Kali linus gets uninstalled automatically

[sid1999]

After kali linux installation, optical drive empties automatically and thus requires kali to be installed again. I uninstalled virtual box and downloaded the latest version, but no desired results.

[scottgus1]

I've done Linux (not Kali) installs to Virtualbox guests. They all run fine after the ISO is removed from the guest's CD drive.

If failure to install Linux guests were a common thing, they'd show a lot more on the Linux Guests subforum, and a quick scroll down the first page of that subforum doesn't show any jumping out glaringly to me.

Take a look at those install instructions again, you're probably doing something wrong.

And this is quite likely a Linux Guests subforum question. I doubt the Windows Host has anything to do with installation of a guest OS.

[erdeslawe]

@sid1999

Are you sure you're not simply running Kali in Live Mode from a Bootable Image. That scenario could explain why it 'disappears' at the end of each session; and why the 'CD/DVD' gets automatically ejected, i.e. it's never been correctly installed.

You really need to provide more detailed information on precisely what you've done to install Kali and how, if that is not the case, if you want some better informed help.

[mpack]

Moving topic to "Linux Guests".

[surforacle]

The lead-off post mentions "optical drive", but it isn't entirely clear that the OP means an actual CD/DVD, or an .iso image file.

In either case you can catch/pause the VM guest boot (using F12), and then inspect to see if the VirtualBox guest machine has a CD/DVD attached (virtual/.iso or actual hardware). Right-click on the CD/DVD Icon on the VM guest window decoration (e.g. right hand lower edge of the VM guest window) to inspect or modify the attachment state.

Media can be attached or detached in this pre-boot state prior to the (linux guest) bootloader (e.g. grub) gaining control.

I have experienced what the OP describes when I was using a linux guest that was installed with a complete multi-DVD .iso file set; typically the way it would occur would be me installing some packages from the first of the (.iso) DVDs set, and then forgetting to detach the .iso and re-booting the guest. Upon reboot, the menu presented was identical to the pre-installation situation. (If the distro DVD/CD does not do any sort of intelligent inspection of bootable partitions on its (virtual) hard drives to see if there is something already installed, it will simply jump back into it's "first use" menus)

Or it could simply be as @erdeslawe suggested - the OP was booting into a "live" mode and not actually performing an install.

@sid1999 : If you see ANY menus from Kali Linux upon reboot - then it is coming from somewhere: either from the (virtual) hard drive or a CD/DVD or attached .iso file. If there was nothing present, the VM guest boot would fail and you would see no Kali Linux menus at all.

Also: I recall (somewhere in my distant past) that some distro installations will perform a mini-install, and then re-boot once, expecting to find the CD/DVD to still present be for a second pass of the installation. (That is sort of uncommon these days but anything is possible - I'm not familiar with Kali linux) That being said, it would be pretty unlikely for such distros to automatically to perform an automatic disk ejection, and I don't think the VirtualBox VM guest manager is doing the ejection. But in any case, if you think that is actually what is happening, you can certainly use the F12 trick mentioned above to re-attach the DVD/CD/.iso prior to the 2nd boot. I doubt this is what is going on; but if you are convinced this is the problem you can see if re-attaching the CD/DVD/.iso resolves the issue.