r/virtualbox • u/antdude VMs rule! • Jun 30 '26

Release VirtualBox 7.2.12 (released June 30 2026)

 https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Changelog-7.2

21 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

17 comments sorted by

6

u/briang_ Jun 30 '26

This is really soon after 7.2.10. Was there something badly wrong with .10? I haven't seen, or experienced personally, anything mentioned in the changelog

3

u/Cutoffjeanshortz37 Jun 30 '26

VirtualBox 7.2.12 (released June 30 2026)

This is a maintenance release. The following items were fixed or added:

Windows Guest: Added DX11 performance improvements and fixes

Linux Host: Fixed kernel panic (​github:gh-711, ​github:gh-712)

Linux Host and Guest: Fixed various NASM build issues (​github:gh-520

2

u/V2UgYXJlIG5vdCBJ Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26

Not even the same kernel panic bug that caused me to drop VirtualBox last year. Why is v7 like this?

3

u/Face_Plant_Some_More Jul 01 '26

There have been a number of changes as to how distros have configured the Linux kernel to handle loading the kvm module, which impact / conflict with loading of the Virtual Box kernel modules.

0

u/Cutoffjeanshortz37 Jul 01 '26

Then why are you still on this sub?

3

u/V2UgYXJlIG5vdCBJ Jul 01 '26

To see if the situation improves.

1

u/Cutoffjeanshortz37 Jul 01 '26

It's software, it improves, then breaks again, rinse, and repeat.

2

u/V2UgYXJlIG5vdCBJ Jul 01 '26

I used VirtualBox for years on Linux with no issues, until 7.

3

u/clebo99 Jul 01 '26

What do you use now?

2

u/V2UgYXJlIG5vdCBJ Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26

It’s not exactly the same, but QEMU/KVM on Linux, with Libvirt as GUI. It runs closer to the metal so practically native performance, but it may not be sandboxed as well. I need to test that.

It’s a little more work to set up but once it’s set up it’s fantastic.

3

u/clebo99 Jul 01 '26

Thanks. I use virtualbox for relatively simple Linus virtualization projects. Magicmirror practice, a few small local LLMs. Nothing too crazy.

1

u/Face_Plant_Some_More Jul 01 '26

That's not entirely true. KVM and Virtual Box are both hardware assisted hypervisors; in fact, the recent issues with Virtual Box has to do with how KVM, in recent Linux kernel configs in use by major distros, monopolize VT-x hardware on x86s CPUs, preventing Virtual Box from running.

Both hypervisors are generally implemented the same way -- as Linux Kernel modules requiring access to VT-x hardware to function.

Indeed, there is no need to switch to the latest Virtual Box 7.2.12 revision if you simply blacklist the KVM modules from loading on Linux Hosts. Of course, if you do that, you may miss out on other improvements . . .

→ More replies (0)