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vmuser28893421
Contributor
Contributor

Cant boot Windows XP -virtual machine, crashes to Blue Screen of Death -error. Recovery with snapshots wont help. HOST is Vista Ultimate 32bit, GUEST is XP Pro 32bit. Vmware Workstation 6.5

The guest is WinXP Pro SP3 32bit.

When I power the VM on and after several seconds of waiting I get bluescreen and the VM

is forced to reboot. Next XP shows "start windows normally" option, but still the same

error. I tried to recover the VM to the "clean" snapshot which is taken after the XP

install, but after the reboot the XP still gives me the same bluescreen error again. If

the xp copes to boot to the desktop it will crash a few seconds later!

Before this day, the XP VM worked fine, i don't know where this error came from?

My computer specs: AMD Turion 64 X2 1.9Ghz, 2GB RAM

Help!

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RDPetruska
Leadership
Leadership

What is the BSOD error? You may need to disable automatic reboots in order to see this - there is an option in the Windows' boot menu (F8).

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vmuser28893421
Contributor
Contributor

BSOD error is this(1.png) :

STOP: 0x0000007F (0x00000000, 0x00000000, 0x00000000, 0x00000000

I googled, and found hotfix from the site:

But when i tried to install the patch:

"setup has detected that the Service Pack version of this system is newer than the update you are applying.

There is no need to install this update. "

So the BSOD-problem is still unsolved!

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ruddg
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

vmuser... curious whether you found a workaround for this problem? I am suddenly seeing exactly the same thing. Host OS is Windows XP, but my laptop is also a Turion X2. My linux guests seem to boot OK, but I have three XP guests that now BSOD during boot. I am not aware of any changes in the host OS/application stack.

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Francois_Lamour
Contributor
Contributor

I'm also having the same issue. Host is Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition SP2, and I now have TWO guess, both running also Windows Server 2003 SP1 and SP2. Same error message.

I had one guess which was a Workstation 5.x VM, which I upgraded to 6.5. No luck. I tried removing all hardware devices (except memory and disk), no luck.

I'm running Workstation 6.5.0.118166.

Any ideas?!?

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Scissor
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Does booting your Guest into Safe Mode work? Did you recently install any updates on either the Guest or Host?

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jtsm1974
Contributor
Contributor

Try adding the below line to your config file for your VM.

Ethernet0.VirtualDev = "e1000"

XP SP3 has all sorts of issues with outdated chipset drivers.

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Francois_Lamour
Contributor
Contributor

Safe mode (with or without networking) also bluescreens.

My Host is up to date with patching, one guest VM is fully patched, the other was not fully patched.

I don't know if this might help, but it all started when I first cloned one of the guest. The clone BDODed, so I tried starting the original VM, and it also did. The second guest VM was copied from a VMware server 1.0.5 on running on Linux, and right after copying it to my Host, BDOD. Original Guest2 on VMware server still boots ok.

Also, no luck with , and FYI, it is added by default when you add a new NIC with WS 6.5.

Thanks, and keep ideas coming!

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Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Safe mode (with or without networking) also bluescreens.

My Host is up to date with patching, one guest VM is fully patched, the other was not fully patched.

I don't know if this might help, but it all started when I first cloned one of the guest. The clone BDODed, so I tried starting the original VM, and it also did. The second guest VM was copied from a VMware server 1.0.5 on running on Linux, and right after copying it to my Host, BDOD. Original Guest2 on VMware server still boots ok.

Also, no luck with , and FYI, it is added by default when you add a new NIC with WS 6.5.

Thanks, and keep ideas coming!

I'm confused.. It sounds like you have a VMware Server in the picture too? Can you clarify something for me?

Currently you are running VMware Workstation 6.5 on 32-bit Windows Server 2003 Host? (you do NOT also have VMware Server installed, correct?)

Why would cloning a Guest cause a BSOD in the Guest? Or was it the Host that BSOD during the clone process? I assume you "Cloned" the VM by simply starting VMware Workstation, highlighting the original Guest, and selecting VM -> Clone from the menu? Or did you use the VMware Converter?

Please attach the .vmx file for the Guest that does not start as well as the vmware.log located in the Guest's folder as well.

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Francois_Lamour
Contributor
Contributor

Sorry for bringing VMware Server... Let me clarify:

Currently you are running VMware Workstation 6.5 on 32-bit Windows Server 2003 Host?

