VMWare Player Freezes Host (Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit)

[KeithFowler]

I was having this problem with Player v 3.0 and just recently upgraded to 3.1 and I still have the same problem.

The guest vm is Windows Server 2003 32bit (x86).

When the system freezes is inconsistent and sometimes happens when I am using the VM or anytime after I have launched then suspened/shut down the VM.

The event log for Windows reports no errors.

[vmroyale]

Hello and welcome to the forums.

How much memory do you have in the Win 7 host?

How much memory do you have in the 2003 VM?

Good Luck!

[KeithFowler]

The host has 8Gb of memory, the VM was givin 3Gb

[pnielsen]

Keith,

     Were you able to find a soultion to this problem? I'm having the same issue some times happens right after each other or goes about a day or two without any issues. Seems like issues were "reduced" when I stopped using secondary monitor on the dock.

Specs:

VMware VMPlayer 3.1.3 x64

Windows 7 Enterprise x64

HP EliteBook 8540p

7i 720QM

16GB RAM

System Drive = 60 SSD

VM Drive= 500 SATA

[vbhines]

So, any updates on this? I have this issue as well. Using VMware Player 3.1. Running Windows 7 x64 Enterprise Guest on a Windows 7 x64 Host. Dell M6500 with Core i7, 8GB RAM. I have 4gb dedicated to the VM, though it did it when I had 2gb dedicated to it as well. I'm giving it four of my eight cores, though I'm not sure if that's the problem since my CPU has eight logical cores but only four physical cores (I get up to eight in the dropdown selection in VMWare). I am also running dual displays, but only one monitor off my dock. The laptop display is my secondary. Nothing in my VMWare log files that point to the issue, and nothing in either the guest or host Windows Event Viewer. I'm running NAT on a corporate domain.

I get complete system lockups every once in a while. I can't really offer any evidence, but due to the timing of my lockups, I've wondered if MS Outlook through Exchange could be an issue.

EDIT:

I forgot to mention, I also have hardware virtualization enabled in my BIOS.

Message was edited by: vbhines

[pnielsen]

VBHines,

      I was not able to fix this issue even after a full reinstall. The laptop also was having heat issues which could have been the issue with the load VM brings. My bet was VM driver intergration because I was able to run other Virtualiztion software without issues. I did not pursure this issue after heat issue was resolved though. I would recommend to run ACPI application to test for heat issues. Sorry I don't really have an update.

Patrick

[continuum]

post a vmware.log from that VM that makes the host freeze

maybe you have antivirus scanning vmdk-files ?

[MaximillianWA]

Hello,

I was experiencing a similar problem, where my whole computer would freeze for several minutes at a time, appearing to be due to excessive hard-drive activity that just brought the PC to a screeching halt until the activity was complete.  It started when I started using my first VMware Player VM a couple weeks ago, and seems to only happen when the VM is active.  I am running Win7 Ultimate w/8GB RAM and SATA RAID5 w/3 WD Caviar Black drives (7200RPM).  I am pretty sure I have the problem narrowed down to it being caused by Windows taking a Volume Shadow Copy of the volume where the VMDK (VM virtual disk) files are stored.  Of course, because the VMDK files tend to be quite large (10, 20, 30GB or more), it seems to hang up as it takes the Shadow Copy of that file.  So, I have the following questions:

1. Does your computer recover from the stall/freeze if you wait long enough (several minutes)?
2. If YES to 1, is the stall time about the same each time?  Mine is around 3 minutes, and of course yours may be longer or shorter depending on your setup.
3. Do you have a HDD activity light, and if so, does it indicate high activity during the time of the stall/freeze?
4. Do you have any backup programs running that could be taking a Shadow Copy during the times you're noticing the freezing?
5. If you go to a command prompt (using Run as Administrator on cmd.exe), and type "vssadmin list shadows", and look under "creation time" for the shadow copies listed, do you see a shadow copy generated about the time the computer froze?

I'm hoping that at least some of you are having the same issue as mine.  Even though I excluded VMDK files on my backup program (Carbonite), it appears that it is still causing VSS to generate shadow copies when it is active, which cause the freezes.  Temporarily supending Carbonite's backups seems to greatly reduce (if not eliminate) the problem.  I am running Live Mesh too, and it is syncing the VMDK files with another machine, though it appears that it is not the culprit (probably because it doesn't take VSS copies to do its syncing).  Hopefully my info helps you identity your issues.  I look forward to your response(s)!

Regards,

Maximillian C.

Seattle, WA

[stepyi]

Hello,

we try to install and test the vmware system on win7 profession 64 bit machines (8GB RAM Intel and AMD CPU´s).

On all machines we try to install the guest system WinXP Professional with 2 GB RAM and 10GB HDD.

Every time we have the same problem that vmware froze host and guest system. The time after this happend is different. Maybe you could install the guest system and work a little bit or the system froze on installation guest system.

After the system froze it dont wake up again, we must switch of power.

We use VMWare Player 4.1.

Are there known problems with VMWare Player 4.1 and Win7 Prof. 64bit host system?

Must we use the commercial product?

BR

Stephan

[GarrusVakarian]

MaximillianWA, you are my hero. I was filled with elation when I discovered you had the exact same problem I do (or did, until a moment ago) and was further delighted to learn that some shadow copies were indeed created at the same time as my computer locked up. The surprising thing is that I had only chosen the VMWare .vmx and .vmxf files to be backed up (and the logs too), so I wasn't expecting this much interference.

Anyway. Seeing how the lock-ups were sporadic, I can't immediately confirm they don't happen any more, but I intend to post back here if they return. In any event, thank you.

For reference:

VMWare Player 4.0.2 build-591240 (but it happened with 3.x as well)

Host: Athlon II X2 Processor, 4GB RAM, Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit

Guest: 1 vCPU, 1.5GB RAM, Windows XP Professional 32-bit

[mukundrv]

Hi

I also faced the same problem and have some weird answers to post which actually solved  the issue.

When I started the VM Player, the progress bar shows the percentage of completion, after some 30 % or 40%, the progress bar initalizes again from 0.

After a few seconds, if I minimize all the windows by clicking (Windows Key + D) and maximize it again.   It pops up a message box "Binary translation is incompatible with slow mode. Disabling long mode. Without long mode the virtualization will not be able to run 64 bit code. A check box with do not show this message again.

I checked the message box and the VMware starts.

When I restarted the VMWare, it hanged again. When I minimized all the apps using (Windows Key + D) and maximized again. It started to run as usual.

It is a bit weird but it works.

Thanks & Regards

Mukund

[NDeanMeyer]

Minimizing with Windows-D and then maximizing worked for me.