VxWorks guest broken on v5.X (#16254)

[pcabral]

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[ModEdit, related ticket #16254]

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Upgraded from VirtualBox v4.3.40 to v5.1.10 on OS X host and I am no longer able to run my VxWorks simulators. The problem seems to be related to the network interface, when I disable the network interface the virtual machine behaves differently (hangs versus crashing), otherwise the virtual machine crashes. I’ve attached log files for each of the versions of VirtualBox, just in case it helps in debugging why one is working and the other is not.

P.S.
There are no issues when running the VxWorks simulators on VirtualBox v5.1.10 on both Windows and Linux hosts.

[pcabral]

The last log file where v5.1.10 does not crash but hangs when network interfaces are disabled.

[michaln]

Please create a bug ticket with the log files (and then reference it from here). The forum is a very poor tool for issue tracking.

[socratis]

Any idea on how to get our hands on a "VxWorks simulator" to try it out?

PS. You can always ZIP the logs to avoid splitting them...

[socratis]

Please create a bug ticket with the log files (and then reference it from here). The forum is a very poor tool for issue tracking.

As opposed to michaln I believe that first there should be a discussion in the forums, and if determined to be a bug (or more accurately if a solution is not found) then head to the bug tracker. More eyes here, and usually more than 95% of the problems are resolved here.

Having said that, you're getting the following:

00:00:04.212787 !!  Guru Meditation -5390 (VERR_IEM_ASPECT_NOT_IMPLEMENTED)

Searching for this returns a couple of interesting results. For example from viewtopic.php?f=3&t=78983 :

The bug was fixed right after the 5.1.8 release. It may be possible to work around it by turning off KVM paravirtualization.

The thing is that you do NOT have the KVM paravirtualization on, because you've set the guest OS as "DOS". Are you sure that "DOS" should be the OS for this VM? The only VxWorks simulator that I found (http://www.windriver.com/evaluations/bsp/ from WindRiver) talks about a "syslinux-4.0.4" disk.

Now, that's really interesting, because that specific Guru Meditation that you're getting usually occurs in Linux guests on OSX hosts. In fact all the references about "VERR_IEM_ASPECT_NOT_IMPLEMENTED" (3 in total) are about Linux guests on OSX hosts:

• viewtopic.php?f=3&t=78983 (as stated earlier)
• viewtopic.php?f=8&t=79068
• viewtopic.php?f=8&t=80041

The thing is that there is no bug report open for this, so the advice would be to head to the bug tracker. Maybe michaln already knew exactly what he was talking about after all...

[michaln]

pcabral: When you create the ticket, please also add information about where you got the OS from and what CPUs it's supposed to run on.

The exact failure mode is maybe not right, but the guest OS is trying to access MSR 0x1E0 which does not exist on any modern CPU. So it probably is supposed to crash (and the fact that it doesn't on other VirtualBox versions is a bug).

[socratis]

Interesting... Someone created a bug report for this. It 's not pcabral. https://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/16251

[pcabral]

The OS is designed to run on a standard Pentium platform more specifically on the AMD Geode line which is X86 compatible. As for the OS, I created image by hand for the actual hardware, then used a tool called "Redo" (essentially a clonezilla based application) to create a backup image, which I then used the backup image to perform a restore onto a guest VM's virtual disk.

Once I had the OS restored within VirtualBox I then exported the appliance and use the appliance instead (vs hardware) for all development activities. Please PM me for more information on how to virtualize a VxWorks image.

I will play with the VM guest settings (DOS to Linux types) to see if it makes a difference.

***Update***

Tried other types such as linux 2/3/4 (32 bit) and still crashes.

Should I still create a ticket since another user is experiencing the same error code?

[michaln]

The OS is designed to run on a standard Pentium platform more specifically on the AMD Geode line which is X86 compatible.

Yeah, x86 compatible... but the problem is with a MSR (Model-Specific Register), and those are not universally applicable. That makes me wonder how transferable such an image is.

Should I still create a ticket since another user is experiencing the same error code?

Yes, and no. The other user got the same error code but for very different reasons, and with a different resolution. So please create a ticket.

[pcabral]

Ticket created and attached log files: https://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/16254

[pcabral]

Here is a link to setting up a VxWorks VM via Windriver's website:

https://knowledge.windriver.com/en-us/0 ... 40/000/020

I should note the following section causes my VxWorks VM to crash under Ubuntu 16.04 host (v5.1.10) and my OS X host (v4.3.40) the VM just hangs. Probably best to ignore that section as it runs fine without it being set under Ubuntu 16.04 host (v5.1.10).

Prerequisites
Prior to installing and using VirtualBox with a vmdk image, the system BIOS must be set to enable Virtualization and VT for Direct I/O or its equivalent, otherwise the vmdk image will not be able to boot.