Windows 10 VM stuck loading after entering credentials

[Jebberino84]

I'm still not entirely sure what happened, but I had an issue a few days ago and I lost some settings for my server. I was able to get the network back up and running, and then re-install Community Applications and all my dockers (Plex/Jellyfin/etc.) but now I've noticed some weird issues with one of my VMs.

I run a Windows 10 VM on this server with Blue Iris on the Windows 10 VM. This entire server and this VM have been running fine for over a year, but it just started having issues a few days ago. 

When I try to run this VM it boots up, and I get past entering credentials, but while windows actually loads there is a "welcome" loading screen with the spinning dots. I've let the VM sit for over 6 hours and it never gets past this screen. I've attempted everything I can think of. Most forums here seem to indicate issues loading windows all-together and speak of the screen before you enter credentials. I am able to enter in my credentials, but after that it hangs up. At one point I did restart in safe mode (with internet), but that didn't do anything. Still got held up on the same screen. I've also tried not passing through the GPU, but that didn't help either. I've also tried updating the virtio drivers on unraid and on the VM settings. Nothing gets me past the windows "welcome" screen. 

I'm at a point now where if I don't figure this out, I believe I will have to scrap this VM and redo it from the beginning. Unfortunately, I did not create any snapshots so if I do this, it will have to be a completely new and fresh install. I'll also be looking into how to automate snapshots if I have to redo the whole VM. I'd like to not go that route though and I'm hoping someone will have some direction for me. This is my last resort to save the VM.

I will include some logs to hopefully help. 

Unraid Diagnostics attached below.

 

Logs from VM while it's stuck on loading screen:

2024-04-18 19:13:54.304+0000: starting up libvirt version: 8.7.0, qemu version: 7.2.0, kernel: 6.1.79-Unraid, hostname: JebsNAS
LC_ALL=C \
PATH=/bin:/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin \
HOME=/var/lib/libvirt/qemu/domain-1-Win10BlueIris \
XDG_DATA_HOME=/var/lib/libvirt/qemu/domain-1-Win10BlueIris/.local/share \
XDG_CACHE_HOME=/var/lib/libvirt/qemu/domain-1-Win10BlueIris/.cache \
XDG_CONFIG_HOME=/var/lib/libvirt/qemu/domain-1-Win10BlueIris/.config \
/usr/local/sbin/qemu \
-name guest=Win10BlueIris,debug-threads=on \
-S \
-object '{"qom-type":"secret","id":"masterKey0","format":"raw","file":"/var/lib/libvirt/qemu/domain-1-Win10BlueIris/master-key.aes"}' \
-blockdev '{"driver":"file","filename":"/usr/share/qemu/ovmf-x64/OVMF_CODE-pure-efi.fd","node-name":"libvirt-pflash0-storage","auto-read-only":true,"discard":"unmap"}' \
-blockdev '{"node-name":"libvirt-pflash0-format","read-only":true,"driver":"raw","file":"libvirt-pflash0-storage"}' \
-blockdev '{"driver":"file","filename":"/etc/libvirt/qemu/nvram/018291b0-e041-9899-5b33-6243ef3ec348_VARS-pure-efi.fd","node-name":"libvirt-pflash1-storage","auto-read-only":true,"discard":"unmap"}' \
-blockdev '{"node-name":"libvirt-pflash1-format","read-only":false,"driver":"raw","file":"libvirt-pflash1-storage"}' \
-machine pc-i440fx-7.1,usb=off,dump-guest-core=off,mem-merge=off,memory-backend=pc.ram,pflash0=libvirt-pflash0-format,pflash1=libvirt-pflash1-format \
-accel kvm \
-cpu host,migratable=on,hv-time=on,hv-relaxed=on,hv-vapic=on,hv-spinlocks=0x1fff,hv-vendor-id=none,host-cache-info=on,l3-cache=off \
-m 8192 \
-object '{"qom-type":"memory-backend-ram","id":"pc.ram","size":8589934592}' \
-overcommit mem-lock=off \
-smp 10,sockets=1,dies=1,cores=5,threads=2 \
-uuid 018291b0-e041-9899-5b33-6243ef3ec348 \
-display none \
-no-user-config \
-nodefaults \
-chardev socket,id=charmonitor,fd=36,server=on,wait=off \
-mon chardev=charmonitor,id=monitor,mode=control \
-rtc base=localtime \
-no-hpet \
-no-shutdown \
-boot strict=on \
-device '{"driver":"ich9-usb-ehci1","id":"usb","bus":"pci.0","addr":"0x7.0x7"}' \
-device '{"driver":"ich9-usb-uhci1","masterbus":"usb.0","firstport":0,"bus":"pci.0","multifunction":true,"addr":"0x7"}' \
-device '{"driver":"ich9-usb-uhci2","masterbus":"usb.0","firstport":2,"bus":"pci.0","addr":"0x7.0x1"}' \
-device '{"driver":"ich9-usb-uhci3","masterbus":"usb.0","firstport":4,"bus":"pci.0","addr":"0x7.0x2"}' \
-device '{"driver":"virtio-serial-pci","id":"virtio-serial0","bus":"pci.0","addr":"0x3"}' \
-blockdev '{"driver":"host_device","filename":"/dev/disk/by-id/ata-WDC_WD84PURZ-85B2YY0_WD-CA37ANJK","node-name":"libvirt-3-storage","cache":{"direct":false,"no-flush":false},"auto-read-only":true,"discard":"unmap"}' \
-blockdev '{"node-name":"libvirt-3-format","read-only":false,"cache":{"direct":false,"no-flush":false},"driver":"raw","file":"libvirt-3-storage"}' \
-device '{"driver":"virtio-blk-pci","bus":"pci.0","addr":"0x4","drive":"libvirt-3-format","id":"virtio-disk2","bootindex":1,"write-cache":"on","serial":"vdisk1"}' \
-blockdev '{"driver":"file","filename":"/mnt/user/isos/Windows/Windows.iso","node-name":"libvirt-2-storage","auto-read-only":true,"discard":"unmap"}' \
-blockdev '{"node-name":"libvirt-2-format","read-only":true,"driver":"raw","file":"libvirt-2-storage"}' \
-device '{"driver":"ide-cd","bus":"ide.0","unit":0,"drive":"libvirt-2-format","id":"ide0-0-0","bootindex":2}' \
-blockdev '{"driver":"file","filename":"/mnt/user/isos/virtio-win-0.1.248-1.iso","node-name":"libvirt-1-storage","auto-read-only":true,"discard":"unmap"}' \
-blockdev '{"node-name":"libvirt-1-format","read-only":true,"driver":"raw","file":"libvirt-1-storage"}' \
-device '{"driver":"ide-cd","bus":"ide.0","unit":1,"drive":"libvirt-1-format","id":"ide0-0-1"}' \
-netdev tap,fd=37,id=hostnet0 \
-device '{"driver":"virtio-net","netdev":"hostnet0","id":"net0","mac":"52:54:00:0a:95:60","bus":"pci.0","addr":"0x2"}' \
-chardev pty,id=charserial0 \
-device '{"driver":"isa-serial","chardev":"charserial0","id":"serial0","index":0}' \
-chardev socket,id=charchannel0,fd=35,server=on,wait=off \
-device '{"driver":"virtserialport","bus":"virtio-serial0.0","nr":1,"chardev":"charchannel0","id":"channel0","name":"org.qemu.guest_agent.0"}' \
-device '{"driver":"usb-tablet","id":"input0","bus":"usb.0","port":"1"}' \
-audiodev '{"id":"audio1","driver":"none"}' \
-device '{"driver":"vfio-pci","host":"0000:01:00.0","id":"hostdev0","bus":"pci.0","addr":"0x5"}' \
-device '{"driver":"vfio-pci","host":"0000:01:00.1","id":"hostdev1","bus":"pci.0","addr":"0x6"}' \
-sandbox on,obsolete=deny,elevateprivileges=deny,spawn=deny,resourcecontrol=deny \
-msg timestamp=on
char device redirected to /dev/pts/0 (label charserial0)
 

