Changelog for v1.6.6 / 2008-08-26 * VMM: fixed excessive logging (bug #1901) * VMM: AMD-V stability fixes (bug #1685) * GUI: added support for Ctrl+Caps reversed keyboards (bug #1891) * SATA: fixed BSODs of Windows guests on a SATA disk (bug #1941) * SATA: fixed hard disk detection on Solaris 10 U5 (bug #1789) * VBoxHeadless: don’t start the clipboard service (bug #1743) * VBoxHeadless: added -vrdp parameter which allows to start the VM session without VRDP (bug #1960) * VBoxManage: fixes to creating raw disk/partition VMDK files, now accepts removable media on Windows (bug #1869) * VRDP: fixed communication with MS Remote Resktop Connection on MacOS X (bug #1337) * VRDP: clipboard fixes (bug #1410) * VRDP: fixed crash during PAM authentication (bug #1953) * Shared Folders: fixed a regression introduced in version 1.6.2: the shared folders service was sometimes not properly installed (Windows guests only, bug #1915) * Shared Folders: don’t deny to load a VM if a shared folder is not accessible (bug #822) * BIOS: allow to specify empty DMI strings (bug #1957) * OSE archive: added missing Makefiles (bug #1912) * Linux hosts: workaround for buggy gcc-4.3 compilers (e.g. openSUSE 11) * Linux hosts: one more fix for compiling the kernel modules on Linux 2.6.27 (bug #1962) * MacOS X hosts: shared folders unicode fix * Solaris hosts: fixed link issue (bug #1840) * Windows additions: allow to downgrade the package * Windows additions: fixed corrupted installer icon on Windows 2000 (bug #1486) * Windows additions: fixed bug when creating intermediate directories (bug #1870) * Windows additions: implemented /xres=, /yres= and /depth= switches for the installer (bug #1990) * Linux additions: properly unregister the misc device when unloading the kernel module * Linux additions: fixed startup order for recent Linux distributions again (e.g. openSUSE 11) * Linux additions: attempt to fix the autostart issue of !VBoxClient with Mandriva guests (bug #1699) * Linux additions: fixed detection of patched Linux 2.6.18 kernels of RHEL5 / FC6 / CentOS 5.2 (bugs #1899, #1973) * Linux additions: added new mount flags dmode, fmode, umask, dmask and fmask allowing to override the file mode (bug #1776) * Documentation: added a note that jumbo frames don’t work (bug #1877) * Documentation: document special host interface names on openSUSE11 (bug #1892)
This version is a major update. The following major new features were added:
* 64 bits guest support (64 bits host only)
* New native Leopard user interface on Mac OS X hosts
* The GUI was converted from Qt3 to Qt4 with many visual improvements
* New-version notifier
* Guest property information interface
* Host Interface Networking on Mac OS X hosts
* New Host Interface Networking on Solaris hosts
* Support for Nested Paging on modern AMD CPUs (major performance gain)
* Framework for collecting performance and resource usage data (metrics)
* Added SATA asynchronous IO (NCQ: Native Command Queuing) when accessing raw disks/partitions (major performance gain)
* Clipboard integration for OS/2 Guests
* Created separate SDK component featuring a new Python programming interface on Linux and Solaris hosts
* Support for VHD disk images
In addition, the following items were fixed and/or added:
* VMM: VT-x fixes
* AHCI/SATA: improved performance
* GUI: keyboard fixes
* Linux installer: properly uninstall the package even if unregistering the DKMS module fails
* Linux additions: the guest screen resolution is properly restored
* Network: added support for jumbo frames (> 1536 bytes)
* Shared Folders: fixed guest crash with Windows Media Player 11
* Mac OS X: Ctrl+Left mouse click doesn’t simulate a right mouse click in the guest anymore. Use Hostkey+Left for a right mouse click emulation. (bug #1766)
This is a maintenance release. The following items were fixed and/or added:
VMM: fixed inability to run more than one VM in parallel (AMD-V on CPUs with
erratum 170 only; bug #2167)
VMM: VT-x stability fixes (bug #2179 and others)
VMM: fixed Linux 2.6.26+ kernel crashes (used by Ubuntu 8.10 Alpha, Fedora 10
Alpha; bug #1875)
VMM: fixed 64 bits Linux 2.6.26 kernel crashes (Debian)
VMM: fixed Vista (32 bits) guest crash during boot when PAE and NX are enabled
(applied to 64 bits hosts with VT-x enabled only)
VMM: fixed OS/2 guest crashes during boot (AMD-V; bug #2132)
