Windows XP Guest unable to be pinged/receive network packets

[TedSears]

Host: Ubuntu 9.04 AMD64
Guest: Windows XP Home 32bit
Bridged networking to eth0

For some reason (I think around the time that I upgraded virtualbox to 2.2.4 - although it may have been something else) I suddenly lost the ability to ping my Windows XP Home guest from any of the other machines on the network. Similarly, any attempt to connect to other ports (samba, etc) times out.

The Windows guest sucessfully gets an IP address from the router, and browses the web fine. It can even connect to other shares on the network without issues. But no packets from my network seem to be getting to it.

I would think it's a firewall issue - but Windows firewall is off. I've also made sure there isn't any firewall running on the host. Ubuntu firewall is disable, and iptables is blank. I tried downgrading to virtualbox 2.2.2, but it didn't help.

I fired up wireshark (which I'm no pro with), on both host and guest. The host sees the pings destined for the guest from the other machine on on the network, but wireshark on the guest doesn't ever see the pings.

Please let me know of any other configuration data or test results that might help. Thanks in advance.

[Perryg]

What are you using for the adapter type in VBox for the guest?
Also it would help if we know what version you upgraded from.

[TedSears]

I had upgraded from 2.2.2 (which I downgraded to without it helping).

I've tried a couple different adapters (I'd seen a couple posts where people said that they had problems with one or the other). Currently it's set to PCnet Fast III

Thanks,

Ted

[Perryg]

What about NAT,Bridged, Host-only, Internal, Which are you using?

[TedSears]

I'm currently using bridged to eth0.

[Perryg]

You know I believe you when you say that the firewall is off but can you check again? MS is notorious about turning it back on with updates.

[TedSears]

I know - it really seems like a firewall issue. I've doublechecked, and the windows firewall is off.

[TedSears]

So, more and more interesting.

I ran a packettrace on the virtual machine using the the following command:
VBoxManage modifyvm <vm_name> -nictrace1 on -nictracefile1 <capture_file>

Loading the resulting log file up in wireshark does show that the PING requests are coming through onto the virtual machine NIC fine - but no response is being sent.

It seems like something is blocking the responses (like a firewall!); except that the windows firewall is definitely off (as per my previous screenshot).

Anyway, if anyone has any thoughts, I'd love them...

[vbox4me2]

What about the Guest IP settings, does it have a valid gateway?

[TedSears]

Here's the output of ipconfig /all from the Windows XP guest:

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : virtualwinxphom
Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Hybrid
IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : ri.cox.net

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection 5:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : ri.cox.net
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Intel(R) PRO/1000 MT Network Connection
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 08-00-27-8E-90-64
Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.195
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.1
DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.1
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.1
Primary WINS Server . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.6
Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : Thursday, June 11, 2009 11:08:26 PM
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : Friday, June 12, 2009 11:08:26 PM

Ethernet adapter Network Connect Adapter:

Media State . . . . . . . . . . . : Media disconnected
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Juniper Network Connect Virtual Adapter
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-FF-00-43-D6-82

It seems to have a gateway, and it's got an IP adress (as I've mentioned, from inside the guest everything works fine - it's just that the guest isn't accessible from anywhere else on the network (ping,etc).

[vbox4me2]

Try the angry IP scanner to see if any port answers on the Guest. Somewhere there must be filtering/firewalling going on.

[Perryg]

What are the other (4) network connections in your network manager? It shows that you are using #(5)? Anything else loaded and working that could be messing with the network?

[TedSears]

So, I finally figured it out.

As you all (perryg and vbox4me2) suspected - it did turn out to be a firewall. I have cisco vpn installed in the windows xp guest in order to access my employer's network. On the cisco VPN there is a "stateful firewall" option which had gotten turned on (software update, or me hitting a stray keystroke?). This, apparently, firewalls all connections, not just the VPN, at all times (even when the vpn is inactive).

Thanks for all of your help - I really appreciate the attempts to help me figure this out.

Ted