[SOLVED] USB & Printer not working in Windows Guest;

[LeonG]

I do hope someone can help me. I have tried the FAQ's, a search of the Forum,and Google but to no avail.
Problem:
Linux host (Mandriva 2011), Brother printer on USB.
Windows 7 Professional 64bit Guest
Virtual Box 4.1.16r70894 with Extension Pack 4.1.16
Guest additions installed.
The guest says there are no USB devices attached ( but I have 3 drives, a memory card reader, and the printer on USB ports) and I cannot get the printer to work, either as USB or as a network printer through the host. Network set to "Bridged Adapter" and in the Advanced tab the Adapter type is "Intel Pro/100MT Desktop (82540EM)

What I have tried:

Does not work whether I do it as root or user.
I have added myself to the vboxuser group and rebooted.
I have added myself to the group "disk" without result.
File /etc/udev/rules.d/vbox-additions.rules contains:

Code: Select all

KERNEL=="vboxguest", NAME="vboxguest", OWNER="root", MODE="0660"
KERNEL=="vboxuser", NAME="vboxuser", OWNER="root", MODE="0666"

I am at a loss and would welcome whatever suggestions you may have. It is important for me to be able to print from the VM for work.
thank you all in advance.

[Perryg]

Try adding your user name to the lp group on the host.

Can you access any USB device on the guest at all?

[LeonG]

I rebooted and was able to access the USB ports, but the system kept freezing and became unstable. I removed the VM and its files and tried to reinstall and now I get a message that Windows files are corrupted and cannot be installed. This is the install disk. The system cannot repair itself or do anything else. For now i am fried and may need to purchase a new windows disk. Next step is to remove and reinstall Virtual box. Thanks for your response.

[LeonG]

I have been away for a while trying to fix things and thought I would share my final resolution.

Don't know what happened to cause all the instability, but finally removed the Windows guest and tried to remove VirtualBox. That didn't go well at first and found I had to rebuild by rpm data base, then remove and reinstall Virtual Box (twice!), but finally it installed and ran nicely. This time when it began, it recognized all my USB devices. I think something must have been wrong with the first install when nothing was recognized. Then installed the extension pack, and then installed the guest additions. Once all that was done I reinstalled the Windows OS guest and this time the same install disk worked with no errors. (Go figure?) I added lp as user to the vboxuser group and my username to the lp group.

Anyhow, after that I found a post on one of the linux forums (sorry, I can't find it again so I am unable to link to it), but it suggested connecting the guest to the host via network sharing to get access to a hosts USB printer, so I set my Linux host to be a Samba server and do Samba sharing, set the Virtual Box to use the Bridged Adapter for network and then opened the Windows guest and set it to find the Samba shares as well as the printer. Samba was set to share both folders and printers on the guest. Now I have access to the printer as well as folders with documents I need.

This has been a journey. Don't know what went wrong in the first place. Almost fried my whole system, but thankfully was able to recover.
Best wishes to all.
Leon

[mpack]

Anyhow, after that I found a post on one of the linux forums (sorry, I can't find it again so I am unable to link to it), but it suggested connecting the guest to the host via network sharing to get access to a hosts USB printer

That is the standard advice on this site too. Obviously assigning the printer to the VM via USB would disrupt the hosts use of that printer, hence not desirable.