What's in the Release Notes

About VMware Fusion

VMware Fusion is the easiest, fastest, and most reliable way to run Windows and other x86 based operating systems on a Mac without rebooting.

For more information, go to the VMware Fusion Docs website.

Prior Releases

Features and Known Issues from prior releases of VMware Fusion are described in the release notes for each release. To view the release notes for prior releases of VMware Fusion 8, click the following links:

VMware Fusion 8.5.9
VMware Fusion 8.5.8
VMware Fusion 8.5.7
VMware Fusion 8.5.6
VMware Fusion 8.5.5
VMware Fusion 8.5.4
VMware Fusion 8.5.3
VMware Fusion 8.5.2
VMware Fusion 8.5.1
VMware Fusion 8.5
VMware Fusion 8.1.1
VMware Fusion 8.1
VMware Fusion 8.0.2
VMware Fusion 8.0.1
VMware Fusion 8.0

Security

This update of VMware Fusion exposes hardware support for branch target injection mitigation to VMware guests. This hardware is used by some guest operating systems to mitigate CVE-2018-5715 (also called by the name 'Spectre').

For a guest operating system to use hardware support for branch target injection mitigation, the following steps must be taken:

1. Install this update of VMware Fusion
2. Ensure that your VM is using Hardware Version 9 or higher. For best performance, Hardware Version 11 or higher is recommended.
3. Update your guest operating system with fixes for CVE-2018-5715 (consult the operating system vendor for these updates).
4. Update the host firmware (or CPU microcode, if host firmware cannot be updated).

Please see VMware knowledge base article 52085 for more details.

These release notes cover the following topics:

Known Issues

The following issues might occur in VMware Fusion 7.1.

• Some Windows Applications Verify Opening Every Time
  On a Mac running OS X 10.10.1, some Windows applications will show the message You are opening the application for the first time every time the application is opened.

  Workaround: Copying the virtual machine to a new location may resolve the issue.

• Slow Graphics Performance in Virtual Machines Created in Fusion 7
  On some older Macs, graphics performance may be slower for virtual machines created in Fusion 7 or virtual machines upgraded to the newest hardware features in Fusion 7.

  Workaround: Downgrading the virtual hardware version of a virtual machine may improve graphics performance.
  To do this:

  1. Shut down the virtual machine.
  2. Navigate to Settings > Compatibility.
  3. Click the Advanced options triangle.
  4. Select 10 on the Use Hardware Version popup.

• Mac Fails to Wake Up
  Occasionally, a Mac running Fusion may fail to wake up.

  Workaround: Some customers reported working around this issue by insuring the Mac is plugged in (not running on battery) or had the Battery Life setting in the Display settings panel set to Use High Performance Graphics for 3D Applications Only. We are continuing to investigate this issue.

• iMac Virtual Machine Poor Performance
  Some users running Fusion on a Mid-2011 iMac with OS X 10.10 installed may see poor performance of their virtual machines.

  Workaround: Until this issue is resolved, the following work around can help:
  

  1. On the iMac, run the Terminal application.
  2. Type the following and press return: sudo nvram boot-args=debug=0x10
  3. Enter your password (you must be an administrator on the machine).
  4. Reboot the iMac.

• The Easy Install feature is not supported for certain guest operating systems.
  Easy Install is not supported for the following guest operating systems:

  • Windows 10 Technical Preview
  • OpenSUSE 13.2
  • SUSE Linux Enterprise 12
  • Fedora 21 Beta

  Workaround: Install the guest operating system and VMware Tools manually.

• Skype Audio and Video Performance
  Using Skype from within a virtual machine may result in poor audio and video quality.

  Workaround: Where practical, use Skype directly, outside of Fusion.

• Remote Virtual Machine Display Problems
  When a remote virtual machine window is resized the display resolution is not changed; rather the pixels will be scaled to meet the new window size. Similarly, entering full screen does not change the resolution either.

  Workaround: Manually set the resolution with the UI in the virtual machine operating system.

• Can't Hear Sound Using Headset with Windows 8 Virtual Machine
  In some cases, attaching a USB headset to a virtual machine running Windows 8 will fail and no sound will be heard

  Workaround: Do not pass the headset to the virtual machine, allow the Mac to use it. If needed, change the audio settings in System Preferences to send audio to the headset.

• OS X Virtual Machine Fails to Start
  An OS X virtual machine uploaded to a server running on Mac hardware will fail to start.

  Workaround: Add smc.present = 'TRUE' to the virtual machine VMX file after uploading the virtual machine to the server.

• Microsoft Office 2013 Performance Slow
  When using Microsoft Office 2013 with Fusion 7.1, the UI may update slowly.

  Workaround: : In each of the Microsoft Office applications, disabling graphics acceleration will increase the UI performance.

• Audio Echos When Using Conferencing Software
  When using audio conferencing software inside a virtual machine significant audio echo may occur.

  Workaround: Using a headset instead of the Mac built-in mic should reduce the amount of echo experienced. Keepass for osx.

• 3D rendering is not available in some guest operating systems if you use virtual hardware version 11.
  If you upgrade a virtual machine from virtual hardware version 10 to 11, you might lose 3D functionality in the virtual machine.

  Workaround: For Windows guest operating systems, upgrade VMware Tools to the latest version, which is included with Fusion 7.1. For Linux guests, only the following distributions are currently supported for virtual hardware version 11:

  • Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and above
  • Ubuntu 12.04.5 LTS and above
  • Fedora 20 with latest updates and above
  For other Linux distributions and versions, if you plan to use 3D functionality, downgrade the virtual hardware version to 10.

Resolved Issues

The following issues have been resolved in VMware Fusion 7.1.

• Resolved an issue where the built-in camera would fail to show video in a virtual machine running Windows 7.

• Resolved an issue with virtual machines running Windows 2000 where resizing the virtual machine window would not resize the desktop within the virtual machine.

• Fixed a rare issue that could occur when switching between Single Window and Full Screen mode after connecting or disconnecting monitors to your Mac.

• Fixed an issue where installing VMware Tools on Fedora 21 would fail.

• Fixed a rare issue where VMware Fusion would not correctly switch to the integrated GPU.

• Fixed an issue where VMware Fusion running on Mac OS X 10.10 would not properly handle changes to the system audio configuration.

• Improved the UI for the Connect to Server dialog.

• Fixed an issue where very small screen updates such as the blinking cursor might not be shown in a virtual machine with both the Accelerate 3D Graphics and the Use full resolution for Retina display checkboxes in the Display settings panel checked.

• Added support to auto-detect the OS type when creating a virtual machine with the Windows 10 Technical Preview ISO.

• Fixed a rare crash when starting up a virtual machine with Bluetooth sharing enabled.

• Improved the performance of some graphics operations on large displays.

• Fixed a number of issues with keyboard mapping on international keyboards.

• Fixed an issue with remote virtual machines where a hard disk could not be enlarged.

• Fixed an issue where the Fusion Start Menu icon in the menu bar is hard to see on Mac OS X 10.10 with the dark menu bar.

• Added options in the Advanced Settings panel to select the type of power options shown in the UI.

• Fixed an issue where the video camera on recent Macs would not work in Windows 7 virtual machines.