Sound disabled on WinXP guest

[Toriatama]

Hello,

Here is my issue:

When I run WinXP (guest) on VirtualBox (installed on Win7 74bits), at first the sound is working, but after several reboot, the sound does not play any more (WinXP driver are still here, the sound card is properly detected and working). I believe this is partially caused by my sound card (Asus Xonar Essence STX), which as a noisy "physical" switch when changing the analogical output between headphone and speakers (and I often have to change).

When I install or update Vbox was the analogical output of the sound card (on host machine, Win7 64bit) set for speakers, the sound works on the guest machine (Win XP). But as soon as switch from analogical output from headphone to speakers or speakers to headphone, the sound does not work any more on the guest machine.

I had this problem with VB 5.1 (and other issues with sound and video so I downgrade to 5.0.28 version), also on 5.0.30 and 5.0.28. I wasted a lot of time trying to tweak/upgrage/reinstall Win XP realtek AC' 97sound drivers, since I though the issue was caused by drivers, and I've also tried others sounds settings on VirtualBox Manager, others settings than DirectSound & ICH97, but they won't work.

The version of VirtualBox you are using: 5.0.28 with Guest Additions v5.0.028 installed (directX support).
Host: Windows 7 Ultimate 64bits (French), 8 Mo RAM, i7 CPU.
Guest: Win XP SP3 32bits (Chinese), 1 Mo RAM.
In VirtualBox sound settings are: Windows DirectSound, ICH AC97
My PC soundcard on Host: Integrated realtek audio (disabled) + Asus Xonar Essence STX

Please find all the logs required attached.

Thank you for your help.
(ps: not sure if I should post this issue on host or guest problem?)

[Toriatama]

I am updating my report:

It's not only a problem with sound... video on internet also won't play at all, however video file on the disk play normally. It's like the issue I had after installing VirtualBox 5.1 (no sound and video not playing). But after I came back to 5.0.x this issue disappeared, at least I believed... Now it's back! Strange!

[mpack]

I can't imagine why that would be, and I don't see anything unusual in the logs. All I can suggest is that you do a full reboot on both host an guest (i.e. purge any saved states) on every VirtualBox update.

[Toriatama]

After a lot of work around, what I've done:

- I uninstalled Guest Additions (5.0.28)
- Switch off the guest (win XP) / no save state
- Restart and reinstall GA
===> No change, still no sound (while the sound card and drivers seems properly installed)

Next I've tried the following:

- I uninstalled again Guest Additions (5.0.28)
- Switch off the guest (win XP) / no save state
- Re-updated to VirtualBox 5.1.10 (previously it was not working, I had many issues with 5.1.10 for sound and even playing video, but I was so upset that I decided to re-try!)
- Reinstalled GA for 5.1.10 and restarted.

===>... and now sound and video are both working!
I rebooted several times and it was ok.

HOWEVER, next I did the following:
- I saved the Guest stat (the Host sound output was set on headphone)
- on the host PC (Win7), I switch the sound card output to speakers (everything works fine on the host)
- on restored the saved state of guest WinXP: no more sound! I've tried to switch back on the host to headphone output, it doesn't work. Restarting VB or rebooting the guest won't help. Sound is definitively lost... I have to find a way to restore it (downgrading or updating VB and GA may be the only solution I found for now, but it's not working at 100%, it may resolve the problem or not.

Any clue?

[Toriatama]

I can't imagine why that would be, and I don't see anything unusual in the logs. All I can suggest is that you do a full reboot on both host an guest (i.e. purge any saved states) on every VirtualBox update.

Sorry I forgot to reply: thank you for your reply. Yes, I did try to reboot on both machine, no change. I would like to reset the sound card settings on the host machine to see if it helps but don't know how to. Since all the sound settings seem to work properly both side, guest and host system, I have the feeling that there is a bug in the connection between the two systems...

But I noticed the problem was worse than I thought, it's not only a sound channel issue, there is also a problem with video playback on the web, video also stopped working again! (the same thing happened when I updated to VirtualBox 5.1.10 the first time...). Any video on the web start playing and freezes immediately.

The logs are attached to this post.

[michaln]

1) Installing or uninstalling the Guest Additions will not impact audio. If it makes you feel better then do it, if you'd rather save time then don't.

2) Except in rare circumstances, changing the default audio settings will only make things worse.

2) Loading saved states has its own set of problems, and if you have trouble with loading saved states, please make that clear at the outset.

[Toriatama]

Thank you for your advises.

Then, what can I try to do? I will try do downgrade and re-upgrade Vbox since this seems it may help to reset the sound settings, and I will avoid to use saved states. But as soon as the sound is disabled again, there is no easy way to get it back...