system freeze with Win XP host, Ubuntu guest- suspect USB

[Josephine]

Over the last couple of weeks, I've had a series of random, complete system freezes for no apparent reason. Both host and guest would be frozen, but would often unfreeze after several minutes or even hours. After doing some research and from a past post on this topic, one suggestion was that perhaps Win and antivirus updates caused this, so I did an OS restore using a backup I made several weeks ago made with the True Image program (I stopped using Win system restore years ago). After finishing the backup restoration yesterday and reinstalling my latest Virtualbox "appliances" (as I didn't have the appliances on the original image- appliances were saved separately), I found a similar system freeze problem when I tried to use USB devices. I'm not sure I'm installing the USB drivers or even using them correctly and looking for guidance. Whenever I plug in a USB device, Windows of course recognizes it and I can easily use it from my host. However, before I can access the device in my Ubuntu guest, I have to bring up the device menu from Virtualbox and then enable whatever attached USB device is shown. This is where I think things are going wrong. I immediately get a message from my host that a new device has been plugged in and needs drivers installed, but doesn't the device already have Win drivers? Anyway, I don't know where to point XP to get these new drivers, so I cancel it out and get a message that the device may not have been installed properly. At first, the device would show up in my Ubuntu guest with full access, but later the freezes began. I do have guest additions installed and they appear to be working.

Can someone help me here? For now, I have USB access totally disabled in the guest until I can find out proper USB installation and use procedures for XP host and Ubuntu guest.

Thank you,
Josephine

[mpack]

VirtualBox version? Any recent changes on your host?

[Josephine]

The version is 4.2.0 r80737. There *were* changes because I was having this issue a week ago, but I reverted to an image state where nothing on the host was updated. So no recent changes.

[mpack]

A freeze when VirtualBox tries to grab a USB device is not unknown.

The best way to use a USB device is to create a filter for it (in VM settings | USB) when the VM is shut down (not suspended). Then run the VM and wait for it to be stable, then plug in the device. A "new hardware detected" dialog will pop up. Sometimes this looks like it is coming from the guest, but in fact it's coming from the host: VirtualBox wants to install a redirection filter for that device, i.e. to redirect all USB messages from it into the guest. It is important that you allow this driver installation to continue: tell it to install the driver automatically. When that succeeds you unplug and then replug the device: the guest should pick it up happily. There should be no need to ever use the "Device" menu in the VM window to attach USB devices.

[Josephine]

With the way my system had been configured before the backup image restore, I always had to enable the USB device in Virtualbox each time it was plugged in so that the guest could access it. This time though, they seem to be automatically recognized. And I am pointing Win to "install automatically" when it asks for drivers for whatever device is plugged in. So far, it seems to be installing the virtualbox drivers each time. As for the filter, should I enable a new one of every device I plug in or is just the one filter good for all devices? All of these steps I didn't do before I did the image restore so maybe that was the cause of all my difficulties with freezing. So far, so good with the host/ guest this time. No freezing so far. I'd like to try updating my XP host with Win and antivirus software updates, but the last time I did it, all of the freezing problems began. Not sure if it was due to the updates or the improper way I was configuring the USB devices. Thanks for the help so far.