I have an installation of 11.2 running in a virtualbox on a windows XP host (as a testsystem). After upgrading it from 11.1 to 11.2 it runs really slow. It’s only a small box with 256 Mb ram running xfce, but the speed was good in 11.1. I tried both the default kernel and the desktop kernel (32bit), but both are slow. Does anyone experience the same?
I’m getting this too. OpenSUSE 11.2 Gnome desktop 2.6.31.5-0.1-default #1 SMP 2009-10-26 15:49:03 +0100 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux
Running in Windows XP Virtualbox 3.0.10 and 3.0.12. Appears to slow down loads when X is running (during graphical installation too, which took ages).
Me too, 11.2 KDE from DVD.iso install in vbox 3.0.10, on openSuse 11.1 host, unusably slow…
But it isn’t running slow in VMware. Neener neener! 
Desktop kernel used in 11.2 now runs at 1,000 Hz.
Been long time part of Virtual Box tuning to lower the guest kernel clock frequency.
With only 256MiB RAM, try logging “vmstat 5” output into a file, whilst you use XFCE and examine for lots sw/so and general block io.
A search on the Factory mailing list, might turn something up, as it’s common for ppl to try out pre-releases in Virtual Box to test applications. They may have commented and had solutions offered, or the cause was discussed.
I tried to run it with more ram but still at 512MB it’s sllooooowwwww. Will try to read vmstat now.
I can confirm, painfully slow. Any solutions?
I have seen reports of openSUSE 11.2 running well as a VirtualBox guest, where other systems didn’t, so it’s unlikely to be a general problem. The Live CD version of openSUSE should install a typical desktop system, THAT is NOT what you want in VirtualBox.
In general with performance problem, someone with the issue needs to do some monitoring, and find out what is eating CPU/RAM or blocking the system. Then there might be more specific suggestions on work rounds or filing bug report.
Negative. Downgrading to VBox 3.0 which was working well under 11.1, didn’t show absolutely any improvement.
Also now on 11.2 host even 11.1 installation is miserably slow - something is wrong with 11.2 as host.
I can’t offer any scientific evidence, nor can I even compare them ATM due to 11.1 being broken, but my VBox MSWinXP SEEMS slower under 11.2 than it ever did under 11.1…
By slow I mean applications on guest are starting slowly, windows takes long time to repaint etc.
Virtual machine settings always remained the same.
How can I investigate further?
Even worse here. It freezes up completely. I filed a bug report on this, so let’s see if they do anything about it.
Oh, and this happened on two different computers I have.
And another point, the LiveCD freezes up or runs so slowly to be undetectable at the same point too
For me, it all goes wrong when booting up and I get the green screen, but nothing else seems to happen, either in VB or the LiveCD. No start bar, nothing.
Can you post link to bug report?
It didn’t get me back to the full speed I had with a previous distro, but installing the Linux Guest Additions that came with VirtualBox make the 11.2 experience bearable for me.
Aditions here didn’t help beside seamless mouse integration.
There were additions that installed automatically with my openSUSE installation that handled mouse integration, but those were quite sluggish for everything else.
It required the kernel-rebuild installation to get performance improvement.
I’m trying kubuntu live cd inside 11.2. So far when running from CD seems responsive, though installer is lagging a lot. Will see how it will work after installation on virtual disk.
Ok, kubuntu is definitely faster inside vbox, so this seems to be suse 11.2 fault. Only installation was lagging - that installer used a lot of cpu.
Hi atomixkriko,
Here is link to bug report as requested:
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=556392.
Don’t know if you need to login to see it though…
Jules