Unable to upgrade additions to 1.4.0

marco · Post by **marco** » 19. Jul 2007, 08:32

After upgrading VB from rel 1.3.8 to 1.4.0 in my WinXP host, my WinXP guest was working well despite not having reinstalled guest additions (i.e. VB 1.4.0 with 1.3.8 GA).

Some days later, in order to complete the upgrade I re-installed Guest Additions in the guest system, but this was NOT successful, as I got error messages about driver installation ("file not found" and similar ones). I tried completely removing GA and installing again. I also tried installing the old GA by mounting the 1.3.8 GA iso file, but nothing better.

The installation process normally starts and proceeds, but in the final steps it produces error messages and I end up with VBox devices detected but not properly installed and consequently not working.

Moreover, every time I start the VM the guest WinXP detects VB devices and prompts for driver location: I point to the mounted 1.4.0 CD image, it finds the INF files and then says "error..." again.

In the end, I have my XP guest without any mouse integration and enhanced video driver anymore.

How can I sort this out without deleting the VM and re-creating it from scratch?

marco · Post by **marco** » 28. Jul 2007, 06:58

Post by **sandervl** » 28. Jul 2007, 10:20

You have a rather strange problem. When you view the mounted iso file inside the VM everything appears to be ok? Just wondering if your iso is perhaps broken.

Could you provide more detailed error messages? Perhaps you can copy the text in the progress control so I can see where it failed.

marco · Post by **marco** » 29. Jul 2007, 06:51

[quote="sandervl"]You have a rather strange problem. When you view the mounted iso file inside the VM everything appears to be ok? Just wondering if your iso is perhaps broken.

Could you provide more detailed error messages? Perhaps you can copy the text in the progress control so I can see where it failed.[/quote]
Thank you for your answer.
I think the iso file is ok, as I tried (amongst other things) installing GA from rel 1.3.8 iso file (which worked well when installed with its own VB release) and got the same problems.

I'll try to better explain what is going on.

When I install GA I get regular installation wizard and messages until the actual installation dialog appears: the installation progress bar extends up to about 80% and then stops, while the "details" text shows:

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Output folder: C:\Programmi\innotek VirtualBox Guest Additions
Skipped: VBoxVideo.inf
Skipped: VBoxVideo.cat
Skipped: VBoxGINA.dll
Skipped: iexplore.ico
Skipped: VBoxVideo.sys
Skipped: VBoxDisp.dll
Skipped: VBoxMouse.sys
Skipped: VBoxMouse.inf
Skipped: VBoxGuest.sys
Skipped: VBCoInst.dll
Skipped: VBoxGuest.inf
Skipped: VBoxGuest.cat
Skipped: VBoxService.exe
Skipped: VBoxControl.exe
Skipped: VBoxMouseInst.exe
Skipped: C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\VBoxSF.sys
Skipped: C:\WINDOWS\system32\VBoxMRXNP.dll
Extract: C:\Programmi\innotek VirtualBox Guest Additions\nsi13.tmp... 100%
Rename on reboot: C:\Programmi\innotek VirtualBox Guest Additions\nsi13.tmp->C:\WINDOWS\system32\VBoxMRXNP.dll
Create folder: C:\Documents and Settings\marco\Menu Avvio\Programmi\innotek VirtualBox Guest Additions
Create shortcut: C:\Documents and Settings\marco\Menu Avvio\Programmi\innotek VirtualBox Guest Additions\Website.lnk
Create shortcut: C:\Documents and Settings\marco\Menu Avvio\Programmi\innotek VirtualBox Guest Additions\Uninstall.lnk
Output folder: C:\Programmi\innotek VirtualBox Guest Additions
Skipped: uninst.exe
Installing Drivers...
Updating the driver for VirtualBox Device...
Driver update has failed. (XP:0,2)
Installing the driver for VirtualBox Device...
------------------------------------------------------------------------