If any additional information is needed to help diagnose the issue, just let me know and I'll get on it ASAP. 

Thanks for taking a look!

 

Unconfirmed 448532.crdownload

[Jebberino84]

Somewhat of an update,

When I setup this VM, I passed through an entire hard drive which I dedicated to this VM. I was able to go into the BIOS of the Unraid server (ASUS Prime Z390-a Motherboard) and I changed the boot order so it would boot directly into windows. After doing this I was having the exact same error with the loading "welcome" screen after I enter in my credentials. To me, this seems to point towards an issue with windows and not Unraid or the VM setup. Knowing this, and after not getting any help here, I have decided to attempt finding other forums dedicated to windows 10 to see if anyone can help. I'm hoping there is a way to fix this without completely reformatting the drive and replacing the VM. I'll try to remember to post back here if I find a solution.

[JonathanM]

Windows safe mode might reveal some information.

[Jebberino84]

19 hours ago, Jebberino84 said:

At one point I did restart in safe mode (with internet), but that didn't do anything. Still got held up on the same screen.

Thank you for your comment on this thread, JonathanM. I'm not trying to be rude, (you have 16.1k comments so I believe you offer a lot of help on this forum and for that, I appreciate you) but I did mention in my first post that I already tried safe mode and unfortunately it made no difference.

 

Something I did remembered now which I did not post about earlier is that I have other Windows 10 VMs on this device that started up just fine. This is the only VM that wouldn't restart after something went wrong with the whole server a few days ago. 

My last attempt was to do a windows 10 restore, (of which I only had 1 restore point available from 2 days ago which I don't remember making, so maybe this has something to do with why the whole server had issues but ???) and that didn't work either. So now, I am just going to delete the VM, reformat the hard drive, and start over. I give up. 

I will 100% be automating some sort of scheduled events to create more windows restore points, as well as snapshots of all my VMs, and Unraid flash drive backups, along with anything else I can think of to make sure this doesn't happen again. I probably should have done this earlier.

Thanks again for anyone taking a look at this post. If anyone has any good theories on why or what happened, please feel free to comment as I may put off fixing this VM for a little bit. 

[JonathanM]

8 minutes ago, Jebberino84 said:

I did mention in my first post that I already tried safe mode

There are many different options in Windows safe mode. You didn't mention how many you tried, it implied just the single option (with internet)

[Jebberino84]

I apologize. I guess I'm just really frustrated. I've tried everything I can think of and I don't understand what's happening.

I'm nuking the disk and rebuilding the VM from scratch. Thanks for reading and posting and trying, JohnathanM!

[shpitz461]

Do you experience the same issue logging in with another user? Trying to rule out corrupt user hive.

[Jebberino84]

I logged onto other vms with the same user, but I guess it could have been something with this user on that VM? It's already deleted now, so no way to test it out further than logging onto other VMs.

[SpaceInvaderOne]

I wonder if a windows update was responsible for this. The reason I think so is because of the restore point that you dont remember making.
Significant Windows updates, like feature updates or semi-annual releases, Windows typically creates a restore point automatically. So i would guess this update caused an issue.