Windows 7 as Host

13yearold · Post by **13yearold** » 21. Nov 2008, 05:48

Hi,

I've been developing my own OS in Fedora, which is inside VBox on a Windows Vista host. (No need to worry about the part about my OS.) Now, I've got Windows 7 6801_64bit_PDC and I really like it, so now I want it as my host, and run Fedora inside of it. However, the 1.6.2, 1.6.4 or 2.04 64 bit VBoxes don't install in Windows 7. As it reaches the install stage (with the progress bar) it moves forward like normal, but get a message "Ended prematurely because of an error, blah blah." So I was wondering, it's just the installer, so it might be able to be fixed in a later release (?) Or is there a command-line option to add? Thanks.

Bold font = Involved OSes.

sst · Post by **sst** » 21. Nov 2008, 10:02

Hi, ...

I have =

Windows 7 x64 Build 6801.0

Same "installation" problem with VirtualBox x64 v2.04 installer.

--------------------------
Sylvain St-Amand (sst)

mbrown009 · Post by **mbrown009** » 21. Nov 2008, 14:04

windows 7 is highly unstable. if i remember right it is pre beta right now.

13yearold · Post by **13yearold** » 21. Nov 2008, 17:53

Of course. But we could still make the installer different, if that is where it fails. Apparently an installer is very easy to modify too.

Post by **TerryE** » 21. Nov 2008, 18:51

"13yearold", are you extremely precocious, or telling porky pies. I thought that I was going well teaching myself Fortran at 13, but that was over 40 years ago

13yearold · Post by **13yearold** » 21. Nov 2008, 21:21

I would be inclined to think that Assembler and C of today is easier than Fortran of 40 years ago. But VirtualBox is proving to be an essential tool in the development of my OS.

Post by **TerryE** » 21. Nov 2008, 22:24

13yearold wrote:Assembler and C of today...

Now there's an oxymoron. Don't you mean C# and python? It's 20 years since Assembler and C were in vogue. Sounds to me like your "handle" is on the porkie pie side. BTW, you are not a Brit then you may need to look up this expression -- cocky rhyming slang.

13yearold · Post by **13yearold** » 21. Nov 2008, 23:43

Lol I use assembler for the bootloader and really low level stuff, and the kernel for now. However, I'll be moving the kernel to C soon, it's more appropriate. I don't like languages like C# as a matter of fact the only thing I like about the .NET framework is the UI designer. Python is something I never bothered to learn, doesn't seem to fit what I want to do. And I'm gonna be 13 on Monday, but I wanted to make the assurance I wasn't tricking the registration COPPA compliance thing.

Post by **TerryE** » 22. Nov 2008, 00:03

Bloody hell, not only are you precocious, you're extremely precocious. Good on you!

Anyway, VBox itself has to cooperate reasonably intimately with the Host OS because it needs to take over ring 0. This means that VBox is far less tolerant of unknown hosts OSs that it is of guest OSs. At the moment VBox is only supported under Windows XP, Vista, 2003, 2008; many Linux flavours, MacOS, OpenSolaris. The NT 6.1 kernel is sufficiently different to the NT6 kernel for VBox not to work with this as a host.

Given that you are at the start of your career, I am surprised that you are picking a twilight OS to drill into. I would stick with 64bit Linux if I were you. This also has the advantage of being entirely open.

13yearold · Post by **13yearold** » 22. Nov 2008, 00:30

OK, I decided I'll go back to Vista (but stupid x86 though) because I'm basically done trying out 7. It's good though. Vista on my other partition already has Virtualbox installed, etc. Remember, I am using Linux as a development environment:

My OS
^
QEMU
^
Fedora 9 i386
^
Virtualbox
^
Windows Vista/7
^
Hardware

Why do I use QEMU in Fedora?
Because I'm having a hard time installing VBox in Linux. I get a silly error with "Can't find your Linux sources" or some crap like that. If you could help me with that, I'd appreciate it, I prefer VBox in any case. It's the closed source edition (Sun)/Fedora 9 i386/r00t account.

Many people think I lie about being 12 (or 13) but I don't blame them. You seem to be the first to believe me

Nice blog by the way.

Post by **TerryE** » 22. Nov 2008, 00:44

13yearold wrote:Why do I use QEMU in Fedora? ... Because I'm having a hard time installing VBox in Linux. I get a silly error with "Can't find your Linux sources" ...

I think that you'll get bitten by having such a deep stack. Why not run your Linux native? You can always repartition your HDD to set aside a 20Gb for Linux root and swap partitions and dual boot. Then you can use the PUEL edition out of the box or many Distro suppliers provide virtualbox-ose as a precompiled package. If you like Linux then I'd try Kubuntu or can you get a canned Fedora / KDE distro?

Come back with any specific Qs.

13yearold · Post by **13yearold** » 22. Nov 2008, 01:20

I can install Fedora with KDE. But I guess I'm accustomed to GNOME, even though I prefer well-polished interfaces. But I get that problem even with running it natively. Also, my screen resolution is bad without drivers. After installing drivers my display gets even worse, I think 320x220 or something like that.

After doing

Code: Select all

yum install virtualbox

I have the same problem with kernel source. Why would VBox even want the kernel source?

I'd love to get a distro with a fully working VBox in it though.

Thanks!

Post by **Sasquatch** » 22. Nov 2008, 02:49

I have the same problem with kernel source. Why would VBox even want the kernel source?

Because it needs to compile and install a Kernel Module. And you can't compile something if you don't have the source of it. You, as a developer, of all people should know that.

13yearold · Post by **13yearold** » 22. Nov 2008, 03:06

@Sasquatch:
1) I don't know much about Linux.
2) Why should I know Virtualbox out of everything wants to install a kernel module. Not the case in Windows.
3) Obviously I know to compile something you need source. I have a brain.
4) Leave kind people (like Terry for instance) to answer my questions. I notice people here are a bit rough, I would like to keep away from them.

Thanks a lot, Sasquatch!

Post by **TerryE** » 22. Nov 2008, 03:22

No, it's just that VBox is quite complex and only a limited number of people are willing to answer Qs so the demand outstrips the supply, so we can be a little terse at times. With the Linux kernel, the device drivers link into tables inside kernel space and so need a bunch of kernel header files to compile and link. You only need these to install this type of driver, and this is why VBox errors if you don't have them. Do a bit of research and use the google search trick on site:forums.virtualbox.org. You'll find answers to most of your Qs.