VirtualBox Beta Testing

[Technologov]

Hi all !

Let's update the status of working Guest OSes on VirtualBox.

I will test on VirtualBox 2.2.2, on Core 2 Q6600 with default settings (i.e. ACPI=on, VT=on, all else is disabled). Using default Audio (AC97 on DirectSound), and default network (NAT).
Host is Windows XP SP2, 32-bit.

I intend to test Windows: 2000, XP, Vista, 7 (RC1)
I intend to test Linux: RHEL 3/4/5, Fedora 10, openSUSE 11.1.

Anyone else want to join efforts?

-Technologov

[Technologov]

First results: So far RHEL 3/4/5 (32-bit) has a number of problems with Guest Additions: Seamless, resolution resizing, autorun install and uninstall do not work.

BTW: GuestAdditions uninstall do not seems to exist as feature. I need to decided wherever to open bug or feature-request. It is pretty basic functionality.
http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/4039

-Technologov

[Technologov]

When installing Windows 7 RC1 32-bit in parallel with Win 2000, I got Disk I/O warning, and few minutes afterwards both VMs stucked. (i.e. became zombie processes without ability to get them killed.) Windows Task manager did not help. I could not soft-restart or soft-shutdown host Windows either. Had to do hard-reset.

update: I had this hard lockup again when installing 4 VMs in parallel: Fedora 7/8/9/10 (all 32-bit guests).

[Technologov]

In the past, I have stopped those tests due to one blocker bug in VBox 2.2.x.
http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/4040

But with v3.0.0 it is resolved, so I may continue...

[Technologov]

Testing VirtualBox v3.0.10

Generally this version is mostly stable, with some problems on the sidelines.

Host is Windows 7 64-bit. Core 2 Q6600 CPU.
VirtualBox 3.0.10, Network - NAT, pcNET-III, Sound DirectSound, AC97, HDD: IDE PIIX4. All VMs have SMPx2 + ACPI + APIC. VT-x enabled. (unless otherwise stated)

v3.0.10 has the following bugs:

Guests Problems: (This page will be continuously updated)
-RHEL 3.9 32-bit -- keyboard reacts twice with SMP kernel. looks like timing issue.
http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/5408
-RHEL 3.9 64-bit -- kernel panic. (cannot boot). NOTE: It has rare 64-bit Linux 2.4 kernel.
http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/5406
-Fedora 7 -- Guest Additions crash it's X server.
http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/4041
-Fedora 8 -- 64-bit - both UP and SMP - randomly stuck during install from DVD ISO. UP kernel panics, if I disable APIC.
http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/5410
-SUSE Linux 9.1 -- system refuses to load with VT-x. It works fine with software virtualization.
http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/5407
-Fedora 11 - 64-bi - fails to install - stucks during install of "evolution-help" package. Need to re-verify that.
-openSUSE 11.1 - So far very good. Not worked: autorun (autoinstall of guest additions) and 3D support.
Good news - Worked: (32+64-bit, SMP) Install, Sound, Network, Mouse integration, Resizing, seamless mode, mini-bar. Very fast performance.
http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/3809
-Fedora 9 (32+64-bit) - huge X display. Incorrectly chooses resolution. This is without Guest Additions.
-Fedora 10/11 - Must manually unmount DVD to reboot from hard disk.
http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/2680
-Fedora 10 (32+64-bit) installed fine, except the issue above. All work, inc. Sound, network, guest additions (MI, mini-bar, dynamic resizing, seamless mode and 3D OpenGL). Very fast performance.

[Technologov]

Other users would like to help me ?

This test topic has 2 main goals: test of VMM (virtualizer engine) with wide coverage of different guest OSes (all OSes) and test Guest Additions (mainly GA for Linux guests, as it still has problems, due to Huge number of different distributions, and huge number of possible configurations withing a single distribution).

[uli100]

Sorry, I don't use Windows 7 64 bit. I'll gladly help on beta testing if Linux hosts are required.

Best regards, Uli

[Technologov]

>Sorry, I don't use Windows 7 64 bit.
From my own experience, there are *very* small differences between different hosts. VBox VMM Engine has almost the same bugs on all hosts.

That is - you can use whatever host you want, and provided we do the same tests, we will get the same results.
What would really help (and makes a difference) -- is to use CPU with VT-x/AMD-V. (as it allows testing guest SMP and 64-bit guests)

[uli100]

OK, fine. This means I can do some testing. I'm using VT-x/AMD-V quite often. Since 3.0.x, a WinXP image of mine refuses to boot unless I activate VT-x/AMD-V. Since then, I activate it for all/most of my images.

I'm using these very often:
- Ubuntu-8.04
- Ubuntu-8.10
- Ubuntu-9.04
- Ubuntu-9.10
With all of them, I didn't observe much issues when using the 32bit versions and 1 CPU. I typically run the images in text-only mode (no graphics).

Regards, Uli.