vmwgfx failure with Ubuntu kernel upgrade (6.5.0-14)

[diegonc]

I just updated the Linux kernel (Ubuntu 22.04) and UI glitches seem to be gone

$ uname -r -v
6.5.0-15-generic #15~22.04.1-Ubuntu SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Fri Jan 12 18:54:30 UTC 2

[bertje]

GUI flickering / glitches is fixed during installation of Ubuntu 23.04 and VirtualBox 7.0.14. However, after installing all Ubuntu updates and reinstalling the guest addtions, the heavy screen flickering occurs again which makes the guest unusable.

Links:
- VirtualBox forum: Heavy screen flickering VirtualBox 6.1.50 / 7.0.14 Ubuntu guest kernels 6.4 / 6.5
- VirtualBox bugreport: issue 21955.

[Kinder Paul]

Sorry @diegonc, but that's exact same version I'm running and it's still a major problem here

[Kinder Paul]

ARGHHHHHHH - Having just done a re-install of VMBox Linux Additions version 7.0.14 onto a clean Red Hat 9.3 Developer Edition ... that's now gone completely screwy with the graphics, and lists similar error as seen under Ubuntu

I know this isn't a RHEL forum, but thought people might like to know it's definitely not a Ubuntu issue going on here.

Now to go rebuild my RHEL VM from scratch.

[Huub]

I do see the same vmwfgx issues. Althought not consequently the same behavior.

For the timebeing I start to use lightdm as the default display manager
I run vitrualbox 7.0.14 on Windows 11 (all patches installed).
I do run inside VBOX an Ubuntu 23.10 with Linux 6.5.0-15-generic kernel

with sudo dpkg-reconfigure gdm3 I configure lightdm!

[Kinder Paul]

Thanks for that update Huub.
I'm currently trying to switch the display manager over to see how that goes.

Edit:  Switching the display manager from gdm3 to lightdm actually broke the Ubuntu install (but, hey, that's why we always make clones to play with isn't it!). Next thing I'm going to try is to see if I can remove the currently installed version of the OracleVM Guest Add-ons and replace with the older version that did work ...and that kept same problem, even though I can see the older version did get installed. Currently, only thing I've seemingly been able to do is to uninstall the GuestAdditions and reboot to the new kernel it built. Not ideal, but at least my various Ubuntu and RHEL VM's are not now glitching constantly (although they do still complain about the wmwgfx error at start-up). Regards Paul

[ka1r0]

I had a similar issue because I had not pre-allocated enough storage on my VM during the creation process. I was able to launch initially, but as I began to setup each container, I would get to the 7th and would get hit with a "low storage" error. Three times I tried to increase storage after receiving the warning, but then was never able to reboot. So, I erased the VM instance and deleted all associated files and started from scratch. This time I increased the storage to 50 GB (for my specific needs) and it resolved the issue for me. Other people in my group had issues because their physical laptops were out of space. I hope this helps.

[diegonc]

Sorry @diegonc, but that's exact same version I'm running and it's still a major problem here

Yes sorry, I spoke too soon. I've just tested again the 6.5.0-21 version and it still shows the flickering

[blz777]

I also had issues with vmwgfx - the gui elements were not rendered properly. The following packages/versions fixed the problem for me (the main culprit being the xf86-video-vmware package):

Virtualbox running on Windows Host: Version 7.0.12 r159484 (Qt5.15.2)

➜ ~ sudo pacman -Q mesa xf86-video-vmware linux-lts linux-lts-headers
mesa 1:24.0.4-2
xf86-video-vmware 13.4.0-1
linux-lts 6.6.23-1
linux-lts-headers 6.6.23-1

I had trouble with this package: xf86-video-vmware-13.4.0-2-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst 31-Mar-2024 20:08 75K
so I ignored it in the pacman conf.

Now the gui elements are rendered properly.

Hope this helps!

[diegonc]

➜ ~ sudo pacman -Q mesa xf86-video-vmware linux-lts linux-lts-headers
mesa 1:24.0.4-2
xf86-video-vmware 13.4.0-1
linux-lts 6.6.23-1
linux-lts-headers 6.6.23-1

I had trouble with this package: xf86-video-vmware-13.4.0-2-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst 31-Mar-2024 20:08 75K
so I ignored it in the pacman conf.

blz777, so, what you did is pin xf86-video-vmware to version 13.4.0-1, right?

Ubuntu only has this verison:

Code: Select all

$ apt-cache policy xserver-xorg-video-vmware
xserver-xorg-video-vmware:
  Installed: 1:13.3.0-3build1
  Candidate: 1:13.3.0-3build1
  Version table:
 *** 1:13.3.0-3build1 500
        500 http://ar.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

I'm not sure how to apply your suggestion to Ubuntu

[bradford.wetmore]

FYI: I've been in contact with the assigned engineer, and he gave me the following information/workaround about the flickering.

The root cause of the flickering already understood: sometimes a screen content overlaps in VRAM with a screen update.

But fixing the reason of such "overlap phenomenon" may take some time.

The simplest workaround for now is just choose X.org session type in GDM instead of Wayland as described here, for example:
https://askubuntu.com/questions/961304/ ... untu-17-10

Switching back to xorg took care of the issue for me, and am now running a 6.5 kernel on both 7.0.14 and 7.0.18.

[itsWhiteNight]

Hey , I read only the first few replies so I don't know if the quality of information is redudant here .

When reading the recovery booting , I decided to go check my graphic controller on virtualbox , it's located in the display section .

My OS needs to run "VMSVGA" graphic controller by default , I decided to try few others . VBoxVGA worked for me

[bertje]

Bug reported December 2023: https://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/21955

VirtualBox 7.0.12 released, reported graphics problem
VirtualBox 7.0.14 released, same graphics problem
VirtualBox 7.0.16 released, same graphics problem, additionally crashing the host with Ethernet in bridged mode -> Useless release
VirtualBox 7.0.18 released, same graphics problem.
VirtualBox 7.0.20 released, same graphics problem.

Unclear if this bug will every be resolved. We gave up.