Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-15 Thread Mike Meyer
On Sat, 14 Jul 2012 13:29:59 -0700
Doug Barton do...@freebsd.org wrote:

 For the OP, make sure you have the latest BIOS. I had a similar problem
 with vt-x and it was solved by a later BIOS upgrade.

And *that* solved the problem. The performance is much better, now
being a lot like using a poor wireless mouse.

My thanks to everyone who took time to help me.

   mike
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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-15 Thread Doug Barton
On 07/15/2012 02:39, Mike Meyer wrote:
 On Sat, 14 Jul 2012 13:29:59 -0700
 Doug Barton do...@freebsd.org wrote:
 
 For the OP, make sure you have the latest BIOS. I had a similar problem
 with vt-x and it was solved by a later BIOS upgrade.
 
 And *that* solved the problem. The performance is much better, now
 being a lot like using a poor wireless mouse.
 
 My thanks to everyone who took time to help me.

I'm glad to help, and more glad that it was that simple of a solution. :)

Doug

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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-15 Thread Wojciech Puchar

being a lot like using a poor wireless mouse.

My thanks to everyone who took time to help me.


by the way anyone know WHY BIOS is over control of that CPU feature?
It is quite scary to know that my FreeBSD system isn't really under 
FreeBSD control.

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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Wojciech Puchar

SandyBridge processor with 32GB of ram on a FreeBSD 8.3-STABLE host.


i am using virtualbox but no linux guest, only windows.


the newest CPU i have is
CPU: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E31220 @ 3.10GHz (3100.03-MHz K8-class CPU)


Unfortunately, once I got it set up, I found that VBox guest
performance simply sucks. The *mouse* isn't responsive. Linux guests
see lots of CPU Locked errors.


FreeBSD have linux emulation. i think you should use it instead of VBox if 
you need to run linux environments under FreeBSD.


jails are your friend too.

Windows runs great (as for windows of course) under VBox.
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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Mike Meyer
On Sat, 14 Jul 2012 19:56:22 +0200 (CEST)
Wojciech Puchar woj...@wojtek.tensor.gdynia.pl wrote:

 CPU: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E31220 @ 3.10GHz (3100.03-MHz K8-class CPU)

If that the one normally listed as E3-1220? If so, it's a Sandy Bridge
processor. If not, then I have not idea what it is.

  Unfortunately, once I got it set up, I found that VBox guest
  performance simply sucks. The *mouse* isn't responsive. Linux guests
  see lots of CPU Locked errors.
 FreeBSD have linux emulation. i think you should use it instead of VBox if 
 you need to run linux environments under FreeBSD.

Yes, it does. And I use it when I can. However, there are applications
that it won't run, because of missing kernel features. And of course,
it does absolutely not good at all if you need to run something other
than Linux.

Sucky Linux emulation performance is not my problem. If it were, I
would have asked about that. My problem is sucky virtualbox
performance, on any guest that has VT-X emulation enabled (which means
all 64 bit guests).

 Windows runs great (as for windows of course) under VBox.

Not for me. *Every* 64-bit guest OS has sucky performance. Linux,
Windows, and others. The only one that reports any problems is Linux -
it reports the CPU Locked errors. The others just suck. If I cut the
memory size down and create 32-bit guests, they all seem to run
OK. But I want to run systems for which there aren't 32-bit
distributions.

Are you only running 32-bit guests? Are you running on 9.x or 8.x?

   Thanx,
   mike
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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Jason Hellenthal


On Sat, Jul 14, 2012 at 06:11:41AM -0400, Mike Meyer wrote:
 I just set up a system designed to handle lots of VBox VM's: a 6-core
 SandyBridge processor with 32GB of ram on a FreeBSD 8.3-STABLE host.
 
 Unfortunately, once I got it set up, I found that VBox guest
 performance simply sucks. The *mouse* isn't responsive. Linux guests
 see lots of CPU Locked errors.

Try booting the linux VBox with HZ=100. This should greatly improve your
performance.

 
 Googling turns up lots of problems with VBox on SandyBridge: Mac's
 running on 64 bit kernels have this problem - running on 32 bit
 kernels helps. Turning off Intel's SpeedStep has been reported to
 help. Turning off VT-X in the guest - if it's a 32-bit guest -
 helps. The last one is the only one that actually helped me.
 
 I was wondering if anyone here had run into and solved similar
 problems? Or if they were running a similar system, and didn't run
 into that problem? Especially anyone running 9.0 instead of 8.X!
 
 
 
Thanks,
mike
 
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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Wojciech Puchar

Wojciech Puchar woj...@wojtek.tensor.gdynia.pl wrote:


CPU: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E31220 @ 3.10GHz (3100.03-MHz K8-class CPU)


If that the one normally listed as E3-1220? If so, it's a Sandy Bridge

yes.


processor. If not, then I have not idea what it is.


so it is. it have working AES-NI.

I am such a kind of person that i am completely not on-time with 
marketing, namings, etc..


