Getting USB to work

[ngong]

very short: The software in Windows client looks for a USB device, that is connected, but does not find it.

versions: linux host 2.6.30, windows client Windows 7, vbox 2.2.4 PUEL installed from Debian package.

longer:
Windows 7 works great in vbox. Installed software that comes with a USB device. Software works great, too.
Host-linux identifies the USB, dmesg shows no problems.
The filter was easy to define, took all attributes automatically, attribute "Port" left empty.
I do not understand fully what a "Remote USB Device" is, but mine is locally attached, so I said "No" to Remote Access.
The vitual window has a "Devices" button with a USB-Devices entry. I can see all USB devices, but all are greyed and are not selectable.
I start the software. The first thing it does: looking for its USB device and claims not to find it.

background:
I have to program a PIC controller. I bought a PICkit 2 from Microchip that comes with a programmer to be attachted to USB and with Windows Software to use it. I tried Linux alternative Piklab but it does not support the new firmware of the PIC programmer. The PICkit 2 comes with MPLAB IDE that includes ther programmer software PICkit 2 v2.50 that I like to bring up.

I chose Windows 7 because I do not have any Windows CD I can install from. Windows 7 RC was free to download and seemed to be supported by vbox. (I have the Vista install disks for my Lenovo laptop by this does not work with vbox.)

#vbox and #sidux refered me to the vbox manual, that I've studied in detail, however questions left unanswered.

I'm allways thinking: There must be something very stupid I'm missing here.

Some patient professional here to help me?

Rolf

[Perryg]

You can select to use USB in the settings and then leave the filters not set (do not define a filter). Then once the guest is running you go to the device tab of VBox and click once on the USB device that you want to mount and it should become active.

Or if that does not work,
Use a blank filter (The one with the blue dot) and then boot the guest. Unplug the USB device and plug it back in to get focus and it should appear in the guest.

[ngong]

Thank you Perryg,

now I understand what a USB "filter" is about: The concept is to specify exclusion not inclusion. That's a good idea, unfortunately not obvious to me.

However, seems not to work for me.
There are some things I've tried:
- have no or a global filter
- tried to select the USB device in the guest with or without unplugging it first

What is the best time to plug and unplug? After closing the settings window? After starting the guest? After login?

Tried all of them. The USB Devices are left greyed out, unselectable. There is a small indicator at the bottom left of the vbox window telling about USB activity. It always tells me that no USB device is connected while I can see five USB devices in the Devices drop-down list. They do have a checkbox left of the name, but as I said: unselectable.

Do you no of even more simple tests that should work?

Rolf