From: ssarthur2 on
Just thought I would post a followup here for anyone who has experienced the
same issue.

Running a low-priority task did not fix the problem as I originally thought.
Rather, this is an issue that seems to vary with time, sometimes worse,
sometimes better. After watching things for a while, I decided that the
low-priority task was not making a difference in my performance.

I finally ended up abandoning Windows Virtual PC and returning to Virtual PC
2007. It saddens me to lose some of the nice features in the newer software,
but I had no choice because the loss of productivity was becoming
significant. Rolling back immediately sped up all my virtual machines.

I will say that going back was fairly painless. I just had to reinstall the
Virtual Machine Additions.

"Robert Comer" wrote:

> >I do hope this is an issue that's being worked by the Virtual PC team.
> >While this does work, it's a pretty cheesy work-around.
>
> Agreed.
>
> --
> Bob Comer
>
>
>
> On Mon, 30 Nov 2009 13:36:08 -0800, ssarthur2
> <ssarthur2(a)discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:
>
> >Thanks Bob. I appreciate the help. I am running the BOINC Manager in one
> >Virtual PC and it seems to do the trick. More than that, if I have multiple
> >Virtual PCs running, it actually seems to eliminate the problem in all open
> >PCs at the same time.
> >
> >I do hope this is an issue that's being worked by the Virtual PC team.
> >While this does work, it's a pretty cheesy work-around.
> >
> >
> >
> >"Robert Comer" wrote:
> >
> >> I've never seen this on a quad core machine, but it's a power
> >> management issue. You can try setting the power management to highest
> >> performance but it might not help.
> >>
> >> The only thing I've seen that can effect it is to run a low priority
> >> task in the background that forces the CPU to stay in the full
> >> performance state. I use Seti(a)Homes Boinc project on my laptop when
> >> I'm running a VM...
> >>
> >> No other workaround at present. Apparently the one's who programmed
> >> the BIOS on some machines turn off bits in a power management state
> >> that WVPC rely on.
> >>
> >> --
> >> Bob Comer
> >>
> >>
> >> On Tue, 24 Nov 2009 10:40:01 -0800, ssarthur2
> >> <ssarthur2(a)discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> >I have recently upgraded my computer from Vista to Windows 7 and from Virtual
> >> >PC 2007 to Windows Virtual PC. I have migrated all my Virtual PCs by
> >> >"Upgrading Integration Components".
> >> >
> >> >But I am experiencing problems which I did not had before. The VPCs
> >> >frequently (once or twice a minute) stop responding for 3 - 5 seconds. This
> >> >is exhibited by the screen stops refreshing and it does not respond to mouse
> >> >or keyboard. When it starts responding again, it typically catches up to
> >> >whatever was being done while it was down.
> >> >
> >> >The hardware is more than capable (Intel quad core with 8GB RAM), so I don't
> >> >believe its a hardware issue. I have tried running both with Integration
> >> >Feature disabled and enabled, but it doesn't seem to make a difference.
> >> >
> >> >Has anyone else experienced this? Is there a workaround? This is bad
> >> >enough to drive me back to VPC 2007 which I really don't want to do.
> >> .
> >>
> .
>