VMWare Workstation Pro is free again (for personal use)

[spuwho]

VMware Fusion & Workstation Going Free: Customer Feedback and New Resources

An overview describing the positive feedback from customers, new guidance for future feedback, available resources, and what's next for VMware Fusion & Workstation.

blogs.vmware.com

Now if anyone can share how to navigate the Broadcom entitlements system, please share.

I am a registered Broadcom Support user and it keeps flagging me for not having the correct entitlements.

So it wants to "build a profile" first, great, problem is it wants a Site ID and the name of my company....well this os for home use per your terms.

Go to the sales site?

https://www.vmware.com/content/vmware/vmware-published-sites/us/products/desktop-hypervisor.html.html

It sends you the front page of a cloud downloading service that isn't ready to accept VMWare requests.

Boy is this screwed up or what.

 

[i386]

No, it's time to get rid of VMware ._.

 

[spuwho]

VMware Workstation and Fusion Pro Are Now Free. Good Luck Actually Downloading Them

Broadcom has blown chaos all over the VMware landscape with their acquisition but they're releasing desktop products for free. They just make it very difficult to download them.

lowendbox.com

I hope Broadcom doesn't run their chip operation this badly.

 

[Stephan]

I refuse to be bothered with their incompetence or teething issues. For test VMs I have a bunch of optimized libvirt XML files and virt-viewer.

 

[Cybernut]

VMware Fusion & Workstation Going Free: Customer Feedback and New Resources

An overview describing the positive feedback from customers, new guidance for future feedback, available resources, and what's next for VMware Fusion & Workstation.

blogs.vmware.com

Now if anyone can share how to navigate the Broadcom entitlements system, please share.

I am a registered Broadcom Support user ....

Once you login to the support portal (you already are a registered user) just go to (for Workstation Pro):

Home - Support Portal - Broadcom support portal - Support Portal - Broadcom support portal

support.broadcom.com

Then choose the v17.0 Pro for Personal Use links.


And go to (for Fusion Pro):

Home - Support Portal - Broadcom support portal - Support Portal - Broadcom support portal

support.broadcom.com

Then choose v13 Pro for Personal Use link.

 

[spuwho]

It's working today. 2 things that are different than the first time.

- links to the "Personal Use" versions were not there before (now they are)
- Broadcom demanded "additional verification" of who I was

The "additional verification" consisted of my address, which was *not* required when I enrolled.in the first place,
but now needed to complete the download.

Otherwise, I didn't change anything else, just logged in and went to the dashboard.

Seems I simply got in before they were ready.

 

[nabsltd]

My VMware login transferred over, but I also had to add an address to download.

What Broadcom had set up as a support site worked OK for what they had before, but with VMware added, it shows just how slow the system runs. Also, I drilled down through the VMware products and there is no way to filter out products that you aren't entitled to download. Then, when you have finally drilled down to the point where you realize you can't download it, you have to spend a minute clicking the "back" button inside the web app so you can drill down again into the correct product.