VirtualBox

Opened 10 years ago

Last modified 4 years ago

#12851 reopened defect

High cpu-load (up to 100%) on idle

Reported by: Sworddragon Owned by:
Component: other Version: VirtualBox 4.3.6
Keywords: Cc:
Guest type: Windows Host type: Linux

Description

My host is Linux 3.13.6 x86_64 and the guest is Windows XP SP3 32 bit with all current updates installed. The guest additions with experimental 3D support are installed too.

If the Windows XP guest is booted up and reached the idle state (0-1% cpu-load in the task manager) I'm noticing that on my Linux host the cpu-load is constantly at ~15% of one core (AMD Phenom II X6 1045T). If I'm booting up the Windows XP guest into the safe mode and it reached the idle state the cpu-load on my Linux guest goes even up to the maximum (~600%/600%).

Attachments (9)

VBox.log (107.4 KB ) - added by Sworddragon 8 years ago.
VBoxCPUUsage.log (94.0 KB ) - added by Pedro Côrte-Real 6 years ago.
Log of a similar situation
VirtualBoxCPUUsage.jpg (458.1 KB ) - added by Pedro Côrte-Real 6 years ago.
Screenshot of VM and top and the same time showing the issue
VBox.log.1 (102.5 KB ) - added by Mihai Hanor 5 years ago.
Debian host running Windows 10 1803 64 bit (installed)
Screenshot at 2018-10-20 19-22-41.png (274.1 KB ) - added by Mihai Hanor 5 years ago.
cpuusage11.png (40.1 KB ) - added by Mihai Hanor 5 years ago.
process profiling on Win10 1803 VM process, issue manifesting itself
cpuusage12.png (38.6 KB ) - added by Mihai Hanor 5 years ago.
profiling on Win10 1709 VM process, no issue, VM up for the same amount of time
VBox.zip (27.1 KB ) - added by Benman2785 4 years ago.
Ubuntu 18.04-LTS Host (low-latency-Kernel) + WinXP 32 Guest high load on Host while Guest nearly idle
VM_CPU-load_on_host.jpg (493.3 KB ) - added by Benman2785 4 years ago.
show 45% load on Host while Guest uses 15%

Download all attachments as: .zip

Change History (23)

comment:1 by Sworddragon, 10 years ago

Little correction:

the cpu-load is constantly at ~15% of one core

The cpu-load is ~15% but shared between all 6 cores (every core is using between 1-3%).

comment:2 by aeichner, 8 years ago

Resolution: obsolete
Status: newclosed

Please reopen if still relevant with a recent VirtualBox release.

comment:3 by Sworddragon, 8 years ago

Resolution: obsolete
Status: closedreopened

I'm still seeing this issue with VirtualBox 5.0.24.

comment:4 by aeichner, 8 years ago

Please attach a VBox.log of the affected VM, the output of "top -H" for the VM process which has all threads listed so we can see which thread hogs the CPU and if possible a coredump of the VM process created with gcore (see here for the description how to provide the core dump to us).

comment:5 by Sworddragon, 8 years ago

Have you tried to reproduce the issue? On my Ubuntu installation (64 bit) it happened across all versions of it within the last 2 years on all Windows guests I have used (Windows XP and Windows 10). Maybe you can reproduce this issue on a recent Ubuntu system (preferably 64 bit) with a Windows 10 guest and installed guest additions. Starting the Windows 10 guest and waiting until it is in idle should cause still significant CPU usage on the host.

Version 0, edited 8 years ago by Sworddragon (next)

comment:6 by aeichner, 8 years ago

There is no point in trying to reproduce it at this stage because without the VBox.log your exact VM setup is not known. There are far too many subtle differences in VM configurations which can have an impact on the issue and I won't invest any time trying to reproduce it blindly with different configurations. Providing a VBox.log is the absolute minimum, a core dump is optional but might help to get an insight into the VM state.

