2.0.2 high CPU load; 1.6.6 okay

Discussions related to using VirtualBox on Windows hosts.
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plong
Posts: 7
Joined: 15. Sep 2008, 04:59

2.0.2 high CPU load; 1.6.6 okay

Post by plong »

VirtualBox 2.0.2 is virtually unusable because it becomes extremely slow after an hour. I upgraded from 1.6.6 when I saw that 2.0.2 was available because I had had some minor GUI issues with 1.6.6.

My PC is at 10% CPU usage without the VB GUI running. Once the GUI and then the guest is up, CPU usage is at 15%. A little over an hour later, it's at 70% with one core pegged at 100% most of the time. (BTW, I get a lot of stuck/repeating keystrokes when load is high.) Shutting down the guest does not improve matters. When I close the VB GUI, I get an "is not working" error from Windows (details below).

Anybody know what's wrong? Is this a VB bug or something screwy about my system or installation?

Here's the performance data followed by my configuration. I'm going back to 1.6.6 until the next rev. Thanks for any help. I still really like VirtualBox.

Startup times
-VirtualBox: 15 seconds
-----Settings: 75 seconds
---------Advanced: 25 seconds
-----Start: 50 seconds
---------Login: 10 seconds

Chronological system load
System CPU and Physical Memory usage from Windows Task Manager.

Without VB
10%
1.28GB

With VB
15%
1.35GB

At F8 greeting
15%
1.71GB and starting to drift up slowly

F8 KDE desktop
15%
1.81GB but increasing by about 10MB/20sec

10 minutes after desktop up
22%
2.01GB

17 minutes
30%
2.09GB

21 minutes
30%
2.12GB

26 minutes
33%
2.15GB

30 minutes
36%
2.15GB

36 minutes
41%
2.13GB

42 minutes
45%
2.17GB

45 minutes
50%
2.16GB

51 minutes
55%
2.16GB

55 minutes
60%
2.16GB

60 minutes
65%
2.12GB

66 minutes
70%
2.13GB

[68 minutes
VBoxSVC.exe process, specifically
50%
747,000K (Private Working Set)]

69 minutes
80%
2.15GB

70 minutes (shutdown F8 guest, VB GUI running)
70%
1.79GB

[70 minutes
VBoxSVC.exe process
50%
791,000K]

80 minutes
70%
1.87GB

80 minutes (close VB GUI, see this dialog box:
"Sun xVM VirtualBox Interface has stopped working - A problem caused the program to stop working correctly. Windows will close the program and notify you if a solution is available."

85 minutes (no VB)
10%
1.05GB

Configuration

Vista HOST, Fedora 8 GUEST, VBox 2.0.2

Host
Vista Business 32 w/Service pack 1, up-to-date as of 13 Sept 2008
lenovo x61s 1.8GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
3GB 800 Mhz DDR2 SDRAM
Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator X3100
Hitachi HTS722016K9SA00 143GB Hard drive

Guest
Fedora 8 (2.6.26.3-14 Linux kernel, KDE), up-to-date as of 14 Sept 2008

Installation history
3 Sept: 1.6.6 with Guest Additions
12 Sept: 2.0.2 on top of 1.6.6 (did not reinstall Guest Additions)
14 Sept: uninstalled then reinstalled 2.0.2

From VirtualBox's "Session Information Dialog"

Details

Code: Select all

General
Name              DevBox
OS Type           Fedora
Base Memory       256 MB
Video Memory      8 MB
Boot Order        Hard Disk
ACPI              Enabled
IO APIC           Disabled
VT-x/AMD-V        Disabled
PAE/NX            Disabled

Hard Disks
IDE Primary Master  DevDisk.vdi [Differencing, 19.80 GB]

CD/DVD
Not mounted

Floppy
Not mounted

Audio
Disabled

Network
Adapter 1     PCnet-FAST III (NAT)

Serial Ports
Disabled

USB
Disabled

Shared Folders
Shared Folders

Remote Display
Disabled
Runtime

Code: Select all

Runtime Attributes
Screen Resolution 800x600x32
VT-x/AMD-V        Disabled
Nested Paging     Disabled
Guest Additions   Version 1.4
Guest OS Type     Linux 2.6

Hard Disk Statistics
IDE Primary Master
DMA Transfers     15,625
PIO Transfers     235
Data Read         340,027,904 B
Data Written      13,006,848 B

CD/DVD-ROM Statistics
DMA Transfers     2
PIO Transfers     3,836
Data Read         0 B
Data Written      0 B

Network Adapter Statistics
Adapter 0
Data Transmitted  7,607 B
Data Received     12,960 B
Paul Long
plong
Posts: 7
Joined: 15. Sep 2008, 04:59

Waiting for microsoft hotfix

Post by plong »

Coincidentally, another recent thread identifies what may be my problem.
TerryE
Volunteer
Posts: 3572
Joined: 28. May 2008, 08:40
Primary OS: Ubuntu other
VBox Version: VirtualBox+Oracle ExtPack
Guest OSses: Ubuntu 10.04 & 11.10, both Svr&Wstn, Debian, CentOS
Contact:

Post by TerryE »

Paul, I think this is a duplicate of http://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic. ... 7543#37543. I don't want two topics open with the same subject, I am locking this thread. Please refer to other topic and post there. Try Sander's hotfix.

Thanks Terry
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