At the same time an error dialog appears saying: "Driver installation failed". When I click on its OK button the installation progress bar restarts and I get the usual dialog about the VirtualBox graphics adapter driver not being signed; when I click on its "continue" button the installation seems to complete. When I reboot the VM as prompted new hardware is detected (VirtualBox device, VB video adapter, VB mouse), suitable drivers are found (in the iso mounted file or in the Windows directories, coming from previous intallation attempts) but the installation of anyone of them results in a dialog saying that there has been a "file not found error". Only the video driver seems to install well, BUT it is not actually working (maybe because of the missing "VB device" driver): when I get to Display Properties I can not change the resolution to values other than 1024x768.

The same as above happens if I completely remove GA and install them from scratch. The same happens also if I try installing the drivers directly from their own folders in the mounted iso file which shows as disk F: (F:\driver\VBoxGuest...)

I really hope you can help me. It has to be something very simple, I suppose, but I've not been able to find it.

marco · Post by **marco** » 4. Aug 2007, 08:52

up

I'm still unable to load the Virtualbox Device (and the VirtualBox Display Adapter) drivers, as I carry on getting, after selecting the GA mounted CD as a source for the drivers, the same message: "Error installing driver ... unable to find file".

What the hell can this missing file be???

Post by **sandervl** » 4. Aug 2007, 09:00

Could you take a snapshot of your VM while it's running and then delete all VBox* files in \windows\system32 & \windows\system32\drivers?

Retry the install afterwards to see if it still skips all those files. If it fails again, then you should close the VM and revert to the snapshot to make sure you don't mess up your VM.

marco · Post by **marco** » 5. Aug 2007, 09:04

[quote="sandervl"]Could you take a snapshot of your VM while it's running and then delete all VBox* files in \windows\system32 & \windows\system32\drivers?

Retry the install afterwards to see if it still skips all those files. If it fails again, then you should close the VM and revert to the snapshot to make sure you don't mess up your VM.[/quote]

I tried removing all VBox* files as suggested. The VBoxMRXNP.dll was not deleted (access denied). I tried to install guest additions with no success.
I tried unistalling again, removing VBox* files AND VBoxMRXNP.dll (I managed to delete it removing all references to it in the registry). I tried to install guest additions with no success.

In both cases the installation did NOT skip any files (except VBoxMRXNP.dll in the first attemp), BUT ended up with the usual error messages:

..........................................
Installing Drivers...
Updating the driver for VirtualBox Device...
Driver update has failed. (XP:0,2)
Installing the driver for VirtualBox Device...
------------------------------------------------------------------------

VirtualBox Device is present amongst system devices but disabled; it gets detected sometimes at startup of the VM, the drivers are found but not installed because of the "file not found" error.

This prevents (I think) also VirtualBox Graphic Adapter's driver from installing.

The annoying thing is that Guest Additions 1.3.8 where working perfectly before I had the ill-fated idea of upgrading them...

marco · Post by **marco** » 13. Aug 2007, 07:58

Post by **sandervl** » 16. Aug 2007, 16:41

Can you then try to manually copy the driver files from the \DRIVER directory to c:\windows? (.sys files go to \windows\system32\drivers, all else to \windows).

Some files will be locked, so you should boot to safe mode.

marco · Post by **marco** » 23. Aug 2007, 06:15

[quote="sandervl"]Can you then try to manually copy the driver files from the \DRIVER directory to c:\windows? (.sys files go to \windows\system32\drivers, all else to \windows).

Some files will be locked, so you should boot to safe mode.[/quote]
Thank you for your advice. I tried it but had no success.

As a further try, I created a new VM, installed XPSP2 and VB additions in it (successfully) and checked the VB files in both the VMs. The files are there in both the machines: same positions, same dates, same dimensions, BUT VB drivers are NOT loaded in the former machine.

I'm afraid I'll end up in patiently installing in the new XP VM all the software I had installed in the old one... I really would like, however, to understand what has gone wrong.