Posts by Michgelsen

1) Message boards : Questions and problems : BOINC does not see that VirtualBox is installed (Ubuntu 15.10) (Message 67101)
Posted 23 Jan 2016 by Michgelsen
Post:
Thank you very much Juha! I got 7.6.22 from LocutusOfBorg's PPA, because it wasn't available from the normal repositories, updated BOINC that way, and voilà, BOINC now detects the VirtualBox installation.
2) Message boards : Questions and problems : BOINC does not see that VirtualBox is installed (Ubuntu 15.10) (Message 67066)
Posted 21 Jan 2016 by Michgelsen
Post:
Hello,

I'm running BOINC on an old laptop of mine, using Xubuntu 15.10. Everything is 32-bit, as the processor does not yet support 64-bit.
BOINC has been running fine on it for a long time. I'm using 7.6.6, downloaded from the repositories via the standard installation procedure using aptitude.

Today I wanted to add VirtualBox, so I would also be able to crunch for projects requiring that. The VirtualBox installation, version 5.0.10, also from the repositories, went fine, and it's working. I can make a VM on it. However, BOINC does not see it. When I attach to a project requiring VirtualBox, vLHC@home in this case, I can't get work because the server detects that VirtualBox is not installed. Obviously it is, only BOINC doesn't see it.

I'm not very good at troubleshooting in Linux, because I'm primarily a Windows user. However, I did try to add the 'boinc' user to the 'vboxusers' group, but this changed nothing.

I did a VirtualBox installation as complete as possible, adding the extension pack, installing the dkms and linux-headers packages and all dependencies. I have no idea where the problem is. I don't think it's with VirtualBox, because that seems to be functioning as it should.

Do I need to give BOINC directions to where it can find the VirtualBox installation? I did nothing to deviate from standard installation paths or anything like that.

Any help is much appreciated! Many thanks in advance.
3) Message boards : Questions and problems : Possible compatibility issue between VB 4.3.12 and Windows 10 (Message 66375)
Posted 23 Dec 2015 by Michgelsen
Post:
Yes, making it impossible to do trouble-free crunching on Windows 10 with all cores working for a VirtualBox project. If you use an old version, you get errors, and if you use the new version, your computer will noticeably slow down...
4) Message boards : Questions and problems : Possible compatibility issue between VB 4.3.12 and Windows 10 (Message 66373)
Posted 23 Dec 2015 by Michgelsen
Post:
I just found this thread, after I had a problem with VirtualBox processes running on normal priority instead of below priority.
The original question was posted on the vLHC@home forum here:http://lhcathome2.cern.ch/vLHCathome/forum_thread.php?id=1744.

Summary: VirtualBox versions after 4.3.12 do not (at least on Windows) support changing the priority of its processes. See here: https://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/13500. This means that while BOINC is running, your computer can noticeably slow down, because the VirtualBoxes are running at normal priority and are competing with normal operations for processor time.

I was running 5.0.12, but downgrading to 4.3.12 solved this problem for me. I think that it is important for users to be able to use their computers while running BOINC, else they might stop donating computer time or switch off BOINC from time to time. For this, it is very important that BOINC can set the VirtualBox processes to below normal priority!

Thus, are you sure it is a good idea to use a newer VirtualBox version, or has this problem been solved somehow? (I would like to know (how) if it is!)



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