DOSBox emulator crashes in VirtualBox

[Technologov]

hi all !

I wanna make sure one kind of Box works in the other one :)

OK, lets be a bit more serious:

-DOSBox, a 32-bit usermode application crashes in VirtualBox.

It doesn't crash when run natively (without VirtualBox). It uses Simple DirectMedia Layer (SDL) for 2D rendering.

System: Windows XP host, XP guest, DOSBox 0.70, VirtualBox 1.3.8

-Alexey "Technologov"

[Technologov]

BTW: Running on Windows XP host, but openSUSE 10.2 guest *works*!

[Sander van Leeuwen]

Probably due to the ntvdm instability. (fixed in SVN)

[Sander van Leeuwen]

Try again with 1.4.0 and reopen if it still happens.

[Technologov]

Yes, it still crashes. DOSbox 0.70.

Tested on: Win Vista, VBox 1.4.0

[Technologov]

Please pay attention: DOSbox is _not_ 16-bit application.

It is a 32-bit application, that runs fine under Linux guest, but crashes under Windows guest. On native hardware, DOSbox works perfectly on both Windows and Linux.

Please fix VirtualBox.

[c2woody]

This is (most likely) a bug in DOSBox, it's already fixed and should work in the next version. You can try setting SDL_VIDEODRIVER=windib before starting DOSBox to work around this, maybe you can report back if it works for you that way because I didn't perform any testing.

The information was already sent to the VirtualBox contact address but there was no reply, so I'm posting it here as well.

[Technologov]

Do you realize that instead of rendering to SDL, it will render to Windows bitmap ?

Which means, that even if this works, it will be slower than SDL.

Since DOSbox runs fine on normal Windows, but crashes on VirtualBox, the bug is in VirtualBox. Changing rendering target is no more than cheap dirty workaround trick.

Thanks for idea anyway. I'll try this workaround, when I return Home.

-Technologov

[Achim Hasenmueller]

Since DOSbox runs fine on normal Windows, but crashes on VirtualBox, the bug is in VirtualBox. Changing rendering target is no more than cheap dirty workaround trick.

This is a rather incompetent statement.

[Sander van Leeuwen]

I know it's hard to comprehend, but if DOSBox crashes because no DirectDraw support is available, then it's not VBox's fault.

[c2woody]

Do you realize that instead of rendering to SDL, it will render to Windows bitmap ?

Maybe check the SDL sources to see how this works.

As noted above it is NOT a bug in VirtualBox but in the code that (should) automatically uses windib if directx is not available to DOSBox.

[Technologov]

to c2woody:

Fantastic ! You were right ! DOSbox really crashes because of lack of DirectDraw support. So yes, this is definitely a DOSbox bug.

Sorry all the people. c2woody: Thanks a lot !

-Technologov

[Technologov]

Please close this bug.

[Technologov]

Fix verified. DOSbox 0.71 doesn't crashes anymore.

-Technologov

[Technologov]

Unfortunately, I'm forced to reopen this bug. 1.5.0 contains incomplete DirectDraw drivers, that makes DOSbox crash again.

Workaround: disable DirectDraw acceleration in Windows XP guest. This makes DOSbox use windib backend.

Host: Windows XP, DOSbox 0.71, VirtualBox 1.5.0.

-Technologov. 01.Oct.2007.

[Technologov]

This is fixed now in 1.5.2.

-Technologov

[Roger Pack]

For followers, dosbox "blows up" in 5.2.4 (windows 7 + guest additions + experimental guest additions). Basically tries to start then exits immediately. Possibly fixes: run windows in safe mode (works great LOL), turn off "fulldouble" (config option), turn off "full screen" (everywhere), with full screen on it does the first graphics screen, continues on, but keeps it on the original screen (like...invisible second screen). If it's too small windows, add scaler=normal2x or scaler= normal3x to your configs. Or uninstall the guest additions besides some weird coloration works fine there.