System instability - OS X kernel panics - with 4.1.x?

[hank]

Took the Mac Mini back to the Apple store. Their Genius said he was sure it was Virtualbox causing the problems, because all the kernel panics named VBox. (currently 4.1.2, most recently with 5GB RAM, OSX 10.7.2)

I'm dubious as I've had other crashes, some with just 2GB installed, that did not leave any log file, so I asked them to do a hardware stress test on it overnight.


EDIT -- they say nothing wrong with the hardware and blame VBox, because the VBox "kext" file is listed in everything that's been a problem. I do see in verbose logout that the Mac has trouble unloading a VBox kext file every time it shuts down, if that's a clue to anyone.

[hank]

Now using 4.0.14 r74382, with the full 8GB of RAM installed (mid-2011 Mini, Lion 10.7.2)
No kernel panics in 24 hours, with up to four Windows VMs open and active at the same time.

EDIT -- but the VMs can 't see the network in Bridged mode, only in NAT mode.

----
Question -- anyone using _more_ than 8GB of RAM? Some suggestion above that the kernel crashes with the recent VBox happen with 8GB.

I'll be trying 12 GB later this week -- wondering if anyone else already has, with VBox 4.1.4 or 4.1.6?

Any reports on 4.1.8, yet?

[hank]

This feels like the joke about how penguins find out if it's safe to go in the water.
http://media.museumofhoaxes.com/2008killerwhale.jpg

Won't somebody else go first trying out the new 4.1.8 to see if the kernel panics persist?

Otherwise it'll be me, in a few days.

[Sharpie]

Question -- anyone using _more_ than 8GB of RAM? Some suggestion above that the kernel crashes with the recent VBox happen with 8GB.

I have 18 GB on my system. Got multiple panics with VBox 4.1.2 before retreating to 4.0.12. Haven't stuck my toe in the upgrade pond since.

[hank]

Aside, I wonder if the kernel panics corrupted the VRDP authentication library; I clicked "reset" on that and my VMs can use bridged mode again, and remote desktop port assignment works again.

[jglogan]

Won't somebody else go first trying out the new 4.1.8 to see if the kernel panics persist?

I updated as soon as it came out because I hadn't downrevved to 4.0.x, so I had nothing to lose

Plus, the 4.1.8 upgrade fixes a problem with NAT networking that was causing much heartburn.

I have not had a panic since updating. I'm guessing that I've run through what seems to be the most likely trigger condition (shutting down one VM with others running) maybe 5-10 times since the update. The best that I can say about it so far (given that I didn't see anything that looked like a fix in a cursory scan of the release notes) is that it's very probably no worse than 4.1.6, and possibly better.

I'm going to try a quick stress test this morning and see if I can get it to fail.

[jglogan]

I'm going to try a quick stress test this morning and see if I can get it to fail.

I got a panic after about five shutdowns. The odd part was that this time it failed right at the time I sent the shutdown signal to the VM. In all other cases I see the failure shortly after the system halts and the VM is destroyed.

[hank]

thanks jglogan -- are you attaching crash logs to the report? It's
https://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/9359

[jglogan]

thanks jglogan -- are you attaching crash logs to the report? It's
https://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/9359

Hi Hank,

Sadly, I never saw that one and created a different ticket a while back: https://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/9897. There's about 10 different crashdumps there also...

Happy holidays...John

[hank]

I put a cross-reference between the two bug reports -- I don't know about bugtracking (just trying to use Vbox myself).
I guess we hope that by attaching our files it gets noticed and figured out.

[hank]

Has anyone had problems with 4.1.8 when running only one VM at a time?

I've had no kernel panics while running and opening and closing four VMs (various Windows versions) with OSX 10.7.2, VBox 4.0.14, 12GB of RAM.

I guess next I'll try 4.1.8 -- with just a single VM -- hoping that might get remote access working so a coworker can look in on what I"m fumbling around with.

[hank]

haven't risked 4.1.8 yet myself -- still at 4.0.14.

Saw this at Apple (other virtualization apps also have kernel panics):

https://discussions.apple.com/message/17119087#17119087

Speculating, is something in the virtual machine software acting like a screwed up router? The first link in that Apple post includes:

"Note: It is possible, although very unlikely, that something on your network is sending your Mac malformed network packets which could cause recurring kernel panics. If the hardware and software on your Mac checks out as OK, check the devices on your network. Make sure your router's firmware is up-to-date, and that the router is not malfunctioning. Refer to your router's manufacturer for service and support."

Is the VBox 4.1.x possibly doing that?

[stephen_liu]

interesting, had been getting random kernel panics in os x lion since i first started using it but never definitively found the reason. did a full reinstall a while back and have been running fine for the last couple of weeks. i decided to install virtualbox 4.1.8 a few days ago to see what would happen. i didn't even create any virtual machines. got 2 kernel panics yesterday and 1 the day before. the logs show seemingly random culprits. the virtualbox kexts are the only new kernel extensions since the crashes.

i can't say it's virtualbox for sure as the panic traces show different culprits each time but if the below is true, the trace would point to seemingly random and innocent processes i guess?

i've uninstalled virtualbox and confirmed that the kexts are unloaded. will report back in a few days.

haven't risked 4.1.8 yet myself -- still at 4.0.14.

Saw this at Apple (other virtualization apps also have kernel panics):

https://discussions.apple.com/message/17119087#17119087

Speculating, is something in the virtual machine software acting like a screwed up router? The first link in that Apple post includes:

"Note: It is possible, although very unlikely, that something on your network is sending your Mac malformed network packets which could cause recurring kernel panics. If the hardware and software on your Mac checks out as OK, check the devices on your network. Make sure your router's firmware is up-to-date, and that the router is not malfunctioning. Refer to your router's manufacturer for service and support."

Is the VBox 4.1.x possibly doing that?

[hank]

> the virtualbox kexts are the only new kernel extensions since the crashes.

I have verbose shutdown set (OSX 10.7.2) and I notice the VBox (4.0.14) kext files cannot be unloaded -- it's the first thing listed during the normal shutdown.

(you did confirm the kext files for you were removed by uninstalling).

I guess I could uninstall VBox each time I shut the Mac down and reinstall it each startup.
(rolling eyes ...)

I did come across this
http://www.justincarmony.com/blog/2011/ ... esolution/
documenting a complicated mess of stuff inconsistent with the usual UNIX behavior and wondering WTF, and "it seems that somehow during the Snow Leopard to Lion upgrade, the /etc/hosts file was encoded incorrectly (likely the type of newlines used), and that Lion would fail to read it properly."

(and he says he finally did "... a fresh install of Lion and this problem has gone away for me. So it appears that this issue would affect some people who upgraded from Snow Leopard.....")

[stephen_liu]

i've uninstalled virtualbox and confirmed that the kexts are unloaded. will report back in a few days.

update: got a kernel panic yesterday about 3 days after removing virtualbox. double checked the panic log and no sign of virtualbox kexts. did a prime95 test overnight utilizing as much ram as possible and 2 full extended cycles using apple's hardware diagnostic test cd. both came up clean. i don't think virtualbox was the problem in my case. judging by all the lion kernel panic posts on apple's official forums, there are probably still yet to be uncovered/fixed bugs in lion that are causing this--at least in my case (Macbook pro 13-inch, Early 2011).