Self-Shutdown Issue

[pthfdr]

I set up a Windows 2003 R2 VM and it was running fine,however, after applying the "Windows Update",when I boot,the system only went to "Windows logo with progress bar" screen for about 10 seconds and shut down by itself.
The ISO file is official and I did nothing "big" between the installation and the "Update".

[socratis]

Why do you believe this to be a VirtualBox issue and not a Windows 2003 issue? Treat it as such and you may find the solution, i.e. search for the solution in a Windows-centric forum. Because, as far as VirtualBox is concerned, everything is OK.

00:00:12.774359 VMMDev: Guest requests the VM to be turned off

Now, to be honest, there are some issues with your setup, but I don't believe that they're responsible for the reboot.

00:00:00.433132   NumCPUs           <integer> = 0x0000000000000002 (2)
00:00:00.549097 CPUM: Physical host cores: 2

You have 2 CPU cores, both of them allocated to the guest. Reduce the CPUs assigned to the guest to 1. See CPU Cores versus threads.

00:00:00.352481 File system of '/media/pthfdr/SORCNYTH/VirtBox/FLOPPY-0.dsk' (Floppy) is jfs
00:00:00.355127 File system of '/media/pthfdr/SORCNYTH/VirtBox/FLOPPY-1.dsk' (Floppy) is jfs

You have two floppies assigned to your guest. Why two? And ... floppies? Just out of curiosity.

[pthfdr]

The VM works fine before "Updating".
I don't think searching the forums could help since the descriptions of those updates are too vague.
Maybe the updater checks the running environment and decided to refuse to boot when it thinks it is running in a VM.
My best guess is that the trouble could come from a particular "update" that updates "Intel microcode",which does not exist in a VM.Just guessing.

You have 2 CPU cores, both of them allocated to the guest. Reduce the CPUs assigned to the guest to 1. See CPU Cores versus threads.

I do not think CPU is an issue since when I start this VM it is the only heavyweight application running and I'm using i3wm by the way.

You have two floppies assigned to your guest. Why two? And ... floppies? Just out of curiosity.

And for the floppies,they are shared and I use them to transfer files between this Windows and several DOS VMs.When I try to attach DOS VHDs onto Windows,they seem to be "sabotaged".

[socratis]

The VM works fine before "Updating". I don't think searching the forums could help since the descriptions of those updates are too vague.

So you update Windows, Windows "dies" and you think it's Intel Microcode is to blame? With no evidence recorded in the logs?

Truth of the matter is that if you search for "windows server 2003 reboots at splash screen" (Google suggested that as soon as I typed windows 2003 ser..., that tells me a lot), you're going to get around 11000 results. Try the following one as an example, one of the first ones I found. They have plenty of good ideas to get you started. https://www.experts-exchange.com/questi ... rting.html

I'm using i3wm by the way

Are you referring to https://i3wm.org/ ? If so, I can't see the relevance, honestly.

the floppies,they are shared and I use them to transfer files between this Windows and several DOS VMs.

I hope not at the same time

[pthfdr]

Not "reboot".No "blue screen".Just "normally" shut down.
The C: drive is far from full,and I have the pagefile disabled.
I can confirm the problem comes from the update,and has something to do with the VM environment since it doesn't happen on a real computer.
Now I have to re-install Windows to bring everything back to normal.

[socratis]

If you can boot in safe mode, try to look at the Event Viewer and see if that reveals anything. I'm just offering an alternative way of thinking where you don't blame the VM, but you treat it as you would any other physical computer. Don't limit yourself and your way of thinking.

[pthfdr]

Thanks for your advice but I have already re-installed Windows.

[mpack]

I set up a Windows 2003 R2 VM and it was running fine,however, after applying the "Windows Update",when I boot,the system only went to "Windows logo with progress bar" screen for about 10 seconds and shut down by itself.

This sounds to me like what XP/2K3 does when activation is required and you have used up the grace period.