XP guest hangs on reboot esp. after MS Updates

Discussions about using Windows guests in VirtualBox.
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scottgus1
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XP guest hangs on reboot esp. after MS Updates

Post by scottgus1 »

I have had XP guests sometimes hang when doing a Windows-Update-invoked reboot. Both XP and 7 hosts, different versions of Virtualbox.

The guests get to just before the VM window would shrink to 640x480. They stop responding, no disk or network activity, just XP's peacefully-running light blue (not BSOD blue) background. If I pause/unpause or save-state/restart the VM window turns black and gets a grid of greenish yellow lines filling half the window. The VM does nothing else and I have to reset it. Then it boots up normally.

Two XP guests sometimes exhibit this behavior for now. I used to have this problem in a third guest, but it hasn't shown itself for a long while, despite still getting the same Windows updates as the two present offenders.

I have searched and found references to audio being the culprit (one guest has audio, one used to but does not now). Also, "absolute pointer" has been fingered, but I never use that setting and neither guest has ever had it turned on. I hunted thru the bug tracker but couldn't find a pertinent post, only one post actually mentioned Windows updates and the poster didn't put in logs, so the post had no activity.

So, here's the logs:

XP guest: "XPnet"; XP host, audio on, no absolute pointer, VB version 3.1.2 (this one runs all the time with no scheduled reboots, I think all the logs in the zip are from Windows-Update-induced hanged reboots)
XPnet logs.zip
(32.88 KiB) Downloaded 9 times


XP guest: "Email Tester" Windows 7 host, audio used to be on but now disabled in VM settings, no absolute pointer, VB version 4.0.16 (this one is shut down by a host-induced Vboxmanage command every night; only the most recent log was a Windows-update-induced hanged reboot, the earlier logs should be normal shutdowns. I've also had this VM running on version 3.2.12 on a different Windows 7 host, with the same behavior)
email tester logs.zip
(41.22 KiB) Downloaded 7 times


The third guest that used to have this problem also was XP, audio on, no absolute pointer. It just had a Windows Update same time as the other two, but did not hang during reboot. Here's this VM's last Windows-Update-successful-reboot log for reference:
Antispam-2012-06-11-23-32-22.zip
(14.3 KiB) Downloaded 8 times
Guest Additions are current in each VM. I have not seen if other causes for in-guest-invoked reboots cause hanging, and I haven't had the hang happen when I tell the guest to reboot from the guest's Start menu or a "Shutdown -r". It seems that Windows Update is the only rebooter that causes this to happen that I've noticed so far. And I've not experienced Windows Update having a problem rebooting the physical XP PCs I have at home.
Perryg
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Re: XP guest hangs on reboot esp. after MS Updates

Post by Perryg »

I remember on older versions where when rebooting a Windows guest it would hang. The biggest reason was the audio which has been fixed in the newer releases 4.*. I don't know if the fixes were backported though. bugtracker has the history on this if you would like to check it out.
scottgus1
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Re: XP guest hangs on reboot esp. after MS Updates

Post by scottgus1 »

I googled thru Bugtracker without much success (various search strings related to: "xp guest" hangs reboot "windows update" site:www.virtualbox.org) I found bug 3792, which hasn't had new activity on it for a couple years. One of the offending VM's is on 4.0.16, so maybe v4 still has it in some cases.
I'll put this on Bugtracker. I am not in the position to switch VB versions, tho, just hoping some guru might notice a VM setting that they know causes it... (Audio was present but is now disabled in the 4.0.16 VM settings, btw, and still has the problem.)
Perryg
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Re: XP guest hangs on reboot esp. after MS Updates

Post by Perryg »

Use this keyword search in Google: xp hangs on reboot site:virtualbox.org
There are several listed and the latest was fixed in 4.1.14 so you may need to actually post a ticket at bugtracker.
Be sure to post logs and explain that you really can't update and wonder if there is a patch or will/can the fixes be backported.
scottgus1
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Re: XP guest hangs on reboot esp. after MS Updates

Post by scottgus1 »

Thanks, Perry. I did open a ticket: https://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/10670 Hopefully just asetting needs to be changed. I'll take a look at that search you suggested, too.
HockeyBum
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Re: XP guest hangs on reboot esp. after MS Updates

Post by HockeyBum »

I am running in to the same problem.
Host: VB 4.1.12 on Ubuntu 12.10.
Guest: WinXP Pro 32-bit

I checked the bug tracker referenced here, no activity in the last 11 months on this. I downloaded/installed Guest Additions (It downloaded the current version I assume) from within VB. I did this while Windows was applying updates, could this be the cause?

Shall I post my logs and/or open a new bug tracker?
noteirak
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Re: XP guest hangs on reboot esp. after MS Updates

Post by noteirak »

I think the first step you should do is try with a newer (or latest) version of Virtualbox to see if the bug is fixed, just like indicated by Frank (one of the devs) in the ticket.
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