[BUG] Cowork and WSL both fail on Windows 11 ARM64 (Snapdragon X Plus 8-core) — VHDX creation blocked at OS level

Preflight Checklist

• [x] I have searched existing issues and this hasn't been reported yet
• [x] This is a single bug report (please file separate reports for different bugs)
• [x] I am using the latest version of Claude Code

What's Wrong?

Device: Snapdragon X Plus 8-core
OS: Windows 11
Claude Desktop version: 1.1617.0.0 arm64
Install method: Direct download from claude.ai (not Microsoft Store)
Error message:
Failed to start Claude's workspace — failed to set session disk path: session disk not found: sessiondata.vhdx
What I tried:

Manually created sessiondata.vhdx via PowerShell (New-VHD and diskpart both fail with "virtual disk support provider not found")
Copied full bundle to both AppData\Roaming and AppData\Local\Packages paths
Manually started CoworkVMService — starts but Claude Desktop kills it during configure step
WSL install fails with same error: 0xc03a0014 A virtual disk support provider for the specified file was not found
VirtualMachinePlatform is Enabled
Microsoft-Hyper-V-All is unavailable/unknown on this chip
Memory Integrity toggle blocked in Windows Security

Root cause: VHDX creation is blocked at the OS level on Snapdragon X Plus. Neither Cowork nor WSL can initialize because no virtual disk can be created by any method.
Related issues: #45549, #40198, #24974

What Should Happen?

Device: Snapdragon X Plus 8-core
OS: Windows 11
Claude Desktop version: 1.1617.0.0 arm64
Install method: Direct download from claude.ai (not Microsoft Store)
Error message:
Failed to start Claude's workspace — failed to set session disk path: session disk not found: sessiondata.vhdx
What I tried:

Manually created sessiondata.vhdx via PowerShell (New-VHD and diskpart both fail with "virtual disk support provider not found")
Copied full bundle to both AppData\Roaming and AppData\Local\Packages paths
Manually started CoworkVMService — starts but Claude Desktop kills it during configure step
WSL install fails with same error: 0xc03a0014 A virtual disk support provider for the specified file was not found
VirtualMachinePlatform is Enabled
Microsoft-Hyper-V-All is unavailable/unknown on this chip
Memory Integrity toggle blocked in Windows Security

Root cause: VHDX creation is blocked at the OS level on Snapdragon X Plus. Neither Cowork nor WSL can initialize because no virtual disk can be created by any method.
Related issues: #45549, #40198, #24974

Error Messages/Logs

Device: Snapdragon X Plus 8-core
OS: Windows 11
Claude Desktop version: 1.1617.0.0 arm64
Install method: Direct download from claude.ai (not Microsoft Store)
Error message:
Failed to start Claude's workspace — failed to set session disk path: session disk not found: sessiondata.vhdx
What I tried:

Manually created sessiondata.vhdx via PowerShell (New-VHD and diskpart both fail with "virtual disk support provider not found")
Copied full bundle to both AppData\Roaming and AppData\Local\Packages paths
Manually started CoworkVMService — starts but Claude Desktop kills it during configure step
WSL install fails with same error: 0xc03a0014 A virtual disk support provider for the specified file was not found
VirtualMachinePlatform is Enabled
Microsoft-Hyper-V-All is unavailable/unknown on this chip
Memory Integrity toggle blocked in Windows Security

Root cause: VHDX creation is blocked at the OS level on Snapdragon X Plus. Neither Cowork nor WSL can initialize because no virtual disk can be created by any method.
Related issues: #45549, #40198, #24974

Steps to Reproduce

Device: Snapdragon X Plus 8-core
OS: Windows 11
Claude Desktop version: 1.1617.0.0 arm64
Install method: Direct download from claude.ai (not Microsoft Store)
Error message:
Failed to start Claude's workspace — failed to set session disk path: session disk not found: sessiondata.vhdx
What I tried:

Manually created sessiondata.vhdx via PowerShell (New-VHD and diskpart both fail with "virtual disk support provider not found")
Copied full bundle to both AppData\Roaming and AppData\Local\Packages paths
Manually started CoworkVMService — starts but Claude Desktop kills it during configure step
WSL install fails with same error: 0xc03a0014 A virtual disk support provider for the specified file was not found
VirtualMachinePlatform is Enabled
Microsoft-Hyper-V-All is unavailable/unknown on this chip
Memory Integrity toggle blocked in Windows Security

Root cause: VHDX creation is blocked at the OS level on Snapdragon X Plus. Neither Cowork nor WSL can initialize because no virtual disk can be created by any method.
Related issues: #45549, #40198, #24974

Claude Model

None

Is this a regression?

Yes, this worked in a previous version

Last Working Version

_No response_

Claude Code Version

latest version

Platform

Anthropic API

Operating System

macOS

Terminal/Shell

Terminal.app (macOS)

Additional Information

_No response_