Maintenance Release Offers Many Performance, Stability Improvements October 12, 2009,
Volume 140, Issue 2
My Solaris desktop is now smokin' fast.
-- Bob Netherton, Sun
VirtualBox is a general-purpose full virtualizer for x86 hardware. Targeted at server, desktop and embedded use, it is the only professional-quality virtualization solution that is also open source. There are a number of performance and stability improvements in the newly released VirtualBox 3.0.8. As listed per the Changelog, these include:
VMM
VMM: fixed 64 bits guest on 32 bits host regression in 3.0.6 (VT-x only)
VMM: fixed a recompiler triple fault guru meditation (VT-x & AMD-V only)
VMM: fixed hang after guest state restore (AMD-V, 32 bits Windows guest and IO-APIC enabled only)
VMM: fixed paging issue with OS/2 guests
VMM: fixed guru meditation in rare cases (2.0 regression; software virtualization only)
VMM: fixed release assertion during state restore when using the Sound Blaster 16 emulation
Security
Security: fixed vulnerability that allowed to execute commands with root privileges
Linux
Linux hosts: fixed runtime assertion in semaphore implementation which was triggered under certain conditions
Linux hosts: change the default USB access mode on certain distributions
Linux hosts: on hardened Gentoo, the VBoxSVC daemon crashed by opening the VM network settings
Linux hosts, Solaris hosts: pass the XAUTHORITY variable along the DISPLAY variable when starting a VM from VBoxManage or from the VM selector
Linux hosts: use sysfs to enumerate host drives if hal is not available
Linux Additions: implemented ftrunctate
NAT: IPSEC did not properly work with Linux guests
Solaris
Solaris hosts: fixed a bug which would hang the host sporadically as interrupts were not re-enabled every time
Solaris hosts: fixed a kernel panic with bridged and host-only networking
Solaris hosts: fixed incorrectly persistent CD/DVD-ROMs when changing them
X11
X11-based hosts: support additional function keys on Sun keyboards
Mac OS X
Mac OS X hosts (Snow Leopard): fixed problem starting headless VMs without a graphical session
Mac OS X hosts: fixed problem listing host-only adapter names with trailing garbage (attached VMs won't start)
Windows
Windows Additions: now work with Vista 64-bit Home editions
Windows Additions: fixed screen corruption with ZoomText Magnifier
Windows Additions: fixed NPGetUniversalName failure
Windows Additions: fixed Windows NT regression
Windows Additions: fixed VBoxService not running if no Shared Folders are installed
VRDP
VRDP: start VM even if configured VRDP port is in use
Networking
Networking: the PCnet network device stopped receiving under rare conditions
SCSI: add support for virtual disks larger than 2TB
USB
USB: fixed potential crash when unplugging USB2 devices
General Features
Some of the features of VirtualBox are:
Modularity. VirtualBox has an extremely modular design with well-defined internal programming interfaces and a client/server design. This makes it easy to control it from several interfaces at once: for example, you can start a virtual machine in a typical virtual machine GUI and then control that machine from the command line, or possibly remotely. VirtualBox also comes with a full Software Development Kit: even though it is Open Source Software, you don't have to hack the source to write a new interface for VirtualBox.
Virtual machine descriptions in XML. The configuration settings of virtual machines are stored entirely in XML and are independent of the local machines. Virtual machine definitions can therefore easily be ported to other computers.
Guest Additions for Windows, Linux and Solaris. VirtualBox has special software that can be installed inside Windows, Linux and Solaris virtual machines to improve performance and make integration much more seamless. Among the features provided by these Guest Additions are mouse pointer integration and arbitrary screen solutions (e.g. by resizing the guest window). There are also guest additions for OS/2 with somewhat reduced functionality.
Shared folders. Like many other virtualization solutions, for easy data exchange between hosts and guests, VirtualBox allows for declaring certain host directories as "shared folders", which can then be accessed from within virtual machines.
Download
The download is available for the following hosts: Windows, OS X, Linux, Solaris, and OpenSolaris.
Bob Netherton has implemented this version of VirtualBox and shares, "It's early yet but my testing of multi-cpu Solaris guests is quite encouraging. I've been stressing several of them quite hard and they are working as expected. I am still using IDE for my virtual platform disk controllers. I'll fire up a few tomorrow and see how SATA does. My Solaris desktop is now smokin' fast."
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My Solaris desktop is now smokin' fast. 
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VirtualBox 3.0.8 Released
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