Cannot add drives

[IMADK]

I just updated to Virtualbox 5.1.6 (from 5.0.16)
Host is Windows 7 machine.

My existing VMs essentially work, but I found I had mouse problems with my Windows XP VM. Solution appeared to be I needed to add the extensions. Seemed easy enough.

Problem is, when I went to add an optical drive so I could mount the extensions, VirtualBox crashed as soon as it brought up the selection dialog for "Create New" or "Select Existing". I tried adding a normal HD... same issue. I can't add any drives to my machines. I'm stuck. I have no details and don't know where to look for them. It just crashes, the useless "Windows is looking for a solution..." box comes up, then it closes every time, without fail. What can I do to fix this?

[socratis]

First of all, you do not have to add an optical drive to install the Guest Additions. You simply go to the Devices menu, when the VM is running, and select "Insert Guest Addition CD Image...".

As for the crash: do you have any applications that have installed an extra namespace (not sure about the name) in Explorer? With that I mean if you open up a Windows Explorer and show the tree on the left, do you have any non-standard items, like a Bluetooth adapter, a mobile phone browser, cloud storage, or anything similar? That might be the source of the crash.

[IMADK]

When I go to "Insert Guest Addition CD Image..." I get the following error:

"Could not insert the VirtualBox Guest Additions disk image file into the virtual machine <machinename>, as the machine has no optical drives. Please add a drive using the storage page of the virtual machine settings window."

So, apparently, I do need to add an optical drive.

Iphone drivers are installed, so it appears on the left when it is plugged in. Nothing else "unusual" pops up. Git appears as a Library since I have Git installed, but that shouldn't impact anything.

[socratis]

Oh, so you didn't have a CD drive in the VM from the beginning. I don't know why you felt the need to remove it, but, hey, you need to have one. Shut down the VM and go to the VM Settings, Storage. Select the controller on the left and click the CD icon with the plus sign. When a new dialog comes up with the optical drive to put, choose "Leave empty". Then launch the VM and proceed with the GA installation normally.

Now, about the additional namespaces, we've seen reports of that. Not sure what the developers know. I'll try to look for an existing bug report (you can look too) and see if it's under the radar. My gut feeling is that it is a Qt related bug.

[IMADK]

Unfortunately, I can't do that. It's when I go to Storage and select "Add New..." whatever (Hard drive or optical drive). it crashes. That's the problem I'm asking about.

[IMADK]

I've worked around the guest additions issue. I created a new VM, pointed it at the existing virtual disk in the Wizard. That automatically puts an optical disk on. Then I ran guest additions from that VM and installed it to that disk. Then closed it out, and reopened my original VM and it had guest additions installed and the mouse now works properly. So I don't have to worry about that specifically now.

The reason this VM has no optical drive itself is because it requires 4 hard drives and I don't have an open IDE slot for an optical drive.

However, though I can add a drive in the Wizard, I still cannot add any drives to any VM through Settings/Storage. It crashes every time. That is still the main issue I need resolved, as I have to switch out drives on some VMs from time to time. It's a basic functionality I don't have right now.

[IMADK]

Thank you, socratis. In a round about way I found a way to make it work based on your comments. You mentioned the "namespace" bug or whatever it is, and I knew the iPhone was the only such thing I had on my computer. I plugged my iPhone in. With my iPhone plugged in, it works. Bizarre... absolutely bizarre...

[socratis]

As I said, we've seen this bug recently and it all boiled down to this "add-on" functionality of Windows Explorer. My feeling as I said is that Qt is failing when one of these "namespaces" are not present. Glad you figured it out, and I hope that the devs will figure out a solution.

[IMADK]

The workaround is not consistent. I've had a few times now where I still have the problem with the iPhone plugged in. The only thing consistent I can see is either time or attempts. The longer my computer is up and running and the more times I try to add drives, the more likely I can add drives to my virtual machines without a problem. Once it starts working, it keeps working... so after I successfully add one drive, as long as I don't restart my computer I can add controllers / drives to my heart's content. After the next restart I usually have to make multiple tries until it starts working again.

[socratis]

as long as I don't restart my computer I can add controllers / drives to my heart's content.

There you go! Solution found! Do not restart your computer!
As I said, this is a new bug with Qt5 and they're trying to fix it...

[edct71]

This works for me:
Just make a right clic on "Controller: SATA" and then Add Hard Drive.

[GonerDoug]

This works for me:
Just make a right clic on "Controller: SATA" and then Add Hard Drive.

Thanks for this! This works for me as well (version 5.2.10) while using the normal add hard drive button and then 'choose existing' hangs every time.