[RESOLVED] Can't connect to guest after Windows Update

[keith73]

Virtualbox: 4.3.10 r93012 with guest additions on guest

host: windows 7 64 bit
guest: ubuntu 12.04 LTS, 32 bit, 1024MB memory


I updated Vbox to latest version earlier in the week, never rebooted machine. Today Windows machine was prompting to reboot for updates so I did so. After restarting twice and starting my ubuntu server in VB, I can no longer connect to the server via ssh or http.

using vbox console I logged in and ran ifconfig, ip is still the same as it was prior to restart. but using my favorite ssh client to hit the box or trying to view web sites on the guest are met with disappointment.

logfile from latest bootup is attached.

thanks,
- keith

[socratis]

- The log file is not complete. It cuts off at the most interesting part.
- Could you share with us the ifconfig output?
- Can you ping the guest from the host and vice versa?
- What's your network mode? NAT? Bridged? Internal? HostOnly?
- What do you mean "using vbox console I logged in" ?

[keith73]

thanks for the reply.

I actually run it with 2 adapters, because for some reason bridged wouldn't work. this has worked for me for 2 years on this machine and never had an issue after updating either windows or vbox software.

Adapter 1:
Host Only Adapter
Promiscuous mode: allow all
cable connected: checked

Adapter 2:
NAT
Cable Connected: checked

ping requests timeout

when virtualbox launches the guest, the terminal window for that guest pops up and I am able to login inside that terminal window. However, as of yesterday afternoon, can not ping the ip, ssh to it or access any of the domains I'm hosting on it. ip address did not change (first thing I checked).

attached ifconfig results and latest vbox.log

[ODTech]

I suspect i have the same issue as you, the same symptoms since Thursday after updates rolled out. Unfortunately i don't have direct access to the machine all the time so i can't pull logs just now to compare.

My host is Win7 PRO 64bit and 2 Windows XP guests.
Check your network config, you'll notice that when the network is in bridge mode it does not detect your hosts network card. In NAT mode it works fine but you can't connect to the guests with any protocol ofc.

While the issue is present if you plug in any device like a thumb drive does the driver load successfully on the host? In my case trying to remove or load network drivers it just does not happen or you get a access denies message. Trying to remove virtualbox for reinstallation the installer start but doesn't get anywhere. I think the windows update broke permissions, vbox likely doesn't have permission to access the network card driver which is why it doesn't find the network card in bridge mode.

I temporarily solved my problem by doing a system restore but loading any antivirus package or letting windows update again breaks the network in bridge mode again. I couldn't look for a solution since the client wanted their POS system running again so i'll tackle it again in the coming week.

[DutchJohn]

Same problem here, also after a Windows (win7p-64) update. Searched the web for solutions and tried everything, to the extend that I lost every connection and had to repair Windows.
That done, I tried again.
1 Install VB 4.3.6. Tried to create host-only network and failed.
2 Upgrade to 4.3.10. Same result.
3 Uninstall and install 4.2.24. Same result.
Logs of attempts 4.2.24 and 4.3.10 are attached.

Does anyone have a solution?

Thanks
Jan

[ODTech]

I solved my issue but attached is the logs anyway. It was not a VBox problem.

The culprit was a service called SafetyNutManager.exe. It's part of a browser add-on that was installed on Google Chrome, the addon is called TheMovies.
I disabled and removed the addon then uninstalled and reinstalled both my network card drivers and the latest version of VBox and the problem was solved.

The addon seems to interfere with windows networking, while it was active i could not uninstall my phisical NIC drivers or the VBox drivers. At one stage i had to take ownership of the registry key for the VBox host only adapter and delete it since it was broken and it wouldn't uninstall through control panel even in safemode.

[ODTech]

A second machine on the same network developed exactly the same symptoms. USB devices doesn't work, network interface is locked so you can't make changes to it and vbox guests does not start when network is in bridge mode since the host adapter is not found.

The culprit this time was a service called Systemk. Stopping and disabling the service is like flipping a switch. After rebooting everything works normaly exactly as with my previous post.

Again, this was not a VBox problem, i'm just posting for troubleshooting purposes incase someone else has the same issue.

[keith73]

I don't have any of those services running (safetynutmanager or systemk) so I can't blame them.

I even went into the guest and upgraded guest additions to 4.3 hoping that would fix something but no dice.
sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-4.2 virtualbox
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install dkms
sudo apt-get install virtualbox-4.3

shutdown guest, restart host, start guest, still no connection

guest can connect out via NAT to get the updates, but maybe my problem is with the host-only adapter. Going to try something there and see if that works.

[ODTech]

I don't have any of those services running (safetynutmanager or systemk) so I can't blame them.

I even went into the guest and upgraded guest additions to 4.3 hoping that would fix something but no dice.
sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-4.2 virtualbox
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install dkms
sudo apt-get install virtualbox-4.3

shutdown guest, restart host, start guest, still no connection

guest can connect out via NAT to get the updates, but maybe my problem is with the host-only adapter. Going to try something there and see if that works.

Easy way to find out is to disable all startup items except windows services on the host, if it solves the problem then you have the same issue most likely. It's obviously malware at work in my case but the weird thing is neither combofix or malwarebytes caught the infection.

Incase your not sure how to do it.

1. Open start menu and search for "msconfig"
2. Select "Selective startup" and untick "Load Startup Items"
3. Go to "Services" tab
4. Tick "Hide all Microsoft Services"
5. Click "Disable all"
6. Apply and reboot your host
7. If the guest networking works then one of the services on your host is interfering and start enabling them back one at a time, rebooting after each enable to test. If it still doesn't work then i'm sorry for hijacking your thread


To put everything back to normal go to step 2 and select normal startup and if you found your culprit you can go to services.msc and disable it or look for it in registry and delete it.

[keith73]

Easy way to find out is to disable all startup items except windows services on the host, if it solves the problem then you have the same issue most likely. It's obviously malware at work in my case but the weird thing is neither combofix or malwarebytes caught the infection.

Incase your not sure how to do it.

1. Open start menu and search for "msconfig"
2. Select "Selective startup" and untick "Load Startup Items"
3. Go to "Services" tab
4. Tick "Hide all Microsoft Services"
5. Click "Disable all"
6. Apply and reboot your host
7. If the guest networking works then one of the services on your host is interfering and start enabling them back one at a time, rebooting after each enable to test. If it still doesn't work then i'm sorry for hijacking your thread


To put everything back to normal go to step 2 and select normal startup and if you found your culprit you can go to services.msc and disable it or look for it in registry and delete it.

thanks. I did this and still no dice. looks like the host adapter is just not letting me in. NAT works fine, gets IP address and can go out and hit the net but for this thing to be useful I need to be able to run web sites locally for dev purposes. Someone suggested I clear out the udev rules in /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules and I did, so the guest picked up the mac address, but that didn't fix anything.

Can anyone tell me, for host only adapter, what adapter type should it be using. I've always left it at the default, PCnet-FAST III.
Also, I looked in file>preferences>network>host-only and saw the IPv4 address started with 169.... which I did not create but as I understand, that's a self-assigned ip.

[keith73]

resolved.


saw what the host-only adapter settings should be when I saw this thread.
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=50496

changed IPv4 address to 192.168.56.1
that's all it was. All the other things I was checking and trying and rebooting and it was just the ip. Not sure why it was set to 169.xxx.xxx.xxx. I never modified that before.

Thanks for all the replies. hope this helps someone else avoid doing everything I tried and try this first.

- keith