by Sworddragon, 8 years ago

Attachment: VBox.log added

by Pedro Côrte-Real, 6 years ago

Attachment: VBoxCPUUsage.log added

Log of a similar situation

by Pedro Côrte-Real, 6 years ago

Attachment: VirtualBoxCPUUsage.jpg added

Screenshot of VM and top and the same time showing the issue

comment:7 by Pedro Côrte-Real, 6 years ago

I'm seeing the same issue in 5.2.10 as packaged by Ubuntu 18.04. I've attached the log and a screenshot displaying the issue happening with top clearly showing what I assume to be the 2 virtual CPU threads consuming CPU continuously even though the guest isn't using almost any.

comment:8 by Pedro Côrte-Real, 6 years ago

I'm using a Lenovo T460s (Linux amd64 host) to run a Windows 7 Guest. The issue either didn't exist or was much less noticeable with 5.0 and 5.1 (also Ubuntu packaged).

comment:9 by Socratis, 6 years ago

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I see the following regarding the CPU consumption:

gnome-shell    15.5
EMT-1          14.8
EMT-2          12.8
...
VirtualBox      0.7

So, why is this a "VirtualBox consumes CPU" issue?

comment:10 by Pedro Côrte-Real, 6 years ago

socratis, EMT-1 and EMT-2 are the two Virtualbox CPU threads. Those are the ones consuming CPU at idle.

comment:11 by Pedro Côrte-Real, 6 years ago

This issue still happens continuously on my machine. Is there anything else I can do to help debug it?

comment:12 by Mihai Hanor, 5 years ago

I thought of opening a new ticket, but I think I'll post here for now. A similar issue is occuring with Windows 10 1803 64 bit, running as a guest on Windows 10 1803 64 bit or on Debian 10 64 bit as host. I've observed the issue after Windows 10 1803 was released. On Windows 10 as host, the EMT thread CPU usage, of the VM process, drops if I start another paused VM, but even then the CPU usage is still indicative something is still spinning in the EMT thread. In full spin, the CPU usage is higher of the EMT thread is higher on the Windows 10 host, consuming 100% of the processing time of one CPU core. I'm attaching a log from the Debian host, but also a screenshot of some process profiling done with Visual Studio, on an OSE build VirtualBox process, some time ago, booting the Windows 10 1803 and 1709 64 bits ISOs, with the same VM uptime for both VM instances. You should be able to reproduce this just by booting the installation ISO and letting it reach the first setup GUI. This issue doesn't occur with Windows 10 1709.

Last edited 5 years ago by Mihai Hanor (previous) (diff)

by Mihai Hanor, 5 years ago

Attachment: VBox.log.1 added

Debian host running Windows 10 1803 64 bit (installed)

by Mihai Hanor, 5 years ago

by Mihai Hanor, 5 years ago

Attachment: cpuusage11.png added

process profiling on Win10 1803 VM process, issue manifesting itself

by Mihai Hanor, 5 years ago

Attachment: cpuusage12.png added

profiling on Win10 1709 VM process, no issue, VM up for the same amount of time

comment:13 by Mihai Hanor, 5 years ago

This is still an issue, with 6.0.0 (including the latest test build). The problem can also be reproduced with Windows 10 1809

by Benman2785, 4 years ago

Attachment: VBox.zip added

Ubuntu 18.04-LTS Host (low-latency-Kernel) + WinXP 32 Guest high load on Host while Guest nearly idle

by Benman2785, 4 years ago

Attachment: VM_CPU-load_on_host.jpg added

show 45% load on Host while Guest uses 15%

comment:14 by Benman2785, 4 years ago

I use VB 5.2.44 with ExtPack 5.2.44 and GA 5.2.44 on my Ubuntu 18.04 LTS KVM-Root (2 dCPU + 3GB RAM + 240GB SAS HDD (in RAID-10)) running a low-latency-kernel (needed). When my Guest is only booted and complete idle i get around 10-20% load on Host while Guest is around 1-5%; when i load needed dedicated game server (flserver.exe) as idleing and Guest has ~5-20% load than my Host goes to 35-45% load. I set core affinity of VM process to one core with -19 niceness and "best-effort" 0 io-niceness. I am expecting 10-30% load on Host while WinXP with game Server is idle - this is the case when i run it on my Win10 with VB 6.1.14. ps i dont use 6.1.14 on my server because i got VT-X error everytime i tried to start the VM.

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