I have been trying without desired success to access my USB DAC connected to my host OS. It has all required drivers, and applications running directly on the host may access it WASAPI exclusive. However, I cannot get it to work using plain VMWare Woskstation features. I am running version 15.5.5 build-16285975.
I installed the DAC drivers under the guest OS (Windows 10), rebooted, then logged back in. The USB drivers are not able to recognize the DAC at all. The DAC does not show as an audio device under Control Panel Sound as it does under my host OS. The ASIO drivers also fail to connect to the device. What does work is configuring the DAC as the sound device within VM Settings for the guest. The downside to this is that I lose WASAPI exclusive and may face Windows resampling that I wish to avoid. VM Sharing is enabled, and the USB Arbitration Service is successfully running.
I did get desired results only by using a third-party utility that allows sharing of USB devices: VMware USB passthrough: 4 methods to connect USB to VMware [2020]
I am using this in trial, and it is working nicely. I would think I should be able to do this without buying additional tools. I just cannot figure out how to get it to work with vanilla VMWare Workstation.
I have not yet checked the price of this utility above. If it's relatively inexpensive, this will work for me (read that as less than $50 US dollars).
Thanks.