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Hello Virtualbox forums,

I have currently used virtual box for quite sometime, but i have never ran into this unexplained problem. I am currently trying to learn pen testing with backtrack and i wanted to enabled my Rosewill Easyn1 wireless adapter in virtual box, so i can use it in backtrack for wireless testing. I have successfully installed backtrack, installed virtual box guest additions, virtual box extensions, and have a wired bridge internet networking setup in the guest VM. Now my problem is when i start my linux guest os and go to Devices -> usb devices and select my "Rosewill usb wireless adapter", it kills my wireless that is coming from the same adapter on the windows 8 host.

The part i don't understand is i have windows 7 on my laptop and set up the exact same setup with the same wireless adapter. When i start my backtrack guest OS on my laptop it doesn't kill my host operating system? Can someone please help me fix this problem? I am really hoping this isn't a windows 8 problem.

hardware + software:
Guest OS -> backtrack
wireless adapter -> Rosewill Easyn1
Host OS -> Windows 8

So if I understand correctly, you use your wireless NIC in the host and when you actually switch it in the guest, it's not working in the host anymore?
If yes, that's the normal behaviour, USB cannot be shared and it will only appear in the host or in the guest.

noteirak wrote:So if I understand correctly, you use your wireless NIC in the host and when you actually switch it in the guest, it's not working in the host anymore?
If yes, that's the normal behaviour, USB cannot be shared and it will only appear in the host or in the guest.

Yeah i was assuming a usb wireless adapter can only work with either the host or guest, so i added another wireless adapter to the same pc and it still kills one of the wireless adapters. If i use one wireless adapter for the Host pc and another wireless adapter for the guest is this possible? That would be total of two wireless adapters to connected to the host pc.

The problem is when i open up a linux OS in virtualbox and click on devices -> usb devices and select the other wireless adapter that isn't connected to internet via the host. The host wireless adapter looses connection?

Are they same adapters? (same model, same brand, etc)
Virtualbox grabs any matching devices to the filter, but if you have two exact same dungle, it will grab both...

Do you see two extra NICs appearing in the guest when you only try to grab one?