Ubuntu 12.10 64bit host reboots when trying to install any guest system

I am having a really nasty problem as everytime I try to install any guest OS(using ISO file as CD for installation media), the installation starts normally but as soon as it is about to start either installing to virtual hard drive or loading(e.g. as LiveFS) it causes the host system to reboot abruptly. Config is as below:

Host system: Ubuntu 12.10 64bit - Intel® Core i7-2640M CPU @ 2.80GHz × 4
Virtualbox version: 4.1.18_Ubuntu r78361
Guest OS systems tried: 32bit version of FreeBSD 9, Debian, Tails

VM setup
Tried to have the minimal setup necessary just in case it would avoid for each system to make sure I'd avoid conflicts, but to no avail. I've tried different values and combinations of the below but the problem still persists:

Shared Clipboard: Disabled
Show in fullscreen/seamless: Disabled
Remember runtime changes: DIsabled
Base Memory: 2048 MB
Chipset: PIIX3
IO APIC: Disabled
EFI: Disabled
Absolute Pointing device: Disabled
Processor(s): 1 CPU
PAE/NX: Disabled
VT-x/AMD-V: Disabled
Video Memory: 12 MB
3d/2d accelearation: Disabled
Storage IDE COntroller: PIIX3 (same as chipset instead of PIIX4)
Use host I/O cache: No
Audio: disabled
Network adapter: NAT
USB controller: disabled
No shared folder

Also another sideeffect of the reboot is that it appears that Virtualbox does not log any information in the error log files; not making things any easier.

Please help.

Perhaps this is similar to a previous thread on Virtualbox / Ubuntu 12.10. Mikesmithv provided the following solution,

"Re: Virtualbox won't run in Ubuntu 12.10
I finally found a fix. It was discussed in this link. To summarize, all I did was run these two line:

sudo apt-get install dkms build-essential linux-headers-generic
sudo /etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup

Hope this helps. It was a real head-scratcher!"

Thanks afz12, I actually had the same problem(could not even start or boot any VM due to the vbxdrv problem) prior to my current one, and I followed the specific thread to resolve it as per Mikesmithv instructions.

The thing is, that although now I can succesfully boot using the installation media(e.g. there I can see the system booting and displaying the install or LiveFS options), as soon as the setup is about to either start loading in LiveFS or start copying files to virtual hard drive the reboot occurs.

I've searched online quite a bit without finding anything related except for https://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/7605 although similar it is quite old (>2 years) and refers to different distro(Arch). The suggestion is that this could be a kernel issue but I wouldn't know where to start at in Ubuntu.

Have you tried using other chipset setting? I didn't used VB much for linux but I have seen that at the stage you are mentioning while installing ubuntu family OSs an error message does appear complaining about up-gradation of BIOS chipset.

pkadeel yes, tried quite a few settings combinations including the ICH9 setting for the chipset -although not recommended by VBox unless it's for specific systems/MacOS). The result is always a reboot of the host.

Starting to lose hope here, as I understand it's really difficult to figure out what is happening if there is no VBox error log file. Hmmm, is there any place I could look for a potential error log file, not necessarily a VBox but a system one? I tried having a look at /var/log/kern to see if there is any crash log file there generated by Ubuntu but did not find something.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gts123

Also another sideeffect of the reboot is that it appears that Virtualbox does not log any information in the error log files; not making things any easier.

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That is not entirely true. VB does keep guest OS logs in the folder where the guest OS is created. you can view those directly or through VB by highlighting the guest OS and then from menu Machine > Show Log

Hmmm I am glad I'm not the only one. After a fresh install of 12.10 and installation of VBox I experience the exact same behavior. Trying to install Windows (XP or 7, doesn't matter) will lead to abrupt reboots of the host and I can't for the life of me find what causes it.

Hey mlentink.. welcome to the club! ;D

Do you get any VBox.log info for the particular VM?

With regards to pkadeel's feedback, my VBox.log is always empty upon coming back in/loging in from the reboot; However, what I did was to start the VM again but shut it down just before the point where it would cause the reboot. The result was that the VBox.log was indeed populated (yet of course with no crash info). Then I started the VM again and let it crash/reboot, when I came back in VBox.log was void and VBox.log.1 had the contents of the previous instance of VBox.log(which naturally contain no crash info).

Also did you try to set up a 64 bit or 32 bit OS as a guest?

You are using 4.1.18_Ubuntu r78361 version. Have you tried the 4.2.4 version from virtualbox.org

I am asking this because I have never used 4.1.18 instead I am using v4.2.4 on xubuntu 12.10 64bit host and never had a host reboot problem.

pkadeel this is a good idea I should had tried earlier; unfortunately same thing occurs after removing the old version and using 4.2.4 as per the official download from https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads.