VMWare Tools suddenly stopped working with Exception 0xc0000006 (disk error while paging)

[varnk]

Using Workstation 12.5.9 build-7535481

Out of the blue, the error in the subject line pops up when I start my VM.  VMWare tools clipboard no longer works once this error occurs.  Not sure what else may be broken related to Tools.  What is causing this problem and is there a fix?

[RDPetruska]

Host OS and version?

Guest OS and version?

Tools version?

Attach vmware.log file ...

[varnk]

Host OS and version? = Windows 10 1809

Guest OS and version? = Windows 10 2004 (just upgraded from 1909)

Tools version? = 10.1.6, build-5214329

Attach vmware.log file ... Couldn't attach file here, but I created a OneDrive share link: https://1drv.ms/u/s!ArERiQKI4v-YgWCTChJfPffl2bPe?e=KxLnEu

[varnk]

One more item to mention.  After I upgraded Windows 10 to 2004, the Start Menu would no longer work and that is coincidentally when VMWare Tools also displayed the error. 

Luckily I had a backup of the VM on an external drive.  I restored from that backup, which had a Windows 10 OS at 1809 that had not been updated since this past April.  After doing that, the VMWare tools error stopped occurring.   I am not sure why installing the 2004 Win 10 update suddenly broke VMware Tools and the Windows 10 Start Menu.  Very strange.

[varnk]

I've narrowed down the possible cause of the VMWare tools problem a bit (at least I think I have).  After I reverted to a snapshot, the tools problem went away.

However, I realized a change that I had made to the Windows 10 text size wasn't on the snapshot.  It turns out that when I changed my Windows 10 Scale and Layout to use 125% text size (Settings->Display), the VMWare tools popup error came back again after I rebooted.  It seems like the problem is related to using a larger text size in Windows 10 settings for some reason.