Mouse and keyboard have stopped working within VM

Discussions about using Linux guests in VirtualBox.
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Pondo
Posts: 4
Joined: 15. Sep 2022, 11:51

Mouse and keyboard have stopped working within VM

Post by Pondo »

After over a year of seamless interactivity, my mouse and keyboard have stopped working within the VM.
The VM boots up as per normal and seems to capture the mouse correctly (pointer colour is black over the guest window, white over host window). Hover and clicking are not registered. No keyboard interactivity.

Software:
- Windows 10 host
- Ubuntu 20 guest
- v6.1.38 Virtualbox (although issue first occurred on v6.1.36)

Settings:
- single screen
- 4 CPU
- Nested Paging (both on and off)
- 128MB Video Memory
- Shared clipboard and DnD both disabled

Attempts to fix:
- Booting a secondary VM using the same .vdi - same behaviour
- Starting a fresh (Ubuntu 22) VM - mouse and keyboard work appropriately
- Switching various settings as recommended in multiple other threads

Logs attached
Attachments
Ubuntu_20-2022-09-15-11-51-44.zip
(35.47 KiB) Downloaded 5 times
mpack
Site Moderator
Posts: 39156
Joined: 4. Sep 2008, 17:09
Primary OS: MS Windows 10
VBox Version: PUEL
Guest OSses: Mostly XP

Re: Mouse and keyboard have stopped working within VM

Post by mpack »

Make sure you haven't added any overly-broad USB filters.
00:00:05.562942 Host RAM: 16293MB (15.9GB) total, 7481MB (7.3GB) available
...
00:00:05.796568 RamSize <integer> = 0x0000000222400000 (9 164 554 240, 8 740 MB, 8.5 GB)
00:00:05.796782 VRamSize <integer> = 0x0000000008000000 (134 217 728, 128 MB)
Reduce the RAM allocation to something your host can afford, e.g. 6GB (6144MB).

And your Guest Additions are ancient (6.0.0). Please update them.
scottgus1
Site Moderator
Posts: 20965
Joined: 30. Dec 2009, 20:14
Primary OS: MS Windows 10
VBox Version: PUEL
Guest OSses: Windows, Linux

Re: Mouse and keyboard have stopped working within VM

Post by scottgus1 »

Also check to see if Wayland got turned on in the VM OS. If so, try switching to X.
Pondo
Posts: 4
Joined: 15. Sep 2022, 11:51

Re: Mouse and keyboard have stopped working within VM

Post by Pondo »

Thank you for the replies.
I currently do not have any USB filters applied and have reduced the RAM allocation to 6GB.

Unfortunately I cannot interact with the VM at all in order to update the Guest additions or check if Wayland got turned on.
scottgus1
Site Moderator
Posts: 20965
Joined: 30. Dec 2009, 20:14
Primary OS: MS Windows 10
VBox Version: PUEL
Guest OSses: Windows, Linux

Re: Mouse and keyboard have stopped working within VM

Post by scottgus1 »

Pondo wrote:Unfortunately I cannot interact with the VM at all...
If it were a Windows VM, I'd suggest booting it into Safe Mode, where none but the most basic drivers are loaded so the basic hardware should work and tests can be done. Maybe your Ubuntu VM has a Safe-Mode-like boot-up? Web-search how to do such a thing in Ubuntu, then do it to the VM, and see if you can uninstall the Guest Additions.
Pondo
Posts: 4
Joined: 15. Sep 2022, 11:51

Re: Mouse and keyboard have stopped working within VM

Post by Pondo »

scottgus1 wrote:
Pondo wrote:Unfortunately I cannot interact with the VM at all...
If it were a Windows VM, I'd suggest booting it into Safe Mode, where none but the most basic drivers are loaded so the basic hardware should work and tests can be done. Maybe your Ubuntu VM has a Safe-Mode-like boot-up? Web-search how to do such a thing in Ubuntu, then do it to the VM, and see if you can uninstall the Guest Additions.
Thank you for the suggestion. I was able to upgrade the guest additions and check if Wayland had been turned on. Unfortunately this has not solved the issue, but I was able to get all crucial work off the VM, which was the primary crisis :?
mpack
Site Moderator
Posts: 39156
Joined: 4. Sep 2008, 17:09
Primary OS: MS Windows 10
VBox Version: PUEL
Guest OSses: Mostly XP

Re: Mouse and keyboard have stopped working within VM

Post by mpack »

Pondo wrote:but I was able to get all crucial work off the VM, which was the primary crisis :?
For future reference. Unless the drive is corrupted then it should always be possible to add the drive to another VM that supports the same filesystem.
Pondo
Posts: 4
Joined: 15. Sep 2022, 11:51

Re: Mouse and keyboard have stopped working within VM

Post by Pondo »

mpack wrote:
Pondo wrote:but I was able to get all crucial work off the VM, which was the primary crisis :?
For future reference. Unless the drive is corrupted then it should always be possible to add the drive to another VM that supports the same filesystem.
Ah, noted, thank you!
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