Virtualbox -- trouble with win 7 install

English Virtualization
#1

I am attempting to install window 7 as a virtual machine using virtualbox-4.3. Sometimes I get through 1 DVD, sometimes two, and once even all three before a fatal error. The DVD’s work fine on other machines. The one time that I did get all the way through all 3 DVD’s it just sat there for 4 hours black screen occassional cd or hdd activity flashes.

Once I do get win 7 installed I need to get guest additions working so that I can share a 615GB partition between Linux/Win7,WinXp,WinVista, and Win2k

I have 2 brand new Acer Aspire e1-572 Laptops 4core intel, 6gb memory, 1tb hdd that I am trying to set up identical in all aspects.

any ideas

#2

On Wed, 14 Oct 2015 22:06:02 +0000, techwiz03 wrote:

> I am attempting to install window 7 as a virtual machine using
> virtualbox-4.3. Sometimes I get through 1 DVD, sometimes two, and once
> even all three before a fatal error. The DVD’s work fine on other
> machines. The one time that I did get all the way through all 3 DVD’s it
> just sat there for 4 hours black screen occassional cd or hdd activity
> flashes.
>
> Once I do get win 7 installed I need to get guest additions working so
> that I can share a 615GB partition between Linux/Win7,WinXp,WinVista,
> and Win2k
>
> I have 2 brand new Acer Aspire e1-572 Laptops 4core intel, 6gb memory,
> 1tb hdd that I am trying to set up identical in all aspects.
>
> any ideas

Maybe the physical devices are having problems?

Are they new new machines, or refurbished new machines?

I ask because when I was teaching, we had DVD drives in all the laptops
we shipped around the country for classes, and eventually the DVD drives
just stopped working in them - probably from being knocked around in the
padded shipping containers.

If yours are refirb, that’s a possibility to consider - that the drives
aren’t fully up to spec.

Otherwise, it’s really hard to say without more information. I’ve got
Win7 running on VB (5.0 now here) on openSUSE 13.2, so it’s something
specific to you - the media, the hardware - possibly the Vbox version
(but I installed my VM actually on 4.2 or 4.3 - I’ve had it a while).

Maybe run the VirtualBox VM in a terminal window or look through the logs
to see if there’s any issue reported there.

Where did you install VirtualBox from?

Jim

–
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
Forum Use Terms & Conditions at http://tinyurl.com/openSUSE-T-C

#3

The 2 Acers came straight from the store warehouse as new units. That what was paid for so will be quite angry if
given a refurb. Windows 10 on refurb was cheaper but there is no way I will use / recommend above windows 7.
Microsoft has been downhill since XP IMHO.

#4

FYI -
Don’t know if it still works because I haven’t installed anything that required multiple media for quite awhile…

  • I was able to install without switching media by mounting multiple virtual CDROMs all pointing to the different ISO images. The install I ran was able to find what it needed each time it needed to switch to a new CDROM. In any case you should always use ISO images instead of reading off your physical optical reader… Much, much faster. Then you can archive your original CD/DVDs for emergencies.

  • Install your Guest Additions with the DKMS option. That is supposed to keep your Guest Additions automatically updated with each kernel change.

HTH,
TSU

#5

I finally wound up getting windows 7 Professional x64 and it installed perfect. FYI Windows 7 OEM & HOME-Premium commonly preinstalled on hardware no longer support multi-boot or running in a virtual Host. The DVD hardware actually does work fine, it was the windows created recovery discs that are flakey. When the recovery media finally did make it through it says contact microsoft and purchase an upgrade to windows professional or ultimate.

Now that I have win2000, winXP, and win7 all as virtual guests we will see if I can resolve all The virtualbox issues that are starting to show up like:
guess additions don’t persist between guest OS runs
USB Flash drives show but are inaccessible
During ACER bootup, there two errors that show about virtualbox guest … that says FAILED in red [dmesg says nothing about errors]
Printers not available in guest

#6

From what I’ve been seeing recently,
Some Windows Install media are time-bombed… So it might not necessarily be “all” WinHome install media. Also, it may make a diff whether it’s OEM, TechNet, MSDN, etc.
I doubt Win7 anything is still downloadable from MS (All should be Win10 now), but new media probably would work.

TSU