What happens when a "Not Attached" n/w adapter has its cable connected

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Nap
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Joined: 22. Jul 2014, 02:06

What happens when a "Not Attached" n/w adapter has its cable connected

Post by Nap »

From section 6.2 of the Virtual Box documentation, a network interface can be "Not attached":
Not attached

In this mode, VirtualBox reports to the guest that a network card is present, but that there is no connection -- as if no Ethernet cable was plugged into the card. This way it is possible to "pull" the virtual Ethernet cable and disrupt the connection, which can be useful to inform a guest operating system that no network connection is available and enforce a reconfiguration.
When a cable is attached, say from the GUI, what type of network is thus created? NAT, Bridged, or some other?
mpack
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Re: What happens when a "Not Attached" n/w adapter has its cable connected

Post by mpack »

It will be whatever connection type was configured.

This is not a separate feature, it's just part of the NIC simulation, which is the same client side simulation regardless of network type.
Nap
Posts: 30
Joined: 22. Jul 2014, 02:06

Re: What happens when a "Not Attached" n/w adapter has its cable connected

Post by Nap »

The "Not attached" choice is mutually exclusive to the other choices, so there is no fall-back to go to when you connect the cable in the UI.
mpack
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Posts: 39156
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Primary OS: MS Windows 10
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Re: What happens when a "Not Attached" n/w adapter has its cable connected

Post by mpack »

Ah, I thought you were referring to the cable connected option in the dialog.

In that case I don't think I've ever enabled a NIC without attaching it to a network. But, I'd guess that connecting and disconnecting the cable would do nothing much. It would be like connecting and disconnected a physical cable to your physical Ethernet NIC while your router/server is switched off.
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