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I'm a little confused. I just updated and in the About dialog box I see that I have VMware Fusion Player v13.5.2 but I've been reading all about the new product being rebranded as VMwareFusion Pro. Is VMware Fusion Player v13.5.2 actually VMwareFusion Pro?
 

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I'm a little confused. I just updated and in the About dialog box I see that I have VMware Fusion Player v13.5.2 but I've been reading all about the new product being rebranded as VMwareFusion Pro. Is VMware Fusion Player v13.5.2 actually VMwareFusion Pro?
It should be like this
Screenshot 2024-05-15 at 8.33.49 PM.png

you downloaded the player, not the pro version.

EDIT: i did not update. I did not even have an account before. I registered and downloaded the pro version today and made a fresh install of W11
 
This may help. On a UK Site that had this announcement they mentioned that the down load site would be live by the end of the month. I suspect that the new free stuff will be rebranded to reflect the new ownership and may look a little different. I think the links people are going to are for updating the current product, free or Paid. Their announcement was just not clear. I bet you will have to remove the old product and install the new, not really an issue as the VM's are separate files anyway. I could be Totally wrong here but the end of the month availability seems to make sense based on the issues people are having.
 
Has anyone been able to convert their Fusion Player over to the Fusion Pro? The link for the so called directions provides nothing.
First, you need to update to Fusion 13.5.2, then delete your existing Fusion license key file. This will remove the "Player" functionality limitation and unlock the “Pro for Personal Use” functionality without needing any additional keys.

You can find your license key file at: /Library/Preferences/VMware Fusion/ and it's named something like: license-fusion-xxx
 
It should be like this
View attachment 2378499
you downloaded the player, not the pro version.
Interesting - all I did was update from within the app, and even now it's telling me I'm up to date with the Player version. I was under the impression I'd be automatically updated to the Pro version. Also, when I click on Get Support under the Help menu it takes me to vmware.com instead of Broadcom's domain. There was an option purchase the Pro version but it took me to a digitalriver website so I'm erring on the side of caution for now.
 
First, you need to update to Fusion 13.5.2, then delete your existing Fusion license key file. This will remove the "Player" functionality limitation and unlock the “Pro for Personal Use” functionality without needing any additional keys.

You can find your license key file at: /Library/Preferences/VMware Fusion/ and it's named something like: license-fusion-xxx
Thanks - this solved it for me :).
 
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Is there a way to get my existing Parallels Windows 11 Arm to open in VMware Fusion Pro?
 
The implication of free products is: software support and updates will also likely be slower than before, maybe also weaker. We shall see.
 
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Switched entirely to Parallels a couple of years ago and have been quite happy. No need to try VMWare again.
 
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The implication of free products is: software support and updates will also likely be slower than before, maybe also weaker. We shall see.
Yes, we'll see. I think the hope is this though, and it was always this way with VMWare themselves:

They make most of their money selling virtualisation at scale and with support to large organisations. Having a desktop hypervisor product which is, fundamentally, the same thing though, builds developer/user mindshare. People use it at home, then recommend it at work when the subject comes up, or they already have comfort and experience at using it on workstation or fusion, and it gives them a head-start on getting going with the server products.

It would be logical to continue this.
 
Yes, we'll see. I think the hope is this though, and it was always this way with VMWare themselves:

They make most of their money selling virtualisation at scale and with support to large organisations. Having a desktop hypervisor product which is, fundamentally, the same thing though, builds developer/user mindshare. People use it at home, then recommend it at work when the subject comes up, or they already have comfort and experience at using it on workstation or fusion, and it gives them a head-start on getting going with the server products.

It would be logical to continue this.
The only flaw I see in that logic is that VMware's desktop virtualization is not really the same technology as its ESXi technology. The latter is a Type 1 hypervisor that runs on bare metal, the former is a Type 2 hypervisor that runs under a host operating system. I'm not entirely sure how similar they are under the hood, but having used both, they seem to operate in some pretty fundamentally different ways that would lead me to think that they are completely different code bases.

The discontinued VMware Server and GSX hypervisors were much closer to Workstation in the way that they worked (VMware Server kind of lives on as an extension to Workstation but is no longer available as a separate product).
 
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Not going to lie, I was expecting Broadcom to ruin VMware with subscriptions or something. This is a pleasant suprise. Though I guess they are still screwing over enterprise clients so that sucks.
Yeah - a 700% price bump for data centers… Broadcom at its finest…
But Fusion Pro for free is a nice (and unexpected) move 😀
 
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I have a new ARM based Mac and now I have to deal with (I believe) only the ARM-based Windows 11 for my VMware VM. There appears to be no way to migrate any x86 VMware VM and also it looks like copy and paste with the Mac doesn't work, nor can I drag and drop files from the Mac into the ARM Windows 11 VM. Unless I'm missing something really fundamental, this is just awful...
 
I have a new ARM based Mac and now I have to deal with (I believe) only the ARM-based Windows 11 for my VMware VM. There appears to be no way to migrate any x86 VMware VM and also it looks like copy and paste with the Mac doesn't work, nor can I drag and drop files from the Mac into the ARM Windows 11 VM. Unless I'm missing something really fundamental, this is just awful...
Copy/paste and drag and drop do work with Apple Silicon Macs and VMware Fusion 13.5.x with ARM Windows. You can’t migrate the Intel virtual machine to Apple Silicon though.
 
Does VMware DFusion Pro 13 offer an M2 Mac mini user the ability to play Windows games either while booted into Windows 11 or via Steam when booted into Windows 11? Asking for a 13-yo who has an M2 Mac mini and games via Steam and would like to play Windowd'based games. TIA.
 
Give it a year or two then Broadcom will force you to pay. That company destroys most things they acquire.
THIS! ☝️

They basically ruin everything they touch. The non-personal use has to be a subscription, and I wouldn't be surprised they change the personal one at some point.
 
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