Keyboard not working

[Riverbank]

Hi all,

I have a Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 server running VBox 4.2.4
I am having an issue with the keyboard not working at all within my Virtual Machines using VBox. The keyboard works fine with everything else.
This is obviously causing serious issues as I cannot log into Windows without entering a password, and the ease to use keyboard on display does not work either at the logon screen, so I have no way round this.

I am running this on a HP Proliant DL385p Gen8.
All windows updates have been installed.

I can't upgrade the VBox software as I am using Shadowprotect VirtualBoot to restore backup images with, and the latest compatible version with this software is VBox 4.2.4
I have also created a Virtual Machine from scratch using Windows 7 32b ISO image, this had the same issue, so it is nothing to do with the images from ShadowProtect.

Any help would be much appreciated.

[mpack]

Make sure the guest isn't grabbing ownership of the keyboard from the host. I.e. make sure you don't have a blank USB filter that could match a USB keyboard or mouse.

[Riverbank]

The USB Controller setting in VBox is not enabled, so I'm guessing no filters are being applied, if this is what you mean?

[mpack]

Yes, that is what I meant. Ok, not that then.

Where did this VM come from? Was it perchance ported from VMWare or Virtual PC or etc?

I would normally ask for a VM log file (zipped), but I believe the forum has a problem and isn't accepting attachments. You can try it though - the file I want is "VBox.log" from the "Logs" subfolder of the VM folder. Make sure the VM isn't still running when you grab it. Zip it and attach here. Possibly post an offsite link if you can't attach directly.

[Riverbank]

Thanks for helping mpack.

I will try this a little later.
I have found a workaround for now.

It seems that using logmein to remotely connect to the server running vbox and then attempting to use the keyboard in the Virtual Machines did not work, but I have created a direct RDP connection to the server from my machine and this does allow keyboard input within the Virtual machines in vbox.

Also, plugging a keyboard into the server and working directly from there works, but as this server is located at a remote site, this is not practical for me.

It did work via logmein on another server we have with vbox until yesterday, where I ran some windows updates and then it stopped working. I did notice the keyboard driver within device manager changed on this server, perhaps caused by windows updates and restarts. So it seems to me that the virtual machines within vbox no longer recognises the keyboard pass through whilst using logmein.

It would be interesting to find out exactly what the issue is so I will try and upload those logs for you to take a look at soon.

The VMs I am testing with were created from scratch using Windows ISO file and also from our Backup software images using VirtualBoot.

Thanks

[mpack]

There is no keyboard "passthrough" in VirtualBox. The VirtualBox host application gets keystrokes from the host OS like any other app running on that OS. VBox uses those to simulate keystrokes into the guest. If the host considers what you're doing to be normal keystrokes then the guest should be receiving keystrokes too.