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Guest freezes up with USB 3.0 enabled

Posted: 13. Mar 2016, 18:33
by etatoby
I'm trying to set up different version Mac OS X guests to test removable drives.

But every time I start up a guest with USB 3.0 emulation enabled, it freezes as soon as the graphical desktop shows up. No error is displayed, but the mouse and keyboard don't work.

Maybe it's just a problem with USB HID not working on USB 3.0? What can I try?

Re: Guest freezes up with USB 3.0 enabled

Posted: 13. Mar 2016, 21:16
by michaln
You forgot to mention the most relevant piece of information: Which (guest) OS X version? Mountain Lion (10.8) was the first OS X version with built in USB 3.0 support. Lion had it added in some update, and Snow Leopard and older have no USB 3.0 support whatsoever.

What you describe matches the behavior of a guest with no USB 3.0 support rather well.

Re: Guest freezes up with USB 3.0 enabled

Posted: 14. Mar 2016, 02:38
by etatoby
You are absolutely right.
I started working on the older versions and found that issue.
In Mountain Lion and above USB 3.0 works perfectly.

So the real issue is that I cannot connect a host USB 3.0 device to the emulated USB 2.0 bus.
I get the error: Failed to create a proxy device for the USB device. (Error: VERR_PDM_NO_USB_PORTS)
Maybe that's expected.

Re: Guest freezes up with USB 3.0 enabled

Posted: 14. Mar 2016, 10:00
by michaln
Yes, expected. A USB 1.x/2.x controller can't handle a USB 3.0 device.

What you could do is plug the physical device into a USB 2.0 port on the host (normally not an option on Macs), plug the device into a USB 2.0 hub, or use an USB 2.0 extension cable. Any of that will force the device to behave as a USB 2.0 device and older OS X versions should be able to use it (and it's going to be way slower).