VERR_REM_VIRTUAL_CPU_ERROR in Windows 3.11/MS-DOS 7.10 Guest

[kumba]

So this one might be one of those freaky corner cases.

I have an MS-DOS 7.10 VM running Windows 3.11, with a tweaked SVGA256.DRV file to get 1024x768, NetWare Client 3.x w/ IPX/IP Gateway loaded (NIOS.EXE -- what came after the VLM era), Win32s for some Win32 support, and I was trying to install IE6, for kicks and giggles, inside Win3.11 to see if the setup program would even execute under win32s. The latest supported IE was 5.01, from what I can tell. Netscape 4.08 runs fine. Up pops a Guru: 00:00:28.163059 fatal error in recompiler cpu: Trying to execute code with memory type addr_code=00000000000ac020 addend=000000000829d000 at 00000000000ac964. (iHandlerMemType=0x38 iMMIOMemType=0x30)

I also have some non-standard DOS utils running, DOSIDLE, KILLER, UMBPCI, HIMEMX, and original DOS EMM386. It's hard to tell if any of this contributes, but because this is quite the hodgepodge of apps running to make both the DOS portion stable and Win3.11 usable, I figured that I would mention it. I also lack a TCPIP networking stack in this install. I am allowing the Netware client to tunnel TCP inside of IPX, so it's got its own WINSOCK/WSOCK32 files it slips in. Though, I doubt the setup program is getting that far.

I actually expect IE6 to throw an error under Win32s, since Win32s only implements a subset of the NT API calls. It's possible the setup program is trying to make a call out to one of these missing APIs and dying. VBox.log and VBox.png attached.

The video driver tweaking forum thread is here: ​https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=51190

[kumba]

PNG of the last screenshot before the guest died (executing ie6setup.exe in win3.11, note Win32s error before Guru happened)

[kumba]

VBox.log of VERR_REM_VIRTUAL_CPU_ERROR (redacted info)

[kumba]

Also, forgot to add, I had to disable hardware virtualization per ​this forum post because that messes with the mouse too much in Windows 3.11. Seemed to be the easiest solution.

Just to test, if I try to run ie6setup with hardware virtualization turned on, then the Guru does not happen, and I instead get an unknown format error from ie6setup.exe. It throws a second error after that one, then just goes back to doing whatever Win 3.11 does when idle. So this does appear to be an odd case of something bad happening when hardware virtualization is turned off. I tried w/ IOAPIC, PAE, and turning off just Nested Paging, too, but the key is VT-x.

Re, the mouse problems looks like Windows polls the drivers too frequently and the hypervisor can't keep up? If you mouse the mouse really slowly, it works semi-okay and doesn't jump around.

[aeichner]

Please reopen if still relevant with a recent VirtualBox release.