Virtualbox winxpguest fails to boot second time

Question

I wanted to build a winxp sp2 vm on my arch acer revo, but I don't have a cdrom there.
I have VirtualBox installed on another machine which does have a cdrom and have built a machine there. Both machines are running Arch Linux latest with
kernel 3.12.1-1-ARCH #1 SMP PREEMPT Thu Nov 21 08:18:42 CET 2013 x86_64 GNU/Linux
and the following vbox packages installed
virtualbox 4.3.2-1
virtualbox-ext-oracle 4.3.2-1
virtualbox-guest-iso 4.3.2-1
virtualbox-host-modules 4.3.2-4
and the running user is in the vboxusers group.
On the build machine everything runs fine for multiple boots etc etc.
However, when I transfer the vm to the revo I find that winxp will boot just once. It doesn't seem to matter whether  I just rsync across or use virtualbox export/import.
On the build machine I made sure that the VTx/AMD stuff is off (that option is not available on the revo), but clearly there's some residual issue.
I see this in the VBox log for the failing case
00:00:13.818617 Changing the VM state from 'POWERING_ON' to 'RUNNING'.
00:00:13.835064 Guest Log: BIOS: VirtualBox 4.3.2
00:00:13.836814 PIT: mode=2 count=0x10000 (65536) - 18.20 Hz (ch=0)
00:00:13.886290 Guest Log: Keyboard error:31
00:00:13.897960 ERROR [COM]: aRC=VBOX_E_IPRT_ERROR (0x80bb0005) aIID={480b372c-c0b5-4c23-9bd7-dcbb85b1594c} aComponent={Display} aText={Could not take a screenshot (VERR_NOT_SUPPORTED)}, preserve=false
00:00:13.952796 ERROR [COM]: aRC=VBOX_E_IPRT_ERROR (0x80bb0005) aIID={480b372c-c0b5-4c23-9bd7-dcbb85b1594c} aComponent={Display} aText={Could not take a screenshot (VERR_NOT_SUPPORTED)}, preserve=false
00:00:13.987106 2D video acceleration is disabled.
00:00:14.968783 ERROR [COM]: aRC=VBOX_E_IPRT_ERROR (0x80bb0005) aIID={480b372c-c0b5-4c23-9bd7-dcbb85b1594c} aComponent={Display} aText={Could not take a screenshot (VERR_NOT_SUPPORTED)}, preserve=false
00:00:15.968362 ERROR [COM]: aRC=VBOX_E_IPRT_ERROR
Googling doesn't seem to reveal a suitable fix that works.
Edit: I find that after a reboot of the host machine that the winxp guest will boot properly at least once, but after one or two reboots the guest again starts hanging.
Edit: The VM is not the issue, nor its source. I built a new VM with an arch linux iso on the REVO and that too will only boot after a host restart.
Last edited by replabrobin (2013-11-24 13:18:40)

Answer 1

Thanks for your suggestions. Just to clarify what is happening and what I have done so far.
Every time the Satellite C660 notebook is turned on when it has been sitting turned off for more than an hour it will not boot.
Power on goes like this
The Toshiba splash screen comes up
The blinking cursor on the top left appears then disappears
The screen goes blank (noticeably on still, but blank)
No matter how long it is left it stays at this screen
The above has happens so
I press and hold the power button to turn it off
Press to turn the notebook back on - one out of three times it states the system failed to start - offering boot to safe mode or turn on normally
Pressing boot normally the computer will boot successfully
The Satellite C660 will run perfectly with no errors, failures or crashes
Reboot the Satellite C660 it will restart and boot correctly
Turn the notebook off and leave it for an hour and it will not boot.
I have scanned the original HDD and it has no errors or issues
I have performed a full system reinstall using manufacturers HDD recovery.
I have performed a full system reinstall from DVD recovery.
I have performed a full system reinstall from DVD on to a brand new hard drive recovery.
I have tested the brand new HDD no errors
I have replaced the RAM memory
There are no errors shown in system logs
I have set the BIOS to defaults
I have set the boot order to boot from HDD first
I have not been able to update the BIOS as when the Toshiba update or manual download and attempt to update the BIOS fails.
On a restart the computer boots as normal
When booting for the first time of the day or if the computer is off for an hour or more it will not boot into Windows