Yes

(you do NOT also have VMware Server installed, correct?)

Of course not. The VMware Server I mentionned is another Host, which I copied an image running on it to my WS6.5 host. This newly copied image (tgz and untarred using WinRAR, if this makes a difference) is also BSOD on my WS6.5 Host. Anyway, let's forget about this one here to avoid confusion.

Why would cloning a Guest cause a BSOD in the Guest?

Dunno.

Or was it the Host that BSOD during the clone process?

The BDOD happens after:

- Proper shutdown of Guest on 6.5 Host

- Full clone (not linked) of Guest

- Power on ClonedGuest : BDOD in ClonedGuest

- Power on Guest : BDOD in Guest

I assume you "Cloned" the VM by simply starting VMware Workstation, highlighting the original Guest, and selecting VM -> Clone from the menu?

Yep

Or did you use the VMware Converter?

Nope

>Please attach the .vmx file for the Guest that does not start as well as the vmware.log located in the Guest's folder as well.

Attached

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Scissor
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Ok, thanks for the clarification.

So you have a working Guest running on a different machine running VMware Server (I assume running some form of linux/unix due to your mention of tgz, but I don't think that is relevant right now). You shut down the Guest and copied the files over to your machine running VMware Workstation. Now the Guest will not boot on your Workstation?

I see that your Workstation system has an Intel processor. Does the VMware Server system where you first built your Guest have an AMD processor? If so, that information coupled with the fact that the guest is running XP SP3 (SP3, right?) would give me an idea...

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Francois_Lamour
Contributor
Contributor

I should not have mentionned VMware Server. Forget that I mentionned that. Here is a recap of my problem using your wording. Hope this clarifies.

I had a working Guest (W2K3 SP1) running in Host (W2K3 SP2) on VMware Workstation 6.5.

Both Guest and Host are up-to-date as for Windows Updates patches.

Guest was shutdown down properly (from Start menu of Guest)

Guest was cloned, highlighting the Guest, and selecting VM -> Clone from the menu. Let's call it ClonedGuest here.

Now powering on ClonedGuest results in a BSOD.

And powering on Guest also results in BSOD.

The log file and .vmx attached previously where the one of the Guest.

My Host has an Intel Pentium D processor.

If I remember, I think the Guest was first built on a Pentium 4 or Celeron, running VMware Workstation 5.5 (if I'm right...) In any case, the Guest was built on a Intel processor host, that I am sure.

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Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Ok, now I think we're on the same page.

Do you have any other Guests that boot properly on your Host? (just want to make sure the problem is only with these two mentioned Guests, and not something with your Host).

Just an FYI... Workstation 6.5.1 was released last week in case you want to consider upgrading to it.

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Francois_Lamour
Contributor
Contributor

I'm scared of shutting down my other running images, I have some that are paused which I will not shut down, and (I don't know why I didn't think of trying that) just tried starting an XP Home Guess that I haven't started in some weeks: same BSOD. So it looks like a Host problem.

It's funny that you mentioned that WS 6.5.1 was just released. When I started having this problem today I checked using "Help -> Check for updates on the web" and WS told me I was using the latest version. Now I just tried it again and it mention about the new release. So I will upgrade and let you know.

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Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Yea... 6.5.1 just came out on Friday of last week.

Looking through your vmware.log file a little closer, I saw these lines:

Nov 26 15:49:49.122: vmx| KHZEstimate 661933

Nov 26 15:49:49.122: vmx| MHZEstimate 662

Now, compare that with the same lines from a vmware.log file from my system ( a 2.4 GHz Intel 😞

Nov 26 14:11:33.162: vmx| KHZEstimate 2400000

Nov 26 14:11:33.162: vmx| MHZEstimate 2400

Since you have a 3.4 GHz Intel Chip, I'm wondering if your Host is scaling down the processor speed to save power, which might be causing problems? Typically you would fix that by adding some lines to your config.ini following the instructions from: http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1227 .

Of course, this could just be a red herring.... and rebooting your Host might fix everything.

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Francois_Lamour
Contributor
Contributor

I had rebooted during the day, so that's not an option.

I just finished upgrading to 6.5.1.126130 and guess what, problem solved.

It's kinda scary but at least, problem is solved. Thanks for all.

I'll also go ahead and apply the suggestion regarding the CPU speed.

Thanks so much

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