VirtualBox hangs in continuous writing of a particular vhd image => fixed in svn

[Mihai Hanor]

Host: Windows 7 SP1 64 bit
Guest: Windows Server 2012 DataCenter trial vhd image:
(9200.16384.amd64fre.win8_rtm.120725-1247_server_serverdatacentereval_en-us.vhd)

Guest settings: the vhd image is attached to a SATA controller (no host IO cache). VT-x and Nested Paging are supported and enabled. I can't seem to reproduce the issue with a cloned vdi image or with an IDE storage controller. I also managed to reproduce the issue using the lsilogic SCSI controller, but I don't remember being able to do the same with the official build. The official build becomes unresponsive, while it continues to keep the host's hdd busy. The guest hdd icon is indicating a writing operation (red). I can reproduce it almost every time. Using a selfbuild VirtualBox (svn rev44059), the following assert fails:

AioMgr1-F !!Assertion Failed!! [[br]]
AioMgr1-F Expression: VDMETAXFER_TXDIR_GET(pMetaXfer->fFlags) == VDMETAXFER_TXDIR_NONE[[br]]
AioMgr1-F Location  : C:\work_x64\vbox\src\VBox\Storage\VD.cpp(4436) int __cdecl vdIOIntWriteMetaAsync(void *,struct VDIOSTORAGE *,unsigned __int64,void *,unsigned __int64,struct VDIOCTX *,int (__cdecl *)(void *,struct VDIOCTX *,void *,int),void *)

If I continue the execution, it ends with an attempt to access an invalid memory location, referenced by pDeferred
\vbox\src\VBox\Storage\VD.cpp line 3964:
PVDIOCTX pIoCtx = pDeferred->pIoCtx;

The issue occurs a few moments after the licence of Windows 8 is presented on screen (the Settings setup page).
Even if the vhd image was build for a specific platform, the guest does have a device detection stage. It is able to boot and it even completes its setup (at least with the official build, by forcefuly closing all Virtualbox processes, and then restarting the VM). VirtualBox shouldn't hang. I would accept the issue if the guest OS wouldn't able to boot, without bringing VirtualBox down.
I first reported the issue here:
​https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=51088

[Mihai Hanor]

Log files: ​http://www.sendspace.com/file/ikg3bq
VBOX_LOG is set to +vd.e.l.f+vd_vhd.e.l.f+drv_vd.e.l.f+thread.e.l.f+pdm_async_completion.e.l.f

I really have no idea if the debug log contains what you need to understand what's going on.

[aeichner]

Thanks a lot for the debug log, I'll have a look at it.

[aeichner]

Reproduced the issue, fix will be included in the next maintenance release. Thanks for the report!

[Frank Mehnert]

Fixed in VBox 4.2.6.