Running VB in Full screen in MacOsX

[NexusPenguin]

Hi,

Running Virtual Box 4.3.34 on MacOsX ElCapitan.

Machine used is : MacPro 4.1 ; 40GB RAM ; 2 X 2.93Ghz Xeon.
Guest : installed on SSD Raid 0 on Pci card ; Installed guest OS : Linux Debian 8.2.

What I would like to do is to go back and forth between MacOs and VirtualBox running in fullscreen mode.

I can, of course, enter full screen mode and go back to windows mode.
I can of course enter full screen mode and go to the VirtualBox display using the usual MacOs key combination.
But once there, I can't go back to MacOs using the same key-combination like I can with Parallels Desktop (and that's the only feature Iike in Parallels).

So I was wondering if I was missing something or if there is a way to do what I want.

Anyone can help ?

Regards.

FRED

[socratis]

Running Virtual Box 4.3.34 on MacOsX ElCapitan.

First of all, I would upgrade to the latest and greatest VBox which actually supports El Capitan, i.e. 5.0.10 as of this writing.

Second, from your post, I think you are complaining about the key combination used to switch back and forth between your guest and your host. You can take a look at two places; 1) keyboard shortcuts on your Mac host and 2) the input options in the preference panel of VirtualBox. See if you can have a unique combination that can make it work.

What I do is to set my host key to Right-Option. So, if I want to switch between applications in my host, I use Cmd-Tab (duh). If I want to switch applications in my Win guest, the same combo works. BUT, if I want to switch between my guest and my host, from within my guest I have to press once the Right-Option to release the keyboard and then the Cmd-Tab works. I wouldn't expect Cmd-Tab to cycle between my Win apps and then transition to my Mac apps. Doesn't make sense.

[NexusPenguin]

Hi Socratis,

Thanks for the tip about 5.0.10.
But it turns out that all 5.0 versions of VB apparently do not marry with multithreaded CPU's in MacOS Host very well.

I mainly use VB to run a Linux Host to compile custom ROM's for my smartphone.
That requires a LOT of CPU power.

Running VB 5.0.X I have about 8 threads running at 70% each and the other 8 threads running at 10% each.
A ROM is compiled in over 2 hours under those conditions.

Same guest (even same image) with 4.X.X : 8 threads running at 100% each and the other 8 threads running between 40 and 80% each.
A ROM is then compiled in 55 minutes.


For the rest, I will try to do as advised to see if I can configure a key combination that will allow me to go back to the Finder when the VB Guest is displayed in full-screen.

Regards.

[socratis]

all 5.0 versions of VB apparently do not marry with multithreaded CPU's in MacOS Host very well.

I certainly cannot concur with that statement, and as far as I know you're the first one to make that claim. Please read the following: Minimum information needed for assistance. In more detail, for the VBox.log.zip, here's what you do:
- Start the VM. Let it boot fully.
- Shut down the VM. Not paused, not saved-state, complete shut down.
- Right-click on the VM in the VirtualBox Manager.
- Select "Show Log..."
- Save it, ZIP it and attach it.

[NexusPenguin]

Hi Socratis,

Thanks for that info...

But as 4.3.34 works like a charm out of the box and as Full screen mode isn't really an added feature of 5.0.10 (I would even say, quite the opposite !) I think I'll stick to 4.3.34 and leave Oracle's support sort out much more important things.

And by the way : just try it for yourself. Set-up a build environment for Android and try to compile whatever you want with 5.0.10 and then the same but with 4.3.14.

Maybe it's just something related to Xeon Processors but it has been that way since the release of 5.0 and that's the same thing whatever OsX version is used...
And that is the same with a perfectly clean install of MacOsX Yosemite or El Capitan. So nothing can interfere...

I will just redo it and let you know the numbers...
Just so you know it.
I tried VB 5.0.10 on my machine.
Installed Linux Debian 8.2 as a guest OS.
Installed the required VBAdditions...
Ran the whole thing in "winowsed" mode (so no full screen or anything...
All thing was simply sluggish : resizing a window was slow, reaction to double click allowed me to go and get a coffee before the instruction was made, host CPU was never used over 35%...
Simply downgraded VB to 4.3.34 => everything was back to normal : smooth windows resizing ; instant reaction to double-click ; 100% CPU usage...

I am not the only one making this statement... there are others that report the same behavior on their Macs...

Regards.

FRED

[loukingjr]

all 5.0 versions of VB apparently do not marry with multithreaded CPU's in MacOS Host very well.

FWIW, there is a difference between multi-threaded CPU's and multiple CPU's. Some Mac Pro's came configured with two Xeons as the user mentions his has. I have noticed a few posts over time where someone has more than one CPU and had issues running VirtualBox on them whether on a Mac or not. Nothing to do with VB 5.0.* vs VB 4.*.

For most users with an issue setting the number of CPU's to less than the total cores of one CPU seemed to fix their issue.

There are a number of statements in this post however that make no sense. Like setting all threads to a guest.

[NexusPenguin]

Hi loukingjr,

Thanks for your reply.

I think I already posted about this but that was pretty long ago and that was not the subject of this thread.
As I said : I run a Dual Xeon Mac Pro.
So that would be 8 physical cores and 8 added "threaded cores".

If I run VB 4.3.34, it seems that the 8 physical cores are used to 100% each, and the 8 "threaded cores" used at up to 80% each.
I am now running VB 5.0.10 to check it... I have the 8 physical cores running at about 70% each and the 8 "threaded cores" running at 10% max each !