GUI: fixed crash when trying to release an inaccessible image in the virtual disk
manager
GUI: fixed invalid error message for a changed snapshot path even if that path
wasn't changed (bug #2064)
GUI: fixed crash when creating a new hard disk image (bug #2060)
GUI: fixed crash when adding a hard disk in the VM settings (bug #2081)
GUI: fixed a bug where VirtualBox isn't working with the new QGtkStyle plugin
(bug #2066)
GUI: fixed VM close dialog in seamless mode (Mac OS X hosts only; bug #2067)
GUI: fixed standard menu entries for NLS versions (Mac OS X hosts only)
GUI: disable the VT-x/AMD-V setting when it's not supported by the CPU (or on
Mac OS X hosts)
VBoxManage: fixed crash during internalcommands createrawvmdk (bug #2184)
VBoxManage: fixed output of snapshot showvminfo (bug #698)
Guest properties: added information about guest network interfaces (Windows
guests only)
Shared Folders: fixed regression that caused Windows guest crashes (bug
#2055)
API: fixed number of installed CPUs (Solaris hosts only)
VRDP: allow a client to reconnect to an existing session on the VRDP server by
dropping the existing connection (configurable and disabled by default; only
relevant when multiconnection mode is disabled)
VRDP: fixed an image repaint problem
Linux hosts: fixed bug in vboxdrv.ko that could corrupt kernel memory and panic
the kernel (bug #2078)
Linux hosts: compile fixes for kernel module on Linux 2.6.27
Mac OS X hosts: added Python support
Additions: fixed a possible hang in HGCM communication after a VM reboot
Windows additions: added support for Windows XP 64 bits (bug #2117)
Linux additions: deactivate dynamic resizing on Linux guests with buggy X servers
Linux additions: support Ubuntu 8.10 guests and Fedora 9 guests (dynamic
resizing disabled for the latter) (bug #1854)
Linux additions: added installer check for the system architecture
Linux additions: fixed Xorg modules path for some Linux distributions (bug #2128)
VMDK: be more liberal with ambiguous parts of the format specification and accept
more format variants (bug #2062)
VHD: fixed a bug in the VHD backend which resulted in reading the wrong data
(bug #2085)
Solaris hosts: fixed kernel panic on certain machines when starting VMs with host
interface networking (bug #2183)
Solaris hosts: fixed inability to access NFS shares on the host when host interface
networking was enabled
Solaris hosts: installer now detects and reports when installing under the wrong
architecture
Solaris hosts: fixed security hardening that prevented starting VMs from non-
global zones even as root (bug #1948)
Solaris additions: combined the 32 bit and 64 bit additions installer into a single
package
Mac OS X hosts: experimental support for attaching a real serial port to the guest
* VMM: fixed Guru meditation when running 64 bits Windows guests (bug #2220) * VMM: fixed Solaris 10U6 boot hangs (VT-x and AMD-V) bug #2220) * VMM: fixed Solaris 10U6 reboot hangs (AMD-V only; bug #2220) * GUI: the host key was sometimes not properly displayed (Windows hosts only, bug #1996) * GUI: the keyboard focus was lost after minimizing and restoring the VM window via the Windows taskbar (bugs #784) * VBoxManage: properly show SATA disks when showing the VM information (bug #2624) * SATA: fixed access if the buffer size is not sector-aligned (bug #2024) * SATA: improved performance * SATA: fixed snapshot function with ports>1 (bug #2510) * E1000: fixed crash under rare circumstances * USB: fixed support for iPhone and Nokia devices (Linux host: bugs #470 & #491) * Windows host installer: added proper handling of open VirtualBox applications when updating the installation * Windows host installer: fixed default installation directory on 64-bit on new installations * Windows host installer: added proper handling of open VirtualBox applications when updating the installation * Linux/Solaris/Darwin hosts: verify permissions in /tmp/vbox-$USER-ipc * Linux hosts: fixed assertion on high network load (AMD64 hosts, fix for Linux distributions with glibc 2.6 and newer (bug #616) * Linux hosts: don’t crash during shutdown with serial ports connected to a host device * Solaris hosts: fixed incompatibility between IPSEC and host interface networking * Solaris hosts: fixed a rare race condition while powering off VMs with host interface networking * Solaris hosts: fixed VBoxSDL on Solaris 10 by shipping the required SDL library (bug #2475) * Windows additions: fixed logged in users reporting via guest properties when using native RDP connections * Windows additions: fixed Vista crashes when accessing shared folders under certain circumstances (bug #2461) * Windows additions: fixed shared folders access with MS-Office (bug #2591) * Linux additions: fixed compilation of vboxvfs.ko for 64-bit guests (bug #2550) * SDK: added JAX-WS port caching to speedup connections
