Software Update: VirtualBox 3.1.4

Oracle released version 3.1.4 of VirtualBox on Friday, the second update to version 3.1.0, which was released in early December. This program can be used to install other operating systems on a computer in a virtual environment. That way, different OSes can be used on the same hardware. VirtualBox is available for Windows 2000 and above, Mac OS X, Linux, and Solaris, and can handle a variety of guest operating systems.

VirtualBox is available in two versions. The full version has additional functionality, such as support for USB ports and the remote display protocol, but it is only free for private use and evaluation purposes. This extra functionality is closed source and is therefore missing in the open source version. Version 3.1.0 includes several improvements. For example, 2D video acceleration can now be used for Windows guests, USB works a lot better for OpenSolaris, support for EFI has been added and the performance for PAE and AMD64 has been improved a lot. Version 3.1.4 is a maintenance release and contains the following changes:

The following items were fixed and/or added:

• VMM: SMP stability fixes
• VMM: fixed guru meditation in certain rare cases (bug #5968)
• VMM: activate NXE for PAE enabled guests (VT-x and AMD-V on 32 bits hosts only; bug #3578)
• VMM: added workaround for broken BIOSes that make VirtualBox think AMD-V is in use (for details see bug #5639)
• VMM: fixed rare host reboot when restoring a saved state (bug #3945)
• VMM: fixed incompatibility with 2.6.32 Linux kernels (software virtualization only; bug #6100)
• VMM: turn on nested paging by default for new VMs (if available; VT-x and AMD-V only)
• VMM: turn on VPID by default for new VMs (if available; VT-x only)
• VMM: perform strict CPUID compatibility checks when teleporting; to get the old behavior set “VBoxInternal/CPUM/StrictCpuIdChecks” to 0
• VMM: fixed VM crash with certain 16 bits Windows applications (software virtualization only; bug #5399)
• Snapshots: fixed a 3.1 regression that broke deletion of snapshots when a machine had immutable or writethrough storage attached (bug #5727)
• Saved state: fixed VERR_SSM_LOADED_TOO_MUCH error when loading DisplayScreenshot(bug #6162)
• VBoxManage: add restorecurrent operation to snapshots command
• VBoxManage: fixed broken snapshot lookup by name (bug #6070
• GUI: fixed the broken “Reload” button that reloads the machine XML when a machine is inaccessible
• GUI: fixed guest fullscreen mode after reboot (bug #5372)
• GUI: handle Ctrl+Break properly on X11 hosts (bug #6122)
• GUI: fixed status LEDs for storage devices
• GUI: workaround for disabling the seamless mode on KDE hosts (KWin bug)
• 3D support: fixed SELinux warning saying VBoxOGL.so requires text relocation (bug #5690)
• 3D support: fixed Corrupted surface rendering (bug #5695)
• 3D support: free textures on guest application termination (bug #5206)
• 3D support: fixed ubigraph_server crashes (#4674)
• 3D support: fixes for 64-bit Solaris guests
• Seamless: disable seamless mode when guest changes screen resolution (bug #5655)
• NAT: fixed high CPU load under certain circumstances (Windows hosts only; bug #5787)
• NAT: fixed handling of the broadcast flag in DHCP requests
• NAT: fixed rare crash due to an assertion in the ICMP code (bug #3217)
• Virtio-net: don’t crash when ports accessed beyond the valid range (bug #5923)
• LsiLogic: fix for Windows 7 guests
• ATA: fix for guru meditation when installing Solaris 8 guests (bug #5972)
• VHD: fixed an incompatibility with Virtual PC (bug #5990)
• VHD: update the footer backup after setting a new UUID (bug #5004)
• Host DVD: really fixed loading “passthrough” setting from config file (bug #5681)
• Shared folders: fixed resolving of symlink target on Linux (3.1.2 regression)
• VRDP: fixed VERR_NET_ADDRESS_IN_USE error when restarting a VM (3.1 regression; bug #5902)
• VRDP: fixed crash on Mac OS X when 3D is enabled (3.1 regression)
• PulseAudio: fixed recording (bug #4302)
• USB: fixed a shutdown blue screen (Windows hosts only; bug #5885)
• BIOS: fixed attribute during text scroll (bug #3407)
• OVF: fix strange error messages on disk import errors
• OVF: do not require write access the the .ovf file during import (3.1 regression; bug #5762)
• iSCSI: fix taking snapshots of a running VM (#5849)
• Solaris hosts: several USB fixes (including support for Apple iPod; bug #5873)
• Solaris installer: fixed USB module removal and Solaris 10 “id” binary incompatibility
• Guest Additions: fixed wrong guest time adjustment if the guest clock is ahead (3.1 regression; non-Windows guests only)
• Linux Additions: fixed shared folders for Linux 2.6.32 guests (bug #5891)
• Linux Additions: make the mouse driver work on Debian 5.0.3 guests again (3.1.2 regression, bug #5832)
• Windows Additions: fixed malfunctioning !VBoxService that broke time-sync (bug #5872)
• Windows Additions: fixed uninstallation issues on 64-bit guests
• Windows Additions: fixed some sysprep execution issues
• X.Org Additions: never reject the saved video mode as invalid (bug #5731)
• XFree86 Additions: accept video mode hints for the initial mode again