wrong video driver?

[j-retired]

I have vbox running on a Gigabyte GA-H61M-2PV, with Intel G620 @ 2.6G, 8G of DDR3 and a Radeon HD 5450.
Vbox only sees 4G for some reason I don't understand - Pclos sees it all.
The guest is win7, all the guest additions are installed.
The virtual disk is set as dynamic, 100G, the memory 1.9G, and the video memory at 256M (the max allowed). One processor core is selected.
The win7 control panel reports that a generic "Virtual Box Graphics Adapter" is running.
I am having trouble getting the win7 video to run at a reasonable speed - even solitaire tells me "h/w acceleration is disabled or not available" or something like that.
The host pclos is running at 1920x1080 very satisfactorily, and correctly sees the HP 2309v monitor.
The best res I can see is 1600x1091, but regardless which res I select, I cannot get it up to speed.
win7 cannot recognise the monitor - it says 'generic 1024x768'.

What on earth have I missed? I've tried fiddling with all sorts, but as yet failed to get the right mix!

j
 

[GermanTux]

First - Are you sure PCLOS sees that extra memory?  This can get tricky with what Virtualbox sees, espeically on 32 bit systems.  Are you using PCLOS 32 bit? 

Secondly,  Have you also installed guest additions on the host?  Also, giving your guest 256MB of display memory is dangerous.  That is memory that is being choked off from your host system. 

-Windows will not recognize your monitor inside the guest.   This is by design. 

[j-retired]

"free" shows me 8Gb of memory with the pae kernel installed. With the original it was just under 4Gb.
Yes PCLOS 32 bit version, with the guest OS selected as Win7 64 bit.
Yes, the guest additions are installed on the host.
I understand your comment on the monitor recognition.
j

[7272andy]

Hi Guys
From the VirtualBox Forums

32 systems can't handle more than 4 GB of RAM by default and there is little use to give more than that. This is a hard coded limitation on 32 bit Hosts for 32 bit Guests. If you want to give the VM more RAM, you need to be able to run 64 Guests AND run a 64 bit Host. See the VirtualBox FAQ for the hardware requirements.

More information about this memory limitation can be found in the manual.

So 4GB is the limit when using a 32-bit host

[menotu]

Could also check that the Enable pae/nx switch is ticked. in Virtualbox > Settings > System > Processor Tab

And that both options are ticked on the System > Acceleration Tab

[7272andy]

For Windows guests you need to install the GuestAdditions with Windows in safe mode, if you don't Windows will overwrite the drivers for hardware acceleration with its own (which wont work).

You may also need to enable virtualization in the bios of the host machine. If this is disabled in bios the Hardware Virtualization VT-x/AMD-V switch will be ignored.

[GermanTux]

Hi Guys
From the VirtualBox Forums

32 systems can't handle more than 4 GB of RAM by default and there is little use to give more than that. This is a hard coded limitation on 32 bit Hosts for 32 bit Guests. If you want to give the VM more RAM, you need to be able to run 64 Guests AND run a 64 bit Host. See the VirtualBox FAQ for the hardware requirements.

More information about this memory limitation can be found in the manual.

So 4GB is the limit when using a 32-bit host

This is what I figured.  Despite the PAE kernel, the memory addressing schemes can get quite messy when trying to get a VM to recognize all that RAM.  

J-Retired, you can download the PCLOS 64 bit test iso here.