virtualbox.org

I have a Win7 host which has been very reliable for years. Recently I experienced occasional problems with the network. Although I wasn't sure any more, it seemed to me that the Problems began around the time I installed VBox 5. After trying all sorts of things with the Windows config, I finally installed VBox 4 over VBox 5, and the problems have not recurred since. So I tend to believe that a network driver in VBox 5 was the source of my problems.

Some Details:
Host Win 7 Home Premium Version 6.1 SP1
My VBox Versions: Version 5.0.10 r 104061 suspected Problem, Version 4.3.34 r 104062 Looks good to me

Symptoms of the Problem:
My usual usage of the System is to have a guest permanently running, using the Default NAT network Interface.
When I'm not using the System, I put the host to sleep or hibernate it, without shutting down the guest OS.
As Long as the host is running, everything works very well with any Version of VBox. The Problems Show up when I wake up the host from sleep or hibernate. Sometimes, but not always, the host's Internet Connection is locked up. Sometimes Windows Shows it as broken, sometimes it doesn't, but I can't connect to the Internet. The only Thing that helps (and the success rate is 100%) is restarting the host. In many cases, I had to do a hard reset, because the shutdown process locked up.
With VBox 4 the wake-up works flawlessly.

Please be clear - are you saying that the host loses Internet after a wakeup?

If you're using NAT then VirtualBox isn't doing anything special. It's using the host's Internet connection just like any other host application.

Yes, the Problem is with the host. The host's Internet Connection breaks or hangs, and the host hangs when attempting a shutdown ...
The guest seems to work well, as Long as it doesn't Access the net. At least I can do a normal guest shutdown.

Well, as I said, in NAT mode the VM is using the host internet, just like any other software on your host would. I can think of scenarios that might break the virtual connection between guest and host (i.e. the guest can no longer access the internet). But, I can't think of how VirtualBox could break the host Internet connection.

And how would the settings for a mere VM affect the host in any way?

I would try disabling the bridged networking service attached to the host NIC. I suspect the VM is a red herring, and you have one of the usual NDIS problems.

You mention the bridging Service. That rings a (remote) bell. In my list of guests I also have one that is configured with bridging Network Access. Most of the time this guest isn't running, and it certainly wasn't running when I experienced the Problems. But maybe this is enough for causing Trouble.

I can also add that I have a second PC acting as a VBox host, where I'm happy with VBox 5.0.10. Comparing it to the host System with Problems, I can say that
- it runs Win 8.1
- I run a guest only for a short time. When I hibernate that System, guests are shut down.
- There is no guest with bridging Network Access.

You suggest that I disable bridging. I'm not sure what you are referring to. Is that something in Windows or in VBox? Would that prevent me from running the VM with Bridge? You mention "the usual NDIS Problems". Can you give me pointer to find out more about that? Are these NDIS Problems specific to VBox 5?

By "disable bridging" I mean go to the Control Panel | networking area in your host OS, view properties for your NIC, and untick any service that mentions VirtualBox bridging.

p.s. I see that there's a new test build which fixes a problem with bridging on Win10. I guess there'd be no harm in you trying it too, in case the problem is more widespread.
https://www.virtualbox.org/download/tes ... 75-Win.exe

While I had these Problems, I went to the NIC part of Windows. However, there wasn't a Bridge. What I did find, was a host-only Controller. I disabled that one, but it didn't help. When I installed VBox 4 over V5, the host-only Controller was enabled again. I left it that way, and everything is fine.

I'll try the test build. But it will take some time to evaluate the results. Although I experienced the Problems often, I couldn't reproduce them in a straightforward way. There is some randomness involved.

Erbsli wrote:What I did find, was a host-only Controller.

The host-only controller is a device, not a service. If you're looking at the device manager then you aren't looking where I said. The host-only NIC should not be able to affect the performance of other (physical) NICs. Bridging is different in that it's the only thing designed to affect how a physical NIC works in your system.

Currently I am using your test build. There is no improvement. I get a fairly consistent set of symptoms.

- 2 users logged on to the host: An administrator without an active guest, a standard user having a guest running.
- Everything works well after booting the host.
- After sleep/wake-up, the host's internet access is blocked.
- Win7 (host) displays the NIC as disabled. I can start a function to enable it. Win7 responds with a pop-up box with a text "enabling".
The text in the pop-up then changes to "enabled", and the box disappears. However, the NIC is still shown as disabled. No success.
- Shutting down the guest works normally.
- Shutting down the host is not possible. The shutdown process begins and never completes.

When looking at the NIC properties, I have (among others) the following:
- "VirtualBox NDIS6 Bridged Networking Driver" disabled (I did this as you suggested)
- Virtual PC network filter driver enabled
- "HTC NDIS Protocol Driver" enabled

The latter 2 have always been there and appear not to be conflicting with VBox 4 (having its bridging driver enabled).

Some additional information:
- Still running the test build
- I have also disabled the HTC bridge driver, with no noticeable effect.
- When the NIC is broken and I open the Windows task manager, I see a system process eating up 50% of the CPU.
I have a 2-core CPU, so this looks to me like some piece of software went into a tight loop.

It isn't "my" test build. These are user self help forums, and I'm a user too.

Did you have Virtual PC installed? Trying disabling the VirtualPC filter attached to the NIC.

It has happened again, with the VirtualPC component disabled.

I never installed VirtualPC. In fact, until now I never realized that I have it, although I could have guessed. Microsoft included VirtualPC in many Win7 editions to encourage XP users to move on to their latest OS. So there must be many Win7 based VBox hosts out there that coexist with VirtualPC. IMHO VBox can only support Win7 hosts if it can coexist with VirtualPC.

Btw: The guest I have permanently running is also XP. I prefer VBox over VirtualPC.

I just tried the newly released version 5.0.14 . Result: I experienced the same problem as with any 5.0.x release. So I had to downgrade again to 4.3.34.