JFYI: VirtualBox stable/unstable setteings (3.0.51.r22902)

Mario Lobo lobo at bsd.com.br
Thu Dec 31 15:11:58 UTC 2009


On Wednesday 23 December 2009 02:29:33 Daichi GOTO wrote:
> In a month, I have been tried to investigate FreeBSD system
> stable/unstable situations and factors around VirtualBox
> bacause frequently my VirtualBox let FreeBSD freeze, panic
> and fatal trap.
> 
> I guess my report is not strict comprehensive, but it's useful
> and helpful for everyone who wants to use VirtualBox on FreeBSD.
> 
>    Tested environment:
>      host os: FreeBSD 9-current amd64 (among 12/2009)
>      virtualbox: virtualbox-3.0.51.r22902_3
>      cpu: Intel Core2 Quad Q9550
>      mem: 8GB
>      video: GeForce 9800 GT
> 
>    Kernel settings:
>      - Vimage lets FreeBSD freeze within VirtualBox bridge
>        networking feature.
> 
>    VirtualBox settings:
>      -------------------------------------------------------------
> 
>      |                         | effects on the host os stability|
> 
>      -------------------------------------------------------------
> 
>      | ACPI                    | NO                              |
>      | IO APIC                 | NO                              |
>      | PAE/NX                  | (not checked)                   |
>      | Core numbers            | YES (*1)                        |
>      | VT-x/AMD-V              | NO                              |
>      | nested paging           | (not checked)                   |
>      | 3D acceleration         | (not checked)                   |
>      | IDE controller type     | NO                              |
>      | Additional controller   | NO                              |
>      | CD/DVD drive host       | NO                              |
>      | CD/DVD drive image file | NO                              |
>      | FDD drive host          | (not checked)                   |
>      | FDD drive image file    | (not checked)                   |
>      | Audio                   | (not checked)                   |
>      | Network adapter type    | NO                              |
>      | Network NAT             | NO                              |
>      | Network bridge          | NO                              |
>      | Network inner network   | (not checked)                   |
>      | Network host only       | (not checked)                   |
>      | Serial port             | (not checked)                   |
>      | share folder            | (not checked)                   |
>      | Guest OS sort           | NO                              |
> 
>      -------------------------------------------------------------
> 
>     (*1) Multicore attached virtual environment easily and frequently
>         lets FreeBSD freeze.
> 
>    Hardware health:
>      - Weakened PC power unit or less-power power unit leads PC
>        very unstable condition. If you encounter non-reproducible
>        error or panic, you should better to check your PC power unit.
> 
>      - Unstable memory leads FreeBSD system panic and fatal trap.
>        If you encounter "segmentaion fault", "panic" or "fatal trap"
>        error, shutdown system and check your PC memory health with
>        memtest86+. (Ubuntu install CD has memtest86+ feature.
>        Using Ubuntu as memetest86+ checker is reasonable way).
>        If you have luck, updating BIOS and set DRAM settings for
>        stable resolves this issue.
> 
>      - Hard Disk should be health. Check your disk status by
>        smartmontools (sysutils/smartmontools).
> 
>    Driver:
>      - NVIDIA driver (x11/nvidia-driver, nvidia-driver-195.22) leads
>        FreeBSD freeze non-reproducibly. If you use both
>        NVIDIA driver and VirtualBox along with non-reproducible
>        FreeBSD freeze, use nv driver instead.
> 
> 
> Recap points:
>    - Check your PC health first, especially for Power unit,
>      memory and Hard disk.
>    - Remove Vimage if you want to use bridge networking feature
>      of VirtualBox.
>    - Use nv driver instead of nvidia-driver if you have FreeBSD
>      non-reproducible freeze problem with nvidia-driver.
> 

What I have found out in all the time I've been testing is that, at least on 
my system here, the problem with VBox/Nvidia IS definitely with OpenGL.

If I leave the KDE composite option as XRENDER, I can open up to 6 VMs without 
any freeze. All of them with 2 CPUs, 3D accel enabled an all. But all I need 
to do to freeze the machine is to start ANY OpenGL app and let it run for 
about a minute. It can even be one of the GL screensavers. It is a guarantied 
freeze !

I have tried all sorts of combinations: nvidia.ko last, vboxdrv.ko last, no 
linux.ko, with powerd, no powerd, etc..., etc... No matter what, if it 
involves OpenGL, bang !! if it doesn't, it's OK.

What I also noticed, monitoring my machine from another terminal on the LAN 
(systat -vm 1) is 200K in page faults at the freezing moment and free memory 
on gkrellm is practically zero, no matter if I have 1 or 6 VMs running. I 
can't say if it is KDE, Vbox or nvidia because not even ping from the remote 
terminal works.

Other than that, It works great.

Machine:

OS: FreeBSD 8.0-STABLE #0 r198930M: Sat Dec 12 12:49:49 BRT 2009
MB: AOD790GX/128M
VB: nvidia0: <GeForce 9800 GT> on vgapci0
RAM: 8 G
CPU: Phenom 955 black

(II) Module nvidia: vendor="NVIDIA Corporation"
compiled for 4.0.2, module version = 1.0.0
Module class: X.Org Video Driver
(II) NVIDIA dlloader X Driver 195.22 Mon Nov 30 14:03:12 posix/SystemV/PST 
2009
(II) NVIDIA Unified Driver for all Supported NVIDIA GPUs

X: X.Org X Server 1.6.1
KDE: 4.3.4 


-- 
Mario Lobo
http://www.mallavoodoo.com.br
FreeBSD since version 2.2.8 [not Pro-Audio.... YET!!] (99,7% winfoes FREE)


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