I just asked what CPUs will support AES-NI which is important for me (geli 
speedup) and got that in Dell Server ;)



Virtualbox works great with windoze on that machine.


FreeBSD have linux emulation. i think you should use it instead of VBox if
you need to run linux environments under FreeBSD.


Yes, it does. And I use it when I can. However, there are applications
that it won't run, because of missing kernel features. And of course,
it does absolutely not good at all if you need to run something other
than Linux.



would have asked about that. My problem is sucky virtualbox
performance, on any guest that has VT-X emulation enabled (which means
all 64 bit guests).


i would rather bet on linux addon kernel modules you have to install.

In windows you have to install guest additions without this it is plain 
terrible.



Windows runs great (as for windows of course) under VBox.


Not for me. *Every* 64-bit guest OS has sucky performance. Linux,


Are you sure with two level pagetables featured in modern CPUs including 
sandy bridge?



Are you only running 32-bit guests? Are you running on 9.x or 8.x?


for production - yes (6 instances of windows XP). Virtualbox does never 
make main workload for me, it is just addon. On FreeBSD 8.3.


But i've tried Windows 7 64-bit and it worked fine. didn't see any 
problems with latency you describe

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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Mike Meyer
On Sat, 14 Jul 2012 20:27:11 +0200 (CEST)
Wojciech Puchar woj...@wojtek.tensor.gdynia.pl wrote:
  would have asked about that. My problem is sucky virtualbox
  performance, on any guest that has VT-X emulation enabled (which means
  all 64 bit guests).
 i would rather bet on linux addon kernel modules you have to install.

Are you talking about the guest additions? They're already installed
(on a VM that was running on an older Core 2 CPU). Performance sucks.

 In windows you have to install guest additions without this it is plain 
 terrible.

I haven't managed to get through an install on a 64-bit windows system
yet to try that. However, that Linux doesn't
Linux, or for the 32-bit

  Windows runs great (as for windows of course) under VBox.
  Not for me. *Every* 64-bit guest OS has sucky performance. Linux,
 Are you sure with two level pagetables featured in modern CPUs including 
 sandy bridge?

Yes, I'm sure that every guest OS I've tried on a 64 bit guest
sucks. I'm busy recreating 32-bit versions of the 64-bit guests where
I can.

  Are you only running 32-bit guests? Are you running on 9.x or 8.x?
 for production - yes (6 instances of windows XP). Virtualbox does never 
 make main workload for me, it is just addon. On FreeBSD 8.3.

Could you tell me if they all have VT-X disabled?

 But i've tried Windows 7 64-bit and it worked fine. didn't see any 
 problems with latency you describe

Could you send me the system settings (VT-X, PAE, etc.) you used for
this?

Thanks,
mike
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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Warren Block

On Sat, 14 Jul 2012, Mike Meyer wrote:


I just set up a system designed to handle lots of VBox VM's: a 6-core
SandyBridge processor with 32GB of ram on a FreeBSD 8.3-STABLE host.

Unfortunately, once I got it set up, I found that VBox guest
performance simply sucks. The *mouse* isn't responsive. Linux guests
see lots of CPU Locked errors.


Can you give a specific Linux version that has problems?  I'm willing to 
download and test it on this i5/9-stable/amd64 system.  Haven't noticed 
any problems, but I only occasionally boot Ubuntu in a VM for a little 
bit.

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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Mike Meyer
On Sat, 14 Jul 2012 13:13:50 -0600 (MDT)
Warren Block wbl...@wonkity.com wrote:
 On Sat, 14 Jul 2012, Mike Meyer wrote:
 Can you give a specific Linux version that has problems?  I'm willing to 
 download and test it on this i5/9-stable/amd64 system.  Haven't noticed 
 any problems, but I only occasionally boot Ubuntu in a VM for a little 
 bit.

64-bit Ubuntu LTS 12.04. I moved a VM from the previous system, where
it worked fine (same build of FreeBSD, same build of VirtualBox). The
OS seems to be irrelevant. Windows XP and 7 and mumble all have this
problem, *if* I have VT-X enabled in VirtualBox. If I disable VT-X,
the ones I have tested so far worked fine. I'm still getting 32-bit
builds of some of them, as you can't turn VT-X off in a 64-bit guest.

Thanks,
mike
-- 
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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Warren Block

On Sat, 14 Jul 2012, Mike Meyer wrote:


On Sat, 14 Jul 2012 13:13:50 -0600 (MDT)
Warren Block wbl...@wonkity.com wrote:

On Sat, 14 Jul 2012, Mike Meyer wrote:
Can you give a specific Linux version that has problems?  I'm willing to
download and test it on this i5/9-stable/amd64 system.  Haven't noticed
any problems, but I only occasionally boot Ubuntu in a VM for a little
bit.


64-bit Ubuntu LTS 12.04. I moved a VM from the previous system, where
it worked fine (same build of FreeBSD, same build of VirtualBox). The
OS seems to be irrelevant. Windows XP and 7 and mumble all have this
problem, *if* I have VT-X enabled in VirtualBox. If I disable VT-X,
the ones I have tested so far worked fine. I'm still getting 32-bit
builds of some of them, as you can't turn VT-X off in a 64-bit guest.


