Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Discussions related to using VirtualBox on Windows hosts.
klepp0906
Posts: 14
Joined: 6. Dec 2018, 12:57

Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by klepp0906 »

So this plagued me for a LONG time. My pc would hang and require a hard reset, 9/10 during the middle of the night when it was idle. One time out of literally hundreds, whocrashed pegged the virtualbox driver but the overwhelming majority of the time it was hal or ntskrnl or a part of windows.

could NOT figure it out. updated every driver under the sun a dozen times over. ran the usual sfc's and dism's. updated bios's etc.

finally got some help from a developer friend who went through a minidump (that wasnt actually helpful) but he gave me a bit of optimism regarding running driververifier again so i did.

after that dump he was able to peg the problem as being virtualbox and deviceguard not playing nice. Now I have hyperV off but windows still runs deviceguard for this or that.

I disabled deviceguard via group policy. Problem completely gone. The relief is real!

That being said - I asked him who to rib about it, and he said oracle. So for whatever reason its being pegged as you guy's issue. (above my paygrade).

After dealing with this for so long, im stoked to have it working and happy with the band-aid being disabling device guard, but should I ever need to have it enabled (or for others that do) the only other option would be not using virtualbox.

Hopefully this finds its way into the right hands.
Last edited by socratis on 6. Dec 2018, 20:25, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Changed title to something more appropriate.
mpack
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Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by mpack »

he was able to peg the problem as being virtualbox and deviceguard not playing nice.
They are not supposed to play together at all. Hyper-v stops other VM platforms from working and needs to be disabled in all its forms.

Related FAQ: FAQ: I have a 64bit host, but can't install 64bit guests.
socratis
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Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by socratis »

Interesting that this is the 2nd instance in a day that we hear about crashes (BSOD) and hangs with Device Guard. So far there was simply a refusal by VirtualBox's part to run with either a "VT-x not available" or "Hyper-V has taken over". I wonder what changed...
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mpack
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Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by mpack »

Yes, and since it doesn't seem to be associated with a VirtualBox update I'm assuming there's been some update in DeviceGuard, and it's actually some Windows DeviceGuard related code that crashes when "touched" by VirtualBox.

Even at work DeviceGuard is becoming a pain in the ass. We have software that refuses to run in VMs, legitimately so. It detects DeviceGuard as a VM.
klepp0906
Posts: 14
Joined: 6. Dec 2018, 12:57

Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by klepp0906 »

thanks for the replies guys.

yea thats whats weird. I dont have any problem getting virtualbox, or vmware for that matter - to run.

and the crash happens when they arent running though. So somehow the virtualbox network driver is interacting with deviceguard when the pc is idle and poof.

cant even put into words the frustration this caused, or hours lost. I'm pretty anal about my pc and let me tell ya ;p

also crashed a few hours into streaming movies with plex relatively often. I imagine pc must have been ascertained as being idle and deviceguard started to do whatever it is that causes it.

All solved now, just figured id better mention it since nothing directly related turned up ala-google.
socratis
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Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by socratis »

klepp0906 wrote:and the crash happens when they arent running though. So somehow the virtualbox network driver is interacting with deviceguard when the pc is idle and poof.
I really want to understand this right. You're telling us that the crashes happen when VirtualBox is NOT running, is that correct? And that by disabling DeviceGuard the crashes stop?

Where does VirtualBox come into the equation then? I don't see the connection. If a driver is installed it's simply there, not running. If a program isn't running or a component isn't used, how can it be responsible for a crash?

Let's go on a stretch here and assume that this theory is somewhat plausible. Then, by uninstalling VirtualBox you should see the crashes stop. Is that the case? Maybe DeviceGuard is indeed crashing the system, but not because of an interaction with VirtualBox, but some other piece of software?
Do NOT send me Personal Messages (PMs) for troubleshooting, they are simply deleted.
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klepp0906
Posts: 14
Joined: 6. Dec 2018, 12:57

Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by klepp0906 »

this is correct. Was my line of thinking as well, however it was confirmed by not only whocrashed, but by driververifier and a dev friend of mine debugging the dump.

