VirtualBox 1.6.2 -- #%$+@$!

[RonBlizz]

Short version. VirtualBox 1.5.6 (not the OSE version) worked beautifully on my openSuSE 10.3 installation. VirtualBox 1.6.0 worked but had issues with its Guest Additions. VirtualBox 1.6.2 won't see my "Windows 2000" CD-ROM. Windows 2000 says it can't find the vbox-cdrom driver. This basically makes VirtualBox useless as it stands.

I can't just delete and rebuild because I have a training course from Nortel on the virtual machine and its activation depends on the "machine's" BIOS. I lost a hard drive and have already used up my surplus activation. (It was also set up in VirtualBox.)

So my questions... Is there a way to revert to VirtualBox 1.5.6? I tried installing 1.5.6 but got a fatal error (expecting "1.2 but found 1.3" kernel or something). If I uninstall VirtualBox completely will it damage my virtual Windows machine? Is there a way to get the vbox-cdrom driver installed? If I could just get that working I could still mount and run the Guest Addition CD image I've got -- I wouldn't care if it was 1.6.0 or not.

Man, I was worried when Sun bought VirtualBox. Looks like I had a good reason to be.

[RonBlizz]

>>Man, I was worried when Sun bought VirtualBox. Looks like I had a good reason to be.<<

Well, this gets odder. I found that if I mount the Win2K CD image in VirtualBox before I start it, it'll read off the CD. So the virtual machine, itself, will read a CD. It's after the drivers are loaded in Win2K that it quits working. It has to have something to do with the uninstalling of Guest Additions -- it must not have cleaned it out right in the Registration, or something.

Dang, this is why I got away from Windows.

[Spectrum2000]

On Sun, 15 Jun 2008 08:46:03 +0000, RonBlizz wrote:

>>>Man, I was worried when Sun bought VirtualBox. Looks like I had a good
> reason to be.<<
>
> Well, this gets odder. I found that if I mount the Win2K CD image in
> VirtualBox before I start it, it'll read off the CD. So the virtual
> machine, itself, will read a CD. It's after the drivers are loaded in
> Win2K that it quits working. It has to have something to do with the
> uninstalling of Guest Additions -- it must not have cleaned it out right
> in the Registration, or something.
>
> Dang, this is why I got away from Windows.

I know the feeling!

Start the VM.
Control Panel > Add or Remove programs
Remove "Sun xVM VirtualBox Guest additions 1.X.X"
Restart the VM
From the Devices Menu of VBox "Install Guest Additions"
Restart the VM

Try again and see if it works now. When inserting a CD make sure the VM
has focus or the host will grab the mount point.

Regards
Gordon

[watagan]

Apart from removing the guest additions 1.6.x uses a different home/you/.VirtualBox/VirtualBox.xml that is not backwards compatible. Downgrading to 1.5.6 requires a 1.5.x VirtualBox.xml.

Do you have a backup? Experience with VBox suggests a backup of everything in .VirtualBox/ is a good idea before upgrading.

[snakedriver]

If I uninstall VirtualBox completely will it damage my virtual Windows machine? Is there a way to get the vbox-cdrom driver installed? If I could just get that working I could still mount and run the Guest Addition CD image I've got -- I wouldn't care if it was 1.6.0 or not.

On the old install, in /home/yourname is a hidden file ".virtualbox". That's where the virtual machine resides, back it up.

I would try coping that to a new rc1 install and then install "VirtualBox-1.6.2-Linux_amd64.run" which is the non-OSE version from VirtualBox D/L site (which has usb functional). I had no problems with the install.

Once it's up & at 1st set up, when you do the disk part, point it at the virtual disk in the hidden file (not a new one); click "Machine" & select CDrom to mount and set usb to on; etc.

While I haven't done the specific process above, I have previously uninstalled a Vbox rpm and installed a newer version and my VM was still there.

While I am not up on this part, it used to be that you could just install a newer version over an older version and it would handle all the update -- I've done that with almost every upgrade "pre-Sun" -- might check out their forum.

Hope this helps

[hank_se]

Yes upgrading over an old .VirtualBox/ is really easy, but
downgrading might be trickier. First thing, do take that
backup of your /home/user/.VirtualBox/ directory, all of it,
only the *.vdi file is of significant size, all other files
will only be a bonus to have. Let's look at the first lines
in my VirtualBox.xml file:

<!--
 Automatically converted from version '1.3.pre-linux' 
-->
<!-- Automatically converted from version '1.2-linux' -->
<!-- innotek VirtualBox Global Configuration -->
−
<VirtualBox version="1.3-linux">

You can see that I have upgraded over this file twice, now
the first dataline reads:

<VirtualBox version="1.3-linux">

It might be that you only have to change 1.3-linux to
1.2-linux, but take that backup first!

[RonBlizz]

On Sun, 15 Jun 2008 08:46:03 +0000,
I know the feeling!

Start the VM.
Control Panel > Add or Remove programs
Remove "Sun xVM VirtualBox Guest additions 1.X.X"
Restart the VM
From the Devices Menu of VBox "Install Guest Additions"
Restart the VM

Try again and see if it works now. When inserting a CD make sure the VM
has focus or the host will grab the mount point.

Thanks. Unfortunately I've already uninstalled the Guest Additions -- that's when the problems started. Pre-Sun VirtualBox installations required you hand compile the program, but Guest Additions always worked fine.

If I can get this thing working long enough to get my course done, I may try rebuilding the whole Virtual Machine with VirtualBox 1.5.6. -- I've still got the original download, hopefully Sun/VirtualBox will still let me download the 1.5.6 Guest Additons -- though I probably can get them from my other computer, which still runs 1.5.6 on CentOS 5.1.

Thanks again,
Ron

[RonBlizz]

Apart from removing the guest additions 1.6.x uses a different home/you/.VirtualBox/VirtualBox.xml that is not backwards compatible. Downgrading to 1.5.6 requires a 1.5.x VirtualBox.xml.

Do you have a backup? Experience with VBox suggests a backup of everything in .VirtualBox/ is a good idea before upgrading.

Nope. No back up and no Snapshots. Two strikes. What's a VirtualBox.xml? I've got the original SuSE 10.3 VirtualBox 1.5.6 download (not the OSE version). Shouldn't the .xml file be in the download somewhere?

I like your picture. What's really odd, is I just saw that same picture on a site yesterday (about Lenni Lanape Indians) and liked it so much that I downloaded it to show to my wife. Weird.

Thanks again,
Ron

[hank_se]

VirtualBox.xml is a configuration file for VirtualBox, it's
located in the hidden directory /home/user/.VirtualBox/.
About the guest additions, you also have them in the 10.3
repo as an rpm, as far as I know they should still be 1.5.6.

[watagan]

Sorry my directory for the xml file was wrong. This is what should happen (from the Vbox forum):

When you upgraded, for each VM you'll have a backed up xml file. E.g.

<path>/Machines/xp_sp2/xp_sp2.xml.1.2-linux.bak

copy it to

<path>/Machines/xp_sp2/xp_sp2.xml

in ~/.VirtualBox

You'll have something along the lines of

VirtualBox.xml.20080429

Just copy it to VirtualBox.xml and you should be all set.

virtualbox.org :: View topic - Downgrade problem