On VB 4.3.34, compiling a custom ROM (I took Tipsy OS for test purposes) finishes in about 62 minutes.
I have just upgraded the VB to 5.0.10 and just installed the VBAdditions... So that the only thing changing in the config...
I have launched the build and will report how long it takes... when it's finished.

Anyways, thanks to confirm that the problem is not just something I made up...

Regards.

[socratis]

Where is the log file? Too much to ask for?

[NexusPenguin]

Hi Socratis,

The log file is attached. I took the log file after the build of the ROM finished.

Here are simple numbers :

- ROM build duration using VB 4.3.34 : 62 minutes
- ROM build duration using VB 5.0.10 : 152 minutes
- ROM Build duration using other (paid) virtualization software : 48 minutes
- ROM build duration using the same machine but starting it in Linux natively : 42 minutes

I could live with the 62 minutes (especially as I would then use ccache that would increase build times a lot).
I can't live with 152 minutes...

Weird enough, "System Monitor" in the Guest showed that all 16 cores were used between 70 and 80%... when the Host monitor showed that only the 8 physical cores were used at 80% and the 8 threaded cores were used at 10%.

If you can tell me why looking at the log and give an explanation, I'd be more than grateful.

But I suspect I already know what you will say while looking at the log...

And by the way : your "Where's the log file ?Is it too much to ask for" is perfectly superfluous as I am not asking for any assistance on this performance issue in the first place.
You pointed that I should use 5.0.10 and I just answered explaining why I do not !
As I said : I can really happily live with Virtual Box 4.3.34 which works quite well (even though not on par with paid software for Mac from VMWare or Parallels Desktop).

Regards.

[Martin]

Which CPU(s) are in your system?
The log file shows Intel Core i7-3960X which would be a six core CPU.

Did you try a test run with the guest configured to use just 7 virtual CPUs?

[NexusPenguin]

Hi Martin,

My computer is a Mac Pro 4.1 Early 2009 running 2 Intel Quad-Core Xeon's 5500 Series at 2.93Ghz.
Log reports that I use a Mac Pro 5.1 because I "flashed" it's EFI to make the system believe it's a 5.1 Mac Pro which allows me to get sound over HDMI, which the 4.1 did not allow (go figure... that's Apple !).
That CPU supports hyperthreading.
I have no idea why the log reports hexa-core CPU's !

So that would be 8 (2 X 4) physical cores.
And each physical core can be duplicated to create a "hyperthreaded" core.

Basically, that represents 16 cores... so Virtual Box is set-up to run 16 cores.
And that fits the settings, because the bar is green up to 16 cores and begins to turn red at 17 cores and up (to 32 cores).

When I run Virtual Box 4.3.34 (or any other virtualization software) I always set-up the Virtualization software to use 16 cores.
And that gives the expected results.

Yes, I tried to run less cores (and even more cores)...
That wasn't today... but with VB 5.0.4 I think.
Configuring to less CPU's did have no other effect... than to slow down the machine even more

Regards.

[Martin]

Well, for most of us the experience shows that threads don't really provide additional compute power for a virtual machine.
So we only count "real" cores and leave one free for the host to manage the virtual machine.

[NexusPenguin]

Hi Martin,

I am trying it right now with only 8 cores active. I don't need the Host machine at the moment, so...

It's not really changing anything.

Guest reports using 100% of each of the 8 available cores.
Host says 8 cores are used but only to 80% with some 90% peaks.

With VB 4.3.34, when guest reports using CPU at 100%, host is reporting the same thing...

Let's wait if Socratis can come up with a solution after reading the log file I've sent... That would be nice

Edit:  It has changed something in the end Build time was 78 minutes, so that is an hour less Still far less efficient than 4.3.34, but much more efficient than the old setting !

[Martin]

Even if "you don't need the host" it needs CPU time to run your VM. So every time the host needs to do something like moving data to the disk file or through the net your whole guest needs to pause if it is defined with all available cores. That's why I suggested 7 CPUs for your guest.

[socratis]

Several things that I can think of:

1. You do not have PAE enabled. Seeing that you're allocating 16GB of RAM to the guest, it might be a good idea to turn PAE on. In fact it may make all the difference...
2. Although people are going to tell you that there is a difference between physical and logical cores (and they are 100% right), I've found that several tasks that rely simply on processors, can and will perform better, even if you're assigning more CPUs than the physical cores, i.e. you include the logical ones as well. See graph at the end.
3. I have not found 4.3.x and 5.0.x being any different. See graph at the end.
4. You have messed up with your system in a major way. I mean, VBox thinks you have a different processor!!! What if they've tweaked the code to take advantage of some features which you claim to have but you actually don't? That's why most probably you're the only one reporting this drop in performance; nobody else around here re-flashed their Mac.

Now, for the graph below. It's a number crunching program. I have 4 physical cores, 8 logical. As you can tell, since there is no I/O involved or anything like that, the performance increases nicely up to the maximum of 8 that I can afford. CPU usage on the host is of course 100%. But, it's the same with the 4.3.x and the 5.0.x series. One thing you could try is to go to http://www.mersenne.org/ and download the stress test. Run it and see if the CPU hits 100%. It sure did on mine. If it doesn't, then something is wrong with your setup. And I mean in the hardware level...

CPU_StressTest.png (38.81 KiB) Viewed 4516 times