Windows VM via Virtual Box hangs up

English Virtualization
1

Hi there,
This is my first post here. I am new to Suse (used Ubuntu for a few years) and new to Virtual Box, so please bear with me on stupid questions, etc. Also, my command line skills are coming along, but I’m no Linus Torvalds.

So, I am running Oracle VM VB 4.3.6 r91406 and it has Windows 7 (64 bit) on it. My computer has 4 cores, and when I start up the VM, here’s what happens:

  1. Before starting the VM, I shut down pretty much every program in the Suse end of my computer. I may leave FF open with a few browser windows.
  2. Then, I hit the VM start button. It seems to focus on using only one core to start the VM, and that core usually spins up to 100%, and the fan runs like crazy, but the temperature stays in a good range. Usually 155 degrees F or less.
  3. For the next 2-5 minutes, the computer works to boot up the VM. During that time, my computer mostly locks up. Sometimes I can move the mouse pointer around, but sometimes not even that. I can’t open a command line or alt tab to a different program. I can’t alt F2.
  4. 90% of the time, I end up having to hard reboot because the computer stays frozen.
  5. 10% of the time, the VM will finally start. But it runs pretty slow.

Can anyone point me in a good direction for figuring this out? I’m happy to supply more info if that would be useful.

Thanks.

2

I’m purely speculating,

Maybe you either are deploying on a new machine or updated your machine’s BIOS recently?
If either might be true (and even so), you might take a look at your BIOS settings and verify the processor’s virtualization extensions are enabled.

And, you might test a different Guest.
If you need to, create a new Guest and see if the same symptoms persist.

The symptoms you describe generally describe when software is written incorrectly or in this case I’m speculating that software is not running on the hardware it expects.

TSU

3

How much memory do you have and how much have you given to the VM?

4

There are no stupid questions except those unasked; Only stupid answers. :wink: