Fusion 4.1 Allows Mac OS X Client Installations
With the release of Mac OS 10.7 Lion VMWare seem to have decided that all of Apple’s latest operating systems can be virtualized. VMWare Fusion 4.1. (released Nov 17th, 2011) thus allows the installation of all Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, and 10.6. Snow Leopard versions; vulgo: the server and client editions.
Voicemail From Infinite Loop
The tiny downside is, VMWare seem to have gotten an urgent call from a fruity garage company in Infinite Loop soon after their release of VMWare Fusion 4.1. That’s why they issued VMWare Fusion 4.1.1 (released Nov 23rd, 2011) almost immediately, thus effectively reverting the capability of virtualizing the Mac OS X client versions.
Fusion 4.1.1 Update Bars Client Installations Again
That means: if you are running VMWare Fusion 4.1, you should consider not to upgrade to 4.1.1. If you have a Mac OS X client version virtualized it would not boot anymore after the update to Fusion 4.1.1. For all the others, VMWare does not distribute version 4.1 anymore, only 4.1.1. So you would have to search the net for download possibilities of VMWare Fusion 4.1. Luckily there are still legal sources for the 4.1 download. Update: the download link distributes version 3.1.1 (sic!) at the moment. You’re on your own finding the 4.1 download on the net (filename: “VMware-Fusion-4.1.0-529802-light.dmg”). Good luck.
Installation Hints
As a tiny hint for the techies: you cannot use an image of a Mac OS X installation DVD to install into VMWare Fusion, you have to put the Mac OS X installation medium into your DVD drive and use a drive as installation source. In our tests all attempts using an image (dmg, iso, cdr) kept failing with a funky crash during the bootup in VMWare. It neither works with Mac OS X’ built-in image mounter nor Roxio’s mounter in Toast. So don’t waste your time on this, use a DVD.
Installation on Hackintosh Systems
If you are using a hackintosh rather than original Apple hardware you need to have Netkas’ fakesmc.kext installed and not the overcome dsmos.kext.
Your reference to a site which has 4.1.0 to download is no longer current.
While labeled 4.1.0 on their site, it’s actually 3.1.1.
Thanks JM,
you’re right! Looks like they removed it…
The file to search the net for is named
“VMware-Fusion-4.1.0-529802-light.dmg”
Though we doubt there are legal sources left. Our short search showed mainly illegal torrent distributions. So beware!!!
Greetz, JE