so im running win10 guest on TW host. In order to prevent windows automatically downloading updates and using my bandwidth for its own malevolent purposes, id like to know if its possible to connect the guest to a wifi connection instead of LAN. [wifi connection can be designated as metered in windows and prevent such shenanigans]. Any useful hints appreciated.
For ordinary use (not special activities like pen testing which requires real mode access to the physical NIC),
There is nothing special to do.
<Do not> do anything in the Guest, it should remain the same, configured with a “wired” connection.
In the Guest Properties, you should configure your Networking Properties to connect to a Virtual Network associated with your HostOS Wireless NIC.
As usual, the type of connection can be NAT or bridging.
The same applies for <any> switching from one type of physical network to another… The change is made entirely in the Guest Networking Properties and nothing should be touched in the Guest unless it’s something like using DHCP or not.
TSU
This would require you to install a Virtual WIFI adapter in your guest, and as far as I know, this does not exist.
But, take a look at the link I found. This might still work.
https://www.windowscentral.com/how-set-ethernet-connection-metered-windows-10
> The change is made entirely in the Guest Networking Properties and nothing should be touched in the Guest unless it’s something like
> using DHCP or not
you said to change and not change the guest - is that a zen koan, should one read host, or do i not understand and need to do some digging?
Clarifying,
The change is made entirely in the virtual machine networking properties and nothing should be touched in the Guest unless it’s something like configuring as a DHCP client or not.
So, <in> the Guest is defined as logging into the virtual machine.
The Guest virtual machine properties (including networking) is configured <outside> the Guest, and is typically configured using vm manager (there are other ways to do this which is less common… like directly editing the virtual machine configuration file or launching the virtual machine from the command line and specifying as a command parameter).
HTH,
TSU
I set it up by opening Virtual Machine Manager and going to Edit–>Connection Details. Click the Virtual Networks then the + button. Give the VN a name then click forward. This brings you to the IPV4 Address Space dialog. Basically you can configure this virtual network and it will NAT to your physical wlanx device. I just used the defaults without DHCP and assigned this statically in the guest nic. After this click Forward and you get some IPV6 options if your into that. Click Forward and select where to forward this network to.
Once that is configured go back to the Virtual machine’s hardware details and add new hardware. Select the virtual network you just created and click finish. If your running Windows a new network adapter will pop up in the guest where you can assign an address from the virtual network space that was created.
Hope this helps.
Referencing the @OP,
If he was asking about a metered connection, there isn’t anything I know of that would automatically configure but you can install and/or configure various things to monitor existing traffic and notify when some threshold is reached.
@jseaton,
What you suggest should not be necessary but can be configured if existing virtual network selections aren’t sufficient.
To view and select what is already available, simply click on the dropdown in the Guest Machine’s properties > Network settings, you should see the following screenshot. If you only configured a single network device during installation, then only “Adapter 1” will be effective. If you installed a multi-homed machine with multiple network adapters, then you can configure additional adapters. Of the selections you see in the dropdown,
not attached Self-explanatory
NAT Is the default, which in VBox shares the HostOS network adapter (and share the same IP address)
nat-network Is what we normally think of NAT in other virtualization where the Guest has its own IP address
Bridged adapter Is a member of the physical network
Internal Network Virtual network on the Host only, but not including the HostOS.
Host-only Adapter Virtual network on the Host only, including the hostOS
When you select one of the above options, if your HostOS has more than one adapter (eg a wired and a wireless), then you can select which virtual network (or in the case of bridging which physical network adapter) to connect to.
Full and original VBox documentation about this is at
https://www.virtualbox.org/manual/ch06.html
In all cases, <nothing> is configured in the GuestOS no matter what OS (eg Linux or Windows). The network connection should be a default wired connection no matter what kind of physical network is actually being used.
TSU
https://en.opensuse.org/images/d/d3/Virtualbox_Network_Settings.png