Vbox2.2.2 with Ubuntu guest window refresh problem

[rjnbarrass]

Hello all,

Hopefully you can help with the following issue I am seeing:

I am running VBox 2.2.2 on Windows XP SP3 and have 3D acceleration enabled in the settings of my VM (upgraded from previous VBox releases)

The guest is Ubuntu (and the problem exists with either 8.10 or 9.04) with the latest guest additions installed and appear to work correctly – Ubuntu configures itself for the ‘Normal’ visual effects and they behave as expected.

The issue I am seeing however, is that if you minimise the VBox guest window and re-open it, you get the window decoration and the ‘Machine, Devices and Help’ menu bar, but what should be the virtual desktop is ‘missing’ – you can just see what was on screen previously… if you move the pointer around, certain actions cause that area of the screen to be redrawn and you can eventually get the whole Linux desktop re-drawn!

Without changing any of the VM settings, but setting the visual effects to ‘None’, the problem goes away so I suspect it is a combination of the vboxvideo driver and my host graphics card.

Has anybody else seen this issue?

Guest VM settings:
OS Type: Ubuntu
Base Memory: 1024MB
Video Memory: 64MB
ACPI: Enabled
IO APIC: Enabled
VT-x/AMD-V: Enabled
Nested Paging: Enabled
PAE/NX: Enabled
3D Acceleration: Enabled
[Audio and Network also configured.]

Host details:
OS: Windows XP SP3
Graphics card: Nvidia Quadra FX 1500M (256MB)
Main Memory: 4GB

Thanks in advance.

Richard

[jtmccas]

Hello,

I am noticing the same issue with a very similar configuration except that I've allocated 512 MB for Base Memory and 22 MB for Video Memory. My main PC has 4GB of memory with 1.6GB being utilized. Within the Ubuntu virtual machine, I'm seeing about 42percent system memory utilization. A few things I've discovered:

(1) problem appears to be related to using Visual Effects in Ubuntu. In order to use Visual Effects, the 3D acceleration must be enabled. If I select, 'None' in the Visual Effect selection window the issue disappears.

(2) the guest window will refresh if you choosing a different a different workspace by hitting the 'Current Workspace' button in the to panel (if its visible...which is is in my case....)

(3) wrt to (2) if I minimize my virutal machine in Windows host then maximize, the screen is blank. However, if I move my mouse around the virutal machine Ubuntu system and left click, the main window begins to 'tile in' following the mouse clicks.

[alip]

I had the same problem after upgrading VirtualBox to 2.x and Ubuntu guest to 9.04 (XP host). Guest screen did not refresh, integrated desktop (seamless mode, hostkey+L) was unusable. Turning off visual effects fixed the problem.

There's still a problem with integrated desktop though drawing child windows. For example, if I launch Update Manager and click Settings and drag the child window, it will not draw completely those parts that are outside the area of the Update Manager parent window.

[dankrusi]

I have the same problem. It appears that Virtual Box is not receiving the latest screen updates (or is not refreshing them on the host).

Ubuntu 8.10 (with desktop effects) in Virtual Box 3.0.8 r53138 on OS X 10.5.8

[KenNeedsHelp]

Confirming that turning off the Settings, Display, "Enable 3D Acceleration" checkbox makes screen updates happen in real-time. I'm running an XP SP3 host, with Ubuntu 9.10 guest, Virtualbox 3.0.10 r54097. With 3D acceleration enabled, the display would lag; for instance, I configured "sbackup" to back up my VM, and clicking on each tab would cause nothing to change in the display; however, if I then moved the mouse down so it was over the window, it would update the window. Not sure what is causing this, but happy to have found the solution. (I somewhat wanted to try out the 3D stuff, like compiz, but I would MUCH rather have a deterministic computing experience, so I'll leave it off for now.)

[etheng]

Hi KenNeedHelp, thanks for the tips. It works, by disable the "Enable 3D Accelerator". The refresh rate is as normal now.