Win 10 Virtual Box cripples MBP forces restart

[ben824]

I have a late 2011 MBP 13" i5 with a 1TB Hybrid drive and the stock 4GB of Ram (16GB upgrade in the mail currently) and I have tried to run Windows 10 in Virtual Box but every time I try and run it, it cripples my Mac to the point it freezes up solid and I have to do a force restart the computer. I originally upgraded the Windows 7 virtual machine I already had been running. The Windows 7 machine ran ok but it still bogged down my Mac and I couldn't jump back and forth easily from the Windows 7 machine to OS X doing multiple tasks between the two. If I was going to run the Windows 7 machine, I needed to stick with it until I was finished with my tasks and then shut it down before moving back to OS X. Windows 10 doesn't even afford me that luxury. I tried doing a fresh install on a new Virtual Machine of Windows 10 from a Windows 10 .ios file and as soon as I created the machine and booted it to start the installation process, it froze the computer at the very first option screen past the opening Windows logo.

Is the i5 in my machine just not powerful enough to run this anymore or is the RAM what is crippling me here?

 

[Apple 26.2]

I say it's the RAM... even with 8GB, my early 2011 runs slow using Linux VBs. You should be good with 16GB.

 

[Benchobi1]

I agree try the RAM upgrade. I run Virtual Box on my 17" MBP (mid 09 model) and after upgrading the RAM to 8 GB I can run two Win XP virtual machines simultaneously. I can run one Windows 8 machine smoothly. I haven't tried Windows 10 yet. I think you'll find the RAM upgrade helps.

 

[Gjwilly]

The question is, how much memory are you allocating to the Windows machine?
If you're allocating more than 1/2 of what you physically have it's going to slow down your Mac.
Try giving it only 1GB and see how that works for you.

 

[ben824]

The question is, how much memory are you allocating to the Windows machine?
If you're allocating more than 1/2 of what you physically have it's going to slow down your Mac.
Try giving it only 1GB and see how that works for you.

Currently I am giving it 2GB of the total 4GB I have installed on the MBP right now. I have 16GB in the mail, I just wasn't sure if it was the RAM or the 2.4GHz dual core i5 I have on it that it is taxing out.

 

[mikeo007]

RAM would be my first guess.
If it's completely locking up your system though, how many CPU cores are you dedicating to the VM? Your CPU only has 2 cores, so if you're dedicating both to the VM then that's the problem.

 

[Gaprofitt]

RAM would be my first guess.
If it's completely locking up your system though, how many CPU cores are you dedicating to the VM? Your CPU only has 2 cores, so if you're dedicating both to the VM then that's the problem.

That's incorrect and not how virtualization works. Oversubscription is common place, this would only be an issue if his Windows VM was taking up 100% of both cores which is highly unlikely.

 

[ben824]

That's incorrect and not how virtualization works. Oversubscription is common place, this would only be an issue if his Windows VM was taking up 100% of both cores which is highly unlikely.

If I open up the settings, I have 2GB of the total 4GB RAM allocated and in the processor section it says I have 1 of 4 CPUs dedicated to it.

 

[jakespeed]

Definitely sounds like ram based on my experience too. You are giving 2gb of ram to two OS's that both want much more so they use CPU swapping etc. I have seen similar things on my quad if I ran multiple VM's (2 Win10) with more ram/processors than available. In fact it made my force touch not "click" until I shut down.

 

[BorderingOn]

It's not CPU. I have that model with 8GB RAM upgrade and it runs VMs fine. Not sure about your HDD though. You can open activity monitor and see if memory pressure is red or disk access is high.