It only happens when the system is idle so im not sure if its some part of windows maintenence that combs through or what. I know i dont currently have vmware running and yet it has plenty of services running ala task manager.

IIRC it DID point to the vbox network driver in particular so whether that is active or activated during windows maintenance stuffs and is part of the conflict? Like i said, this is all above my paygrade.

I'll reach out to my buddy and see if he can give me something more direct i can forward to you guys. -hold pls- P
Last edited by socratis on 6. Dec 2018, 20:26, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Removed unnecessary verbatim quote of the whole previous message.
socratis
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Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by socratis »

Do you have the minidumps available? I'm pretty sure that the VirtualBox developers would be interested in them.

PS. I changed the title of the thread from "Just wanted to get this out there (bug)" to something more appropriate.
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klepp0906
Posts: 14
Joined: 6. Dec 2018, 12:57

Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by klepp0906 »

socratis wrote:Do you have the minidumps available? I'm pretty sure that the VirtualBox developers would be interested in them.

PS. I changed the title of the thread from "Just wanted to get this out there (bug)" to something more appropriate.
i messaged my buddy, he's overseas so when he replies - i will.

as for the minidumps, I wish. If im being honest, I didnt think this far ahead. After everything I'd been through trying to make it go away - I wasnt holding my breath on that being the solution.

I did check after I posted this thread, but it appears I already cleaned up trash on my hdd which unfortunately is set to include dumps.

I'm almost compelled to re-enable device guard and let it crash again, almost. It takes a few days anyhow, doesnt happen EVERY night. but often enough that I was getting concerned about data corruption, plus im a real stickler about my pc and was distressed considering it can run prime95 avx perpetually without a hang, but was hanging over night relatively frequently.

holding out hope he still has the dumps, albeit unlikely.

Ty for changing the thread title~!
klepp0906
Posts: 14
Joined: 6. Dec 2018, 12:57

Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by klepp0906 »

Was able to get my hands on the dumps but I cant post you-are-L's here until ive been a member for another day or some such. Not sure if its possible to PM them to you or not? Or I can just wait.

EDIT: no bueno. tried to PM them to you and for that i must wait 5 days :P
socratis
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Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by socratis »

You can:
  1. Obfuscate them by leaving a couple of spaces here and there.
  2. Put them in a text file and attach the text file.
Do NOT send me Personal Messages (PMs) for troubleshooting, they are simply deleted.
Do NOT reply with the "QUOTE" button, please use the "POST REPLY", at the bottom of the form.
If you obfuscate any information requested, I will obfuscate my response. These are virtual UUIDs, not real ones.
klepp0906
Posts: 14
Joined: 6. Dec 2018, 12:57

Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by klepp0906 »

yea, just talked to him. said virtualbox driver was the driver causing the crash in the dump file. Beyond that he doesnt know much about virtualbox itself. All i know for sure is it wasnt running any of the times the pc hung, unless it runs something in the background - or something via an idle maintenence causes it to run one of the virtualbox drivers.

either way, here's the crash dump with some spaces :P

http://www.dropbox.com/s/1wa5kjpn7io95f1/dump.zip?dl=0
Last edited by socratis on 7. Dec 2018, 02:02, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Fixed obfuscated URLs.
socratis
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Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by socratis »

Thank you very much klepp0906, I hope that the developers will find the information useful...
Do NOT send me Personal Messages (PMs) for troubleshooting, they are simply deleted.
Do NOT reply with the "QUOTE" button, please use the "POST REPLY", at the bottom of the form.
If you obfuscate any information requested, I will obfuscate my response. These are virtual UUIDs, not real ones.
klepp0906
Posts: 14
Joined: 6. Dec 2018, 12:57

Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by klepp0906 »

socratis wrote:Thank you very much klepp0906, I hope that the developers will find the information useful...
you betcha. heres to hoping :)
bird
Oracle Corporation
Posts: 127
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Re: Host hangs due to interaction of DeviceGuard with VBox driver

Post by bird »

Thanks for the dump. The driver verifier takes offence at using NonPagedPool instead of NonPagedPoolNx. This happens like two lines into the DriverEntry function (the first function invoked in the driver when it is loaded).
-bird
Knut St. Osmundsen
Oracle Corporation
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