virtualbox.org

My PC is an ACER Aspire One, 120Gb hard drive, 1.5Gb ram, Windows XP Pro SP3.

I am using Windows XP Pro guests all at a minimum SP2. The hard disks are set to be dynamically expanding.

I have two network interfaces installed. NAT and also a host interace depending on what I need to use at the time. I also have USB support enabled.

I have recently tried to install some automation software on a Virtualbox guest, but it crashed Windows XP Pro on startup. The software I have been trying to install is Beckhoff TwinCAT, not the most popular I know.

At first I thought this may be due to the nlited version of XP I was using, so I found a normal version and tried using that instead, but the same issue occurs.

I know that TwinCAT modifies the Windows kernel as it is designed as an industrial PC automation system, would this be the cause of the issue?

I have got round the issue for now by using VirtualPC, with the same nlited verison of XP I tried under Virtualbox.

Obviously it would be nice if I could use Virtualbox, as it has more features than VirtualPC, but I just wondered if anyone could shed any light on the issue.

Jon.

Has anyone got any ideas for this?

I tried it again last night with IO APIC and PAE/NX enabled but still no joy.

Thanks,

Jon.

How does Beckhoff talk to the PNCs? Are these through serial ports or through a special to purpose I/O board. In this second case, the VMM will not virtualise these and any attempt of the application to talk to their I/O ports will not be handled by the VMM.

Have you tried VMware Server? Does this crash as well?

The Beckhoff software talks to it's I/O through ethernet.

Haven't tried it on VMWare Server but managed to get XP to load in MS VirtualPC.

Basically, in Virtualbox I can log in to Windows and then everything looks like it is going to boot up but the system just hangs, so I have to close the virtual machine. I have verified it is not the XP install I am using as I used the same one in VirtualPC.

I know TwinCAT makes modifications to the Windows system to allow it access to the kernel, for things like remote shutdown and user control.

Unfortunately I don't know enough about either VirtualPC or Virtualbox to work put what is going wrong. I would like to get it working in Virtualbox as I am trying to migrate to Linux, but still need these apps so Vbox is the ideal solution.

Jon

I have had the same results trying this on a Linux host (Mandriva One 2009).

Jon

Jon R wrote:I know that TwinCAT modifies the Windows kernel as it is designed as an industrial PC automation system, would this be the cause of the issue?

Possibly. Installing different/updated kernels on Solaris was capable of breaking VBox...

Sorry Jon, but I am not sure that I can help more with this limited info.

What further info can I give you?

I am still a bit of a noob at virtualbox, my skills extend to configuring, but if there is anything I can do to give you more information I will gladly do what I can.

Jon

Not sure what has specifically changed with Virtualbox 2.1 from 2.06 but TwinCAT now runs inside my guest.

Thanks to the Virtualbox team.

Jon.