I have a penchant for VirtualBox because it gives me a playground for experimentation.
I can intentionally install viruses in the virtual machine (called the guest OS) with little fear of my real computer (the Host OS) getting infected. I can install entire virtual networks with little trepidation of breaking my real network. And I can test out different operating system before changing my Host OS to that OS.
Corridor: Amount of Fear is a psychological horror for one person. Prepare for the wildest adventure ever. The great fear and paranoia of Apple's Macintosh Computers and all related software, hardware, logos, etc. Used to describe those who fear and can't stand Macintosh and cannot in most cases be in the same room as said operating system. Being near a Mac may cause shivering. Though Mac-o-Phobia is rare due the large amount of Windows.
It’s great.
But the other day something odd happened after I spun up my VM…
The guest OS launched fine, well for the first 10 seconds, but then it unceremoniously burped up an error about Guru Meditation?
If you’ve ever seen this error, it’s pretty disconcerting and hard to dismiss. You only have two options:
You can click OK or hit Ignore but both usually return the same result: the application quits. When you launch it again, it barfs up the same rude error you tried to avoid.
Some crazy spiritual stuff about a meditating guru.
What’s all this about?
Getting spiritual with Guru Meditation
The first time I ever saw this error, I envisioned a Tibetan monk, perched on his aerie ledge in the Himalayas. His legs are crossed Indian style and his wrists are propped face-up on his knees. I don’t know why but that’s the first thing that comes to my mind.
I did some research on this and it turns out the phrase “Guru Meditation” finds its origins from one of the first personal computers called the Amiga. Sold by Commodore in the mid 80’s, these relics of time would sometimes spit up Guru Meditation errors on software failure.
Guru Meditation refers to an error so arcane that you were basically forced to look for a Guru to fix the problem.
Today, you going to help you become a little more Guru when I show you how to fix this positively baffling error. I promise you my solution doesn’t involve meditation, burning incense or any obscure incantations. With the alchemy of a little common sense and some patience we can fix this problem in no time.
Instead of being solemn about this recondite message, let’s get a little goofy and have fun finding the answer.
Getting Goofy with Guru Meditation
Nine times out of Ten when you see a “Guru Meditation” error in Virtualbox it’s related to your system memory. But we don’t have to guess. VirualBox logs all errors to a little file aptly named Vbox.log.
Let’s check it out.
I’m logged into my computer with user account vhudson and my Virtual Machine is simply named “Windows 8.1” so my log file is located here:
Just replace “vhudson” with your computer username and “Windows 8.1” with the name of that refractory VM that keeps going bonkers.
Let’s take a look in here to see what’s going on.
Open VBox.log in Notepad and press Ctrl + End key on your keyboard to zip down to the last line. You should see the Guru Meditation stuff in proximity to the last line. If not, just press Ctrl + f and enter the phrase “Meditation”
There’s a lot of abstruse test in the log but if you look closely you can probably figure out what happened.
I highlighted the last two lines.
It says:
and then this:
The errorID in the first line is telling us the memory on the Host OS is low.
Hmm… so why is that?
Press Ctrl + Shift + Esc to open the Windows Task Manager.
Whoa!
You’ll probably see something similar to the above screenshot. The memory value is almost at the ceiling. I’ve got a total of 8GB of RAM on my Host OS and I’m at 7.6GB (which is only 96% full!)
Alright, so now we need to find out what’s specifically causing the problem.
If you click over to the Process tab and sort by Memory you may find the culprit. A bunch of chrome.exe processes are usually near the top of the list busy slurping up memory, but in my case none had the avarice to debilitate my computer.
I can’t blame Chrome today because after closing VirtualBox I noticed an immediate drop in memory usage. The graph took a veritable nose dive.
Ah, so VirtualBox is killing VirtualBox?
I exonerated Chrome by my new discovery and decided to take a closer look at the VirtualBox settings.
In VirtualBox, select your intractable VM from the left pane and then press Ctrl + s to open the Settings pane.
Click System in the left navigation and check out the Base Memory slider on the right side.
My poor VirtualBox was attempting to allocate half of my physical memory to the VM.
Ultimately, I was apportioning too many resources to VirtualBox. After changing the value from 4096 MB (4GB) to 2048 (2GB), my Guru Meditations went poof!
The Bottom Line
If you notice VirtualBox is experiencing an accretion of errors lately, check out Vbox.log. A quick look inside will often point you in the right direction. Even if the error isn’t immediately obvious, you could always copy the error and paste it into Google to see what other people did to fix it.
In the case of Guru Meditation, you’ll usually find that you can fix the problem by managing your memory allocations to the guest OS. Try decreasing the base memory value by half and see what happens.
