Force Windows Host Device Drivers

[LinuxJamie]

Hey All,

Although I've run VBox since it was released in 2007 on thousands of Linux hosts, I'm doing a new project where my client requires running the host on Windoze 10 Pro so they can then run Linux clients. The problem is, I accidentally bumped the friggin' touchpad during installation on the Windows box on the 2nd of 3 hardware device driver install prompts, as I always uncheck "Always trust Oracle...", so I can have total control over what get's installed.

The problem is now, no matter what I do to do a clean uninstall through appwiz(Add/Remove Programs), the installation does not try to install the hardware device drivers again, and it no longer prompts wanting to do so during re-installation.

After spending hours and hours searching the net and these forums, I have not found any help, as everything I find assumes I'm having guest additions issues! DOH~!

Anyways, I REALLY REALLY don't want to reinstall Windoze, so am hoping someone out there can help me, or at least point me in the right direction! I was actually one of the originally VMware beta testers back in the late 1990's, so have been around a while...

Thanks much in advance for anyone who can help me resolve this without having to go through the dreaded windoze reinstall!

Feel free to ping me at jamie at linuxjamie dot com~! ~

LinuxJamie
TheBestLinux dot com

[BillG]

I am having problems following this. You say that the host is Windows and the guest is Linux. VirtualBox Guest additions (like VMWare PCTools) are installed in the guest OS. How does Windows get involved in installing the GAs in a Linux guest?

[LinuxJamie]

When Virtualbox is installed on a Windows host, during the installation, there are 3 times where the installation prompts to install windows device drivers(Unless you leave the "Trust this..." checkbox checked - I Unchecked them each time, and accidentally bumped the escape key on the 2nd device driver installation attempt, hence giving me a possible corrupt host install), not guest additions which are installed after the main installation to provide hardware support of various guest OS's. This issue is a once only occurrence during the first time Virtualbox is installed on Windows as a host, and if you mess up, reinstallation of Virtualbox does not re-install those required windows device drivers, ever again, even if you "completely" uninstall Virtualbox! The only way I see to get it to prompt to install those required Windows device drivers on the host is to install Virtualbox on a clean Windows machine that has never had Virtualbox installed on it previously. Unless I am missing something?!?!?!??

Are there any VBox developers here that might be able to help?

[scottgus1]

The devs don't usually come here, the forum is run by volunteer fellow Virtualbox users.

This problem is not actually a Virtualbox problem. The Virtualbox installer is actually a Microsoft MSI installer that installs Virtualbox. You will need to web-search how to undo the choice on that Trust box.

I happened to have a fresh Windows 10 install just yesterday which I had to install Virtualbox, so I also unchecked the "Always trust Oracle" box each time and watched the three items queried about. They covered the USB filter and two network setups, likely Host-Only and something called a "network service", perhaps related to NAT Network, as a guess.

You could re-try the installer, paying special care to the USB and Host-Only options. Also run the installer via right-click-Run-As-Administrator, even if you already have admin privileges. After that, you'll have to see what Microsoft says on resetting the Trust box choices.