issue.

I did check the Licensing and other services. They seem to work.

Now here is the strange part.

I uninstalled, erased EVERY directory (program files, appdata dir).

downloaded Workstation PRO 15 and ran it as evaluation to see if it was a corrupted installation (even after one repair on Workstation 14, it did the same error). But the problem persisted identically on Workstation Pro 15.

I have memory protection off in Windows Defender, Windows Firewall off, I have allowed both in my Antivirus (ESET NOD32) and my firewall (COMODO FIREWALL) the app.

I ran as Administrator... and nothing, same error.

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haiweiz
VMware Employee
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From your log, you had done some cleanup manually, but not let uninstaller do the cleanup, so I guess your next installation confusion your system.

Try these steps:

1. Uninstall any Workstation version in your system, make sure there has no "vmware Workstation" entry in your "control panel->uninstall a program" list.

2. Download Workstation 15.0 installer.

3. Open one command line with administrator privilege

4. Run these command make sure those services are stopped or not exist:

sc query VMUSBArbService

sc query VMwareHostd

sc query VMAuthdService

sc query vmx86

sc query hcmon

For example:

If you got this output means the service is running/stopped.

SERVICE_NAME: vmauthdservice

        TYPE               : 10  WIN32_OWN_PROCESS

        STATE              : 4  RUNNING  === :1 STOPPED

                                (STOPPABLE, NOT_PAUSABLE, IGNORES_SHUTDOWN)

        WIN32_EXIT_CODE    : 0  (0x0)

        SERVICE_EXIT_CODE  : 0  (0x0)

        CHECKPOINT         : 0x0

        WAIT_HINT          : 0x0

If you got this output means the service is not exist:

[SC] EnumQueryServicesStatus:OpenService FAILED 1060:

The specified service does not exist as an installed service.

5. Reboot your host.

6. Open one command line with administrator privilege, goto your downloaded Workstation installer path, run this:

VMware-workstation-full-15.0.0-10134415.exe -r

The UI will prompt what the installer try to do and follow the instruction to finish the repair operation.

When the repair down, it will prompt you to reboot.

7. After reboot, try to run VMware-workstation-full-15.0.0-10134415.exe again.

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haiweiz
VMware Employee
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Hi, CesRo:

Upload Installer, UI and VM's log for diagnostic, you can find them in:

UI log: %temp%\vmware-$(your_user_name)\*.log

VM log: Your VM directory\vmware*.log

Installer: %temp%\vminst*.log and %temp%\vmmsi*.log

Thanks.

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CesRo
Contributor
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Attaching logs..

There are no logs in the CENTOS Virtual Machine because it never booted.

Note that it shows again VMWARE PRO 14, I did a roll back because I think update 8006 of Windows crippled my windows installation. (other 2 programs are also having issues running properly)

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haiweiz
VMware Employee
VMware Employee
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From your log, you had done some cleanup manually, but not let uninstaller do the cleanup, so I guess your next installation confusion your system.

Try these steps:

1. Uninstall any Workstation version in your system, make sure there has no "vmware Workstation" entry in your "control panel->uninstall a program" list.

2. Download Workstation 15.0 installer.

3. Open one command line with administrator privilege

4. Run these command make sure those services are stopped or not exist:

sc query VMUSBArbService

sc query VMwareHostd

sc query VMAuthdService

sc query vmx86

sc query hcmon

For example:

If you got this output means the service is running/stopped.

SERVICE_NAME: vmauthdservice

        TYPE               : 10  WIN32_OWN_PROCESS

        STATE              : 4  RUNNING  === :1 STOPPED

                                (STOPPABLE, NOT_PAUSABLE, IGNORES_SHUTDOWN)

        WIN32_EXIT_CODE    : 0  (0x0)

        SERVICE_EXIT_CODE  : 0  (0x0)

        CHECKPOINT         : 0x0

        WAIT_HINT          : 0x0

If you got this output means the service is not exist:

[SC] EnumQueryServicesStatus:OpenService FAILED 1060:

The specified service does not exist as an installed service.

5. Reboot your host.

6. Open one command line with administrator privilege, goto your downloaded Workstation installer path, run this:

VMware-workstation-full-15.0.0-10134415.exe -r

The UI will prompt what the installer try to do and follow the instruction to finish the repair operation.

When the repair down, it will prompt you to reboot.

7. After reboot, try to run VMware-workstation-full-15.0.0-10134415.exe again.

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CesRo
Contributor
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Hi Haiweiz,

My windows def was corrupted. Reinstalled everything from zero and now vmware workstation working normally.

Patch 8003 and 8009 corrupted either framework or other critical component because Workstation Pro was not the only thing failing.

To clarify, I did uninstall using the uninstall tool, then tried to remove any trace. Noticed that a lot of things ran the uninstallation correctly but never removed traces..

Hence why I was thinking there was some serious corruption in Windows. (I still hate how most corruption of framework, and other critical components of windows, are not caught with the sfc scan, or other integrity checks)

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haiweiz
VMware Employee
VMware Employee
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Glad to know this issue resolved. Thanks!

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