Windows 10 guest crashes linux host gui

[sysadmin]

I was working on a customer's system installing VirtualBox 5.x (not sure of exact version; installed from Software Manager. I believe it was 5.06) and really like the improvements over VB 4.x.

I installed several guests OSs, Windows 7, Debian 8.2, Xubuntu and Windows 10, which began as a clone of a Windows 7 and then upgraded to Windows 10.

VBox extension pack was installed on the host, Linux Mint 17.2, kernel version 3.16. Most of the guest OSs had the guest additions installed. It was installed on the Windows 7 and Windows 10 guests. The host is a high end system: Asus Sabertooth P67 mobo with 16GB of RAM, 8 core water cooled i7 CPU, NVidia GForce dual monitor graphics card, 3 500GB drives and a 1TB drive. Don't have the specs or model of the graphics card.

I experienced no significant issues with any of the guests except the Windows 10 guest. Installation / upgrade was time consuming but no errors occurred and after the last restart of the guest ran OK for awhile, but would lockup and then crash the host X Server. I was unable to even login on another virtual console to kill processes. The host was not locked up but it was extremely difficult to interact with (like 100% of the CPU was in use). The only recourse was to hit the reset button and restart the host OS.

The Windows 10 guest was configured with 6GB of RAM and 2 CPUs. All of the guests were setup with 2 CPUs and varying amounts of RAM, but only the Windows 10 guest had a problem.

I was actually quite shocked when the host's X server crashed. I thought the virtualization practically guaranteed complete protection of the host environment against any aberrant behavior of a guest OS. This problem was not a one of event, it occurred on every use of the Windows 10 guest.

[loukingjr]

Attach the vbox.log for the guest…
With the VM fully shut down, right click it in the VB GUI. Select "Show Log" and save "VBox.log" to a zip file. Attach the zip here.

[sysadmin]

I copied all 3 of the logfiles (.log, .log.1, .log2) to a usb stick, but only 1 is there now. Wasn't paying attention, must be they were all named the same so I only have one if the 3 which is attached.

[Perryg]

Code: Select all

VirtualBox VM 5.0.2 r102096 linux.amd64 (Aug 13 2015 16:42:27) release log

You really need to update to 5.0.10 and install the latest guest additions for Windows to to play nicer.

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00:00:00.587556 Guest OS type: 'Windows7_64'

First thing to do is change the type of OS to Win-10_64. Lots of difference in the template between 7 and 10.

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00:00:01.098930 CPUM: Physical host cores: 4

Another thing to watch out for is how many guests are running and the guest CPU count. VirtualBox only deals with cores not threads so if you over-commit the host processor you can have issues.

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00:06:10.232761 VMMDev: Guest Log: VBoxMP::DxgkDdiQueryCurrentFenceNew: WARNING! :=>DxgkDdiQueryCurrentFenceNew

You may also have issues with Win-10 and 3D enabled. Works is progressing but AFAIK it is not complete.

[sysadmin]

Code: Select all

VirtualBox VM 5.0.2 r102096 linux.amd64 (Aug 13 2015 16:42:27) release log

You really need to update to 5.0.10 and install the latest guest additions for Windows to to play nicer.

Code: Select all

00:00:00.587556 Guest OS type: 'Windows7_64'

First thing to do is change the type of OS to Win-10_64. Lots of difference in the template between 7 and 10.

Code: Select all

00:00:01.098930 CPUM: Physical host cores: 4

Another thing to watch out for is how many guests are running and the guest CPU count. VirtualBox only deals with cores not threads so if you over-commit the host processor you can have issues.

Code: Select all

00:06:10.232761 VMMDev: Guest Log: VBoxMP::DxgkDdiQueryCurrentFenceNew: WARNING! :=>DxgkDdiQueryCurrentFenceNew

You may also have issues with Win-10 and 3D enabled. Works is progressing but AFAIK it is not complete.

Thanks for these tips. As I posted, this is on a customer's system which I no longer have direct access to. However I think your noticing that the OS type is still set to Windows 7 could be the main problem. I will pass that along to my customer. In my haste to complete the work and return the system to the customer I forgot to switch that setting after upgrading the VM from Windows 7 to 10. I'm hoping that will be all it takes to allow it to run without crashing the host X server. Very surprised it does that, even with the wrong OS type set. That seems like a major flaw in the code that allows a guest to corrupt the host.