VirtualBox on MacOS Catalina

[socratis]

On the basis of virtualization, you will be able to run 32-bit apps in your 10.14 VM, yes. The host OS has nothing to do with it. That's the definition of virtualization.

[TheMarcello]

Yesterday I installed 10.15 bèta (19A487m) and today upgraded to Virtualbox 6.0.8
I created a new VM Windows 10 64bit, I started the windows installation from a freshly downloaded .iso from microsoft.
The VM does boot, runs for a 10-15 seconds and crashes.

Anyone?

[socratis]

Anyone?

Not with that much information, you would be looking for a mind-reader.

We need to see a complete VBox.log, from a complete VM run, where the problem occurs:

• Start the VM from cold-boot (not from a paused or saved state) / Observe problem / Shutdown the VM (force close it if you have to).
• With the VM completely shut down (not paused or saved), right-click on the VM in the VirtualBox Manager and select "Show Log".
• Save only the first "VBox.log", ZIP it and attach it to your response. See the "Upload attachment" tab below the reply form.

[DnvrSysEngr]

TheMarcello:

This may pertain to your situation.

I too experienced the same issue. Running macOS Mojave (10.14.x) with Windows10 running in VBox 6.0.97 and all was well. Upgraded to macOS Catalina (10.15) and was unable to start vBox 6.0.97 in "Normal Mode" without having it either crash immediately or crash with the slightest movement of my mouse. Tried everything imaginable to no avail. Found this post that mentioned starting in either "Headless Mode" or "Detachable Mode," and then clicking on SHOW and voila, I am now back in.

[dachew57]

I won't bore you with the details, since I have an open thread on VirtualBox, 10.14.5, and Catalina. From what I understand, Catalina has moved all kexts out of kernel space. I was not able to get any Windows VM to boot, run, load, etc. on Catalina. VirtualBox application opens just fine, but the VMs do not run. We have all been anxiously awaiting a version of VirtualBox which can reliably run Windows VMs (specifically, Windows Server 2016). Right now, our Macs (all 20+ of them) are regularly crashing when running the VMs. I don't mean VB crashes, I mean one minute your in your VM, and the next your Max is rebooting and dumping a crash file.

Personally, I've moved on with my life and have been running Parallels Desktop. It's awesome, never crashes, etc. We would however love to not re-tool our dev infrastructure for a different virtualization platform. We've been using VB for years without issue. Only since the 10.14.5 (and up) updates have we been handed a stack of problems we can't continue to experience as an organization. We're simply losing too much time.

[klaus]

The current "development" test build should be working OK (we weren't able to test much yet) with macOS Catalina. Yes, it was a pretty long-standing bug in our code, which for some reason didn't show up with "older" macOS versions. Well, maybe they did cause a very very low rate of crashes (always hard to tell, because they may or may not reach our attention). With Catalina the picture was very clear because the issue was nicely reproducible.

Correction: all macOS test builds have the fix now, not just the "development" one. So you can get the fix for e.g. 6.0 which is rather safe to use in production (unlike the development packages).

[socratis]

Test builds updates page has been updated to show r133612/3/4. Get it while it's fresh from the oven!

But you got to remember that development builds require SIP to be turned off. Details in the Test builds page...

[User Name]

Found this post that mentioned starting in either "Headless Mode" or "Detachable Mode," and then clicking on SHOW and voila, I am now back in.

This worked for me. Many thanks!!!

[moloch652]

I had the same issue, VM crashing when switching to another window, and had nothing set in "Input Monitoring". I did have other stuff set for VirtualBox in the Privacy settings such as Accessibility, Files and Folders, Microphone etc. I have disabled all references to VirtualBox in the Privacy settings and all working ok now. This was MacOS 10.15 and VBox 6.0.12.

[Totoche]

I just updated OSX to Catalina.
Virtualbox starts, I can start any of my VMs, but as soon as I click outside the window of my VM, Virtualbox crashes, VM set is aborted state.
Tried to re-install Virtualbox 6.0.12, no effect.

[socratis]

Tried to re-install Virtualbox 6.0.12, no effect.

This was MacOS 10.15 and VBox 6.0.12.

@Totoche, moloch652,
If you want to use the latest version for your host/guests, you should also consider doing the same for VirtualBox. You should try the latest test builds.

6.0.12 was released way before Catalina went gold...

[klaus]

Just repeating the "other" workaround... run the following in a Terminal window:

Code: Select all   Expand viewCollapse view

VBoxManage setextradata global GUI/HidLedsSync 0

When the fixed release of VirtualBox is out (should be sometime next week) you can undo this change with

Code: Select all   Expand viewCollapse view

VBoxManage setextradata global GUI/HidLedsSync

This is mentioned (rather briefly) in the manual at https://www.virtualbox.org/manual/ch09.html#hidledssync

[socratis]

10.15 (Catalina) is now officially out, locking this thread in the "OSX pre-releases" to prevent "me too" posts. All further discussion should continue on the "OSX Hosts" area, mainly in the "VirtualBox crashes after upgrading to macOS Catalina (#18990)" thread.