In a VM with stock settings (Linux 64-bit), Ubuntu 12.04 LTS Desktop 
Live CD works okay, installed also seems to work okay.  The mouse is a 
little draggy but usable, like using a wireless mouse.  kern.hz is set 
to 100 on the host (9-stable, er 9.1-BETA1, amd64).  This is without 
guest additions.  Trying the VirtualBox menu install guest additions 
made it crash.


The only mouse problem I saw was the mouse pointer disappearing when 
over some preferences icons.

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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Adam Vande More
On Sat, Jul 14, 2012 at 2:27 PM, Mike Meyer m...@mired.org wrote:

 64-bit Ubuntu LTS 12.04. I moved a VM from the previous system, where
 it worked fine (same build of FreeBSD, same build of VirtualBox). The
 OS seems to be irrelevant. Windows XP and 7 and mumble all have this
 problem, *if* I have VT-X enabled in VirtualBox. If I disable VT-X,
 the ones I have tested so far worked fine. I'm still getting 32-bit
 builds of some of them, as you can't turn VT-X off in a 64-bit guest.


If possible, set VM to single cpu.  Also not sure how you migrated
machines.  Occasionally the VM export/import functionality has
produced silliness.  Try creating new VM from scratch then attaching
existing VM disk(s) to it.



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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Doug Barton
For the OP, make sure you have the latest BIOS. I had a similar problem
with vt-x and it was solved by a later BIOS upgrade.

hth,

Doug

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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Warren Block

On Sat, 14 Jul 2012, Warren Block wrote:

In a VM with stock settings (Linux 64-bit), Ubuntu 12.04 LTS Desktop Live CD 
works okay, installed also seems to work okay.  The mouse is a little draggy 
but usable, like using a wireless mouse.  kern.hz is set to 100 on the host 
(9-stable, er 9.1-BETA1, amd64).  This is without guest additions.  Trying 
the VirtualBox menu install guest additions made it crash.


The only mouse problem I saw was the mouse pointer disappearing when over 
some preferences icons.


Switched to XUbuntu because the menus were irritating in plain Ubuntu. 
No serious problems there either, and at least the package manager is 
locatable.

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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Wojciech Puchar

i would rather bet on linux addon kernel modules you have to install.


Are you talking about the guest additions? They're already installed
(on a VM that was running on an older Core 2 CPU). Performance sucks.


something must be wrong with linux interacting with virtualbox.

Won't help you as i never used linux on it, and actually at all for long 
time.


In windows you have to install guest additions without this it is 
plain terrible.


I haven't managed to get through an install on a 64-bit windows system


Windows 7 64-bit installs fine. FreeBSD 8.3, vbox 4.0.12


sandy bridge?


Yes, I'm sure that every guest OS I've tried on a 64 bit guest
sucks. I'm busy recreating 32-bit versions of the 64-bit guests where
I can.


maybe. i didn't do very detailed tests. and don't use 64-bit guest in 
production.



problems with latency you describe


Could you send me the system settings (VT-X, PAE, etc.) you used for
this?
Everything that is possible enable in BIOS, FreeBSD/amd64 8.3-stable 
(like month old or so), virtualbox 4.0.12


no fancy tricks, custom kernel but nothing special.

If you need more ask on priv.
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Re: FreeBSD 8.3

2012-07-14 Thread Bernhard Fröhlich
On Sa., 14. Jul. 2012 12:11:41 CEST, Mike Meyer m...@mired.org wrote:

 I just set up a system designed to handle lots of VBox VM's: a 6-core
 SandyBridge processor with 32GB of ram on a FreeBSD 8.3-STABLE host.
 
 Unfortunately, once I got it set up, I found that VBox guest
 performance simply sucks. The *mouse* isn't responsive. Linux guests
 see lots of CPU Locked errors.

Does the VM use multiple vCPUs? Does reducing to one vcpu help? I have seen a 
lot of instabilities and problems in the past when using more than one vcpu. 
Where is that cpu locked reported? You could also try to build the vbox port 
with debug option enabled and look at VBox.log which gives probably useful 
information in case there are soft errors that cause the slowdown or if some of 
the vt-x features were incorrectly detected and vbox had to fallback to the 
recompiler (=slow).

 Googling turns up lots of problems with VBox on SandyBridge: Mac's
 running on 64 bit kernels have this problem - running on 32 bit
 kernels helps. Turning off Intel's SpeedStep has been reported to
 help. Turning off VT-X in the guest - if it's a 32-bit guest -
 helps. The last one is the only one that actually helped me.

Just to be sure which vbox version are we talking about? You could try 
emulators/virtualbox-ose-legacy to verify if it is a regression of 4.1.x.

 I was wondering if anyone here had run into and solved similar
 problems? Or if they were running a similar system, and didn't run
 into that problem? Especially anyone running 9.0 instead of 8.X

I've not heard about that before so it wasn't reported at least.
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