virtualbox.org

I am on windows, I came from FreeBSD and it seems like VirtualBox works a little differently here. The problem that I have run into is with the optical drive and some BIOS settings that I will reveal below. After having downloaded the virtual machine image and selected it for the os to install this is the message I get with an error following after I am unable to choose an optical drive. "Please select a virtual optical disk file or a physical optical drive containing a disk to start your machine from."

I have only ever had to choose an os as the last step in setting up a VirtualBox VM in my experience. What is this optical drive and how do I set this up and why would I have to touch the BIOS settings?

I have not installed Host Extensions & Guest Additions. I don't have hardware virtualization enabled that I know of and haven't heard of it. I also have not taken any steps yet to fix this problem.

Error:

Not in a hypervisor partition (HVP=0) (VERR_NEM_NOT_AVAILABLE).

AMD-V is disabled in the BIOS (or by the host OS) (VERR_SVM_DISABLED).

Result Code:



E_FAIL (0x80004005)

Component:



ConsoleWrap

Interface:



IConsole {872da645-4a9b-1727-bee2-5585105b9eed}

oracleboy wrote:After having downloaded the virtual machine image

VMs can be preinstalled 'appliances', usually coming as OVA files, rarely coming as a disk image file (VHD, VMDK, VDI, etc) and an OVF file. VirtualBox's 'Import' command in the main window's File menu opens a dialog box where you would select the OVA or OVF and bring in the pre-installed VM.

VMs can also be freshly installed from install media in the form of a physical CD or DVD, or an ISO file, which is a hard drive file copy of a physical CD or DVD. Many OS's can be downloaded as ISO files. You make a new VM, then boot the VM from the CD/DVD or ISO and install the OS into your VM's hard drive. This:

oracleboy wrote:Please select a virtual optical disk file or a physical optical drive containing a disk to start your machine from

says you are starting a new VM, not an import from an OVA/OVF. The box is asking you to pick an install media ISO file, or a physical CD/DVD you can put in your host PC's physical CD drive. Then the VM will boot from the CD/DVD/ISO and go into the OS setup program on the install media.

oracleboy wrote:why would I have to touch the BIOS settings?

This depends on whether you are referring to the VM's 'BIOS' or the host PC's BIOS.

The VM's 'BIOS' settings are all available from the main Virtualbox window, and you cannot access them when you start the VM, like you can do with a real PC. (There is an on-the-fly boot menu you can use to temporarily change the boot order for that start of the VM, but that' is all.)

The host PC's BIOS contains the setting to enable 'virtualization technology': Intel's VT-x or AMD's AMD-V or SVM. This setting is required to be enabled for Virtualbox 6.1.x. 6.0.x & earlier can run without virtualization technology, but the OS's it can run are severely limited: 32-bit, 1 processor, Windows 8.0 & earlier. Linux OS's probably similarly limited to earlier 32-bit versions.

oracleboy wrote:Error:

Not in a hypervisor partition (HVP=0) (VERR_NEM_NOT_AVAILABLE).

AMD-V is disabled in the BIOS (or by the host OS) (VERR_SVM_DISABLED).

You have to go into your PC's BIOS to turn on AMD-V or SVM. You will have to web-search where this is and what it is called in your PC's BIOS.

Working now, thanks for the great help. The explanation makes it so that I understand how its working.

Great! Glad you're up and running.

(bet you knew that was coming... )