I hope this helped you! If so, please share the goodness in the comments below. Oh, and if it didn’t help let me know too. I like bad news just as much as good news. I really want to make sure VirtualBox works for you.
Posted in Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1 Tagged with: Tricks, Virtualbox
I was going to take some time in this installment of my diary to vent about the overwhelming amount of negative feedback I’ve received about Mac OS X. How people have complained till they were blue in the face about the lack of a non-aliased disk or Trash on the desktop — and the entire existence of the Dock is apparently the root of all evil in OS X.
I could go on and on about how the Mac community is once again foaming at the mouth about the latest thing to come to our desktops — yet it really is no different than the complaints about previous Mac OS and Mac hardware releases. On the surface, one could easily think we are an ungrateful bunch.
But maybe it’s just that we’re a critical bunch — and the jury’s still out on Mac OS X. A lot of people haven’t even started using it yet, whether out of fear or out of a reasonable desire to wait until it’s ready to go. But I’m here to tell you that I’ve been using it for months now — and I’m liking it more and more as time goes by.
We live in a world where Apple is recognized as an innovator and is copied at every opportunity. All the PC manufacturers are slowly (but surely) following in Apple’s footsteps. Compaq has color faceplates for their new machines, and the new HP Pavilion looks more like a Power Mac G3 than the Power Mac G4 does. Windows, of course, looks remarkably like the classic Mac OS.
But nothing looks like Mac OS X. And so, for a little while, Apple will have a clear advantage again. People will love Mac OS X.
Over the past few months, I’ve showed off Apple’s new operating system to anyone who will look, and the reaction I get from everyone is great. From the colorful icons to the Dock to all the small interface niceties Apple has added, no one has had a negative thing to say about OS X. And this from an audience of both Mac and Windows users.
But when I demo Mac OS X, I don’t stop there. I also talk about all the remarkable new features I’ve discovered. There’s the power of Unix — but it’s hidden behind a beautiful Apple-designed interface. We don’t have to dicker with the command line to rebuild our printer drivers or configure our network. In fact, we don’t have to know Unix at all! Beautiful.
Then there’s performance. Beta versions tend to run slower than the final equivalents, and if that’s true with the Mac OS X beta, then we’re in for a very fast OS. My startup time for OS X is down to around 40 seconds (50 if you count me logging in). Try that on a Windows machine — or a Mac running OS 9, for that matter.
In terms of system requirements, Mac OS X also shines. It seems much less of a hog in terms of disk space and RAM than Mac OS 9. (I know, Apple suggests you have 128MB of RAM to run OS X, but I’ve run it fine on an old iMac 233 with 64MB of RAM.)
Mac OS X is easy to figure out, even for old Mac users. In fact, after I used it for a day, I stopped noticing the differences and started noticing the improvements. Especially when I would go home and use OS 9 on my G4. Has anyone noticed how often OS 9 crashes? But not my Mac running OS X.
![Corridor: Amount Of Fear Mac OS Corridor: Amount Of Fear Mac OS](https://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/38872489/74572ce9838f4406b9ccaf6cda79ade2c0e1466e.png)
I also have a feeling that the learning curve for OS X is a short one. If you use the OS, you’ll find within minutes that you’re right at home. Only a few times have I moused for the Process menu, and I’ve yet to have a need for the Apple menu.
How did we make it 16 years without the Dock? I’ve got my most-used applications neatly parked there, so there’s no need to go find them, and no need for aliases to mess up my desktop. My most-used documents are right there, too. I can have the Dock tiny at the bottom of my screen, or hidden until I move my mouse toward it. By far, it’s faster than using the application menu in OS 9.
And my hard drives and Trash are back on my desktop, thanks to Adrian Diaconu’s ShowDrives. I don’t use the disk icons much, but getting the Trash back was a nice touch.
Corridor: Amount Of Fear Mac Os X
The flashy icons and colors will get old, right? Wrong. After a while, you don’t even notice them. In fact, what I have noticed is that the interface seems cleaner and more inviting with all the crisp lines, curves, and sharp colors. Aqua says, “Use me! I’m friendly, easy, and fun!” the same way the original Mac OS said it.
Windows may have co-opted the original Mac’s easy and fun attitude, but Apple has set a new standard, raised the bar. Computers should be easy, fun, simple, and powerful. Skool brawl: slaps and dabs mac os. Mac OS X will capture the newbies, such as Nan, my 73-year-old grandmother. But it’ll also give the rest of us enough power to leave our Windows-using peers something to lust after.
Corridor: Amount Of Fear Mac Os 11
PC vendors may be able to create machines that look a lot like a Mac to the untrained eye, or if you squint a little bit. And the classic Mac OS looks too much like Windows. But, for at least a little while, the look of Aqua and the power of OS X are ours.