Memory Leakage - Windows 7 x64 Host ; 2 x Vista SP1 x64 Guest

[Lee Pattison]

Hi,

I'm having memory leaks on a Windows 7 x64 (build 7000) fully patched running VirtualBox 2.1.4 with 2 x Vista SP1 x64 guests.

Before starting the guest my memory usage is stable at 1GB out of a total of 4GB. After starting the client which is configured as 512MB I see my Physical Memory Usage jump by about 600MB to 1.6GB which seems normal. However over time this number keeps getting higher.

In the attached log I was running a single guest for approx 15 mins and the Physical Memory Usage went all the way upto 2.25GB. Upon shutting down the guest the memory dropped to 1.05GB. When I run 2 x guests it ends up using all my memory. Please let me know if there is any further info I can provide.

Cheers TheFUG

[Lee Pattison]

Host log file

[Sander van Leeuwen]

First you should make sure it *is* a memory leak. The host file cache will eat memory like crazy when running guests. It's very easy to misinterpret the numbers.

[Lee Pattison]

How do I check this? Where is the cache file? I'm hunting around now for it. Also I notice that if I don't log into the client the memory stays pretty stable.

[Jens]

There is no "cache file". There is a file cache, in RAM. Unless you have apps dying due to out-of-memory there is no sign of a memory leak. Note that unused RAM is *wasted* RAM. A file cache by designs should use all RAM it can (it will automatically return such memory to the system when needed for other tasks).

[Sander van Leeuwen]

Use ​http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb897561.aspx

This will show a significant increase of memory used by the system file cache. Please reopen the defect if required. I'm assuming for now you misinterpreted the numbers.

[Lee Pattison]

Thanks for the replies guys.

I dont see any issues like this on my Home Server where I am also running VB 2.1.4 and I have 3 x Server 2008 x64 hosts. I'm still looking and comparing hosts.