Stopped before I begin!

[basils57]

Hi, I'm new to this forum, and new to Virtual Machines, so please bear with me.
I have installed VB onto my Win 7 machine, and was following the instructions and trying to load Win XP onto it. However, something happened, and now the screen says "FATAL, No bootable system found. System Halted".
If I reload the VB and press start I get the same message. I can't seem to work it out, could someone please assist in getting me past this and up and running?

[mpack]

Try to be precise when reporting error messages. Happily the error message you mention is commonly reported by newbies, hence I recognize it: "FATAL: No bootable medium found!". And, the message means exactly what it says, which is that none of the virtual drives connected to this VM contains a bootable disk.

If you have a CD mounted in a host drive then make sure that the host drive is mounted in the VMs virtual CD drive. You will also need an XP setup CD (or an ISO image of one) in order to install XP. Make sure any CD you have it isn't just a recovery CD or a service pack only CD.

[basils57]

Apologies for misreading the quote mpack.
I was using an XP setup disc and something got hit by error just after trying to install initially, and that error message appeared. Now I don't seem to be able to get the VB to recognise the disc, every time I try I get the message that I am trying to install an OS which is older than my current, which suggests that VB isn't seeing it.

[mpack]

I get the message that I am trying to install an OS which is older than my current, which suggests that VB isn't seeing it.

It suggests to me more like you might be trying to install XP over your Win7 host instead of in the VM. Perhaps host autoplay kicked in when you inserted the CD, and that confused you into believing you were still looking at the VM.

I suggest deleting the current VM, make an image file of the CD using ImgBurn, and mount the resulting ISO as a virtual CD in a new VM. Being an ISO guarantees that you are not overwriting your host OS, and in general ensures that the host will not interfere.

[basils57]

Thanks for the advice mpack, I will do that and see how I get on.

[basils57]

OK, I completely uninstalled VM Virtual Box and re-installed from scratch. Strangely, I got the same result again, although when I re-installed and started up, my XP details were showing in the preview?
I removed this VM, tried again and the same FATAL message appeared. I removed this VM and decided that just to get a VM, I would install Win7 to get going. This started to load - got to 'Starting Windows' and then failed. I have included the log file if this is of any interest, as that was what was suggested in the failure message.
I thought this exercise was going to be straightforward!

[Martin]

Did you try a VM with less RAM?
The log shows only 3.6GB available and the VM defined with 3GB.
At the end of the log we have some errors:
VM: Raising runtime error 'HostMemoryLow'
message="Unable to allocate and lock memory. The virtual machine will be paused. Please close applications to free up memory or close the VM"

[basils57]

Thanks for that Martin. No, I haven't tried less RAM - do you suggest that's what I should try? If so reduce to what, 2GB?

[noteirak]

2GB is a good amount for Win7 64 bits yes.

[mpack]

OK, I completely uninstalled VM Virtual Box and re-installed from scratch.

Actually, I did not ask you to uninstall VirtualBox - that will do nothing. I asked you to delete the previous VM.

I also asked you to make an ISO image of the install CD so that the last problem would be avoided. You seem to have ignored this.

I suggest sticking with an XP VM. At least that way you'll continue to get the warning when you try to overwrite your host, and anyway your host can't afford the 3GB RAM you are trying to assign to the Win7 VM.

[basils57]

Let me try again with XP, and I appreciate your patience:
I deleted the previous VM. I made an ISO image of the installation CD and mounted as a virtual CD in a new VM, and I only used 2GB of RAM. I got the same result again - FATAL etc.
If it's any use, I've attached a log.

[mpack]

2GB is too much. 512MB is plenty for an XP VM. You could stretch that to 1GB if you wanted to do 3D CAD or something.

The log file shows no indication that you mounted an ISO in the VM. It shows that the VM is still associated with the host D: drive, which I assume is your hosts CD/DVD drive.