This version is a major update. The following major new features were added:
* Support for hardware virtualization (VT-x and AMD-V) on Mac OS X hosts * Support for 64-bit guests on 32-bit host operating systems (experimental; see user manual, chapter 1.6, 64-bit guests, page 16) * Added support for Intel Nehalem virtualization enhancements (EPT and VPID; see user manual, chapter 1.2, Software vs. hardware virtualization (VT-x and AMD-V), page 10)) * Experimental 3D acceleration via OpenGL (see user manual, chapter 4.8, Hardware 3D acceleration (OpenGL), page 66) * Experimental LsiLogic and BusLogic SCSI controllers (see user manual, chapter 5.1, Hard disk controllers: IDE, SATA (AHCI), SCSI, page 70) * Full VMDK/VHD support including snapshots (see user manual, chapter 5.2, Disk image files (VDI, VMDK, VHD), page 72) * New NAT engine with significantly better performance, reliability and ICMP echo (ping) support (bugs #1046, #2438, #2223, #1247) * New Host Interface Networking implementations for Windows and Linux hosts with easier setup (replaces TUN/TAP on Linux and manual bridging on Windows)
In addition, the following items were fixed and/or added:
* VMM: significant performance improvements for VT-x (real mode execution) * VMM: support for hardware breakpoints (VT-x and AMD-V only; bug #477) * VMM: VGA performance improvements for VT-x and AMD-V * VMM: Solaris and OpenSolaris guest performance improvements for AMD-V (Barcelona family CPUs only) * VMM: fixed guru meditation while running the Dr. Web virus scanner (software virtualization only; bug #1439) * VMM: deactivate VT-x and AMD-V when the host machine goes into suspend mode; reactivate when the host machine resumes (Windows, Mac OS X & Linux hosts; bug #1660) * VMM: fixed guest hangs when restoring VT-x or AMD-V saved states/snapshots * VMM: fixed guru meditation when executing a one byte debug instruction (VT-x only; bug #2617) * VMM: fixed guru meditation for PAE guests on non-PAE hosts (VT-x) * VMM: disallow mixing of software and hardware virtualization execution in general (bug #2404) * VMM: fixed black screen when booting OS/2 1.x (AMD-V only) * GUI: pause running VMs when the host machine goes into suspend mode (Windows & Mac OS X hosts) * GUI: resume previously paused VMs when the host machine resumes after suspend (Windows & Mac OS X hosts) * GUI: save the state of running or paused VMs when the host machine’s battery reaches critical level (Windows hosts) * GUI: properly restore the position of the selector window when running on the compiz window manager * GUI: properly restore the VM in seamless mode (2.0 regression) * GUI: warn user about non optimal memory settings * GUI: structure operating system list according to family and version for improved usability * GUI: predefined settings for QNX guests * IDE: improved ATAPI passthrough support * Networking: added support for up to 8 Ethernet adapters per VM * Networking: fixed issue where a VM could lose connectivity after a reboot * iSCSI: allow snapshot/diff creation using local VDI file * iSCSI: improved interoperability with iSCSI targets * Graphics: fixed handling of a guest video memory which is not a power of two (bug #2724) * VBoxManage: fixed bug which prevented setting up the serial port for direct device access. * VBoxManage: added support for VMDK and VHD image creation * VBoxManage: added support for image conversion (VDI/VMDK/VHD/RAW) * Solaris hosts: added IPv6 support between host and guest when using host interface networking * Mac OS X hosts: added ACPI host power status reporting * API: redesigned storage model with better generalization * API: allow attaching a hard disk to more than one VM at a time * API: added methods to return network configuration information of the host system * Shared Folders: performance and stability fixes for Windows guests (Microsoft Office Applications)
