Fusion, VMtools, and Windows Update

[gringley]

So as an experiment I had been running VMtools 11.2 on some Windows guests as well as the Mac Big Sur guests.  The Windows guests are running 11.2.5 from January 2021.  Today Windows Update made me an optional update that really peaked my curiosity - a newer video driver!  I am aware that Windows Updates has been offering VMware drivers for a while, but a newer driver than you can download?  Presumably 11.2.5 is the newest tools you can get and was intended for ESXi 7.0 U1?

What is the Fusion position on allowing Windows Updates vs. the normal VMtools updates that occur with Fusion updates?

Why does Microsoft have a newer version of the SVGA driver than what you can download from VMware?

[wila]

Hi,

I'm not VMware, but this is not too hard to explain.

What happened is that the driver is now recognized by Microsoft to be used as an inbox driver. An inbox driver is a driver that comes standard with Microsoft Windows. Like other devices that just magically work without having to separately install a driver. This happened earlier with the vmxnet3 network driver from VMware.

The driver still has to be supplied and developed by VMware, it is not that the driver comes from Microsoft, they are just offering an easy update mechanism.

This is really great as it means your Windows VM will have proper screen resolution support "out of the box" without having to install VMware Tools instead of having to fall back on the old default SVGA driver.

You will be fine in regards to this working on VMware Fusion and VMware Tools. It's not "an accident", VMware has had to work hard to get here.

--
Wil

[gringley]

Yes I am aware of the VMXNET3 update.  It is going out right now and resetting the network on my Windows servers in ESX such that when I login afterwards I get prompted that the server is on a new network. I agree that it is helpful to have the basic VMware drivers in Windows after all these years.  For me the curiosity is that Windows Update would have an optional update that is newer than what you can download from VMware?!?  

I went down the rabbit hole of optional updates in 20H2 last month.  I have an older HP laptop that I run with M365 and Windows Business.  Over the years it periodically lost its marbles after BIOS updates and most recently lost its marbles after the 20H2 upgrade.  I found it was easier to just wipe the thing and reinstall and then let M365 put everything back.  This time with 20H2 a lot of things on the laptop did not work like Bluetooth, the SD card reader etc.  I looked on HP's website and saw that indeed HP had listed the laptop as end of support with Windows 10 1809.  I realized that the Windows Updates screen now had a link for 'Optional Updates' and then I clicked that, and there was "DRIVER UPDATES" and I expanded that, and there was the drivers for all the stuff on my laptop that was not working.  I applied all the updates and tada the laptop was back to normal. The lesson here is that Microsoft no longer loads older drivers in 20H2 even if Windows can see that they are needed.  I went back and looked at my iMac Pro Boot Camp - and yes there was a dozen or so driver updates in its 20H2 install that were not loaded as well.

Thus when I saw I had Optional Updates available on a VM guest running the latest VMtools on the latest version of a VMware product I was quite intrigued.   Up to now Optional Updates was for older drivers on older hardware.  Here I have a newer driver on the latest "hardware" as it were?

[wila]

Hi,

I certainly have seen optional hardware drivers for newer versions of hardware as well.
Thinking of intel / nvidia drivers etc..
My guess for the reason for it being optional is that you might not want to upgrade if it is currently working fine.

Perhaps somebody from VMware has a better answer, although it might be a question for Microsoft instead.

VMware has been pushing to get things like these drivers upstream.

--
Wil