Changing the guest resolution

[jak888]

Hi,

yesterday I set up a windows 7 guest system on my windows 7 host system. So far it works really nicely except for the screen resolution. I would like to set the resolution to the 1600x900 that's native to my laptop. Naturally I did some research and found many threads and topics. All of which told me to open a command line window, navigate to C:\Programs\Oracle\VirtualBox\ and execute the command:

Code: Select all

VBoxManage.exe setextradata "Win 7 64 Eng" CustomVideoMode1 1600x900x24

When I enter this command, sometimes it doesn't react at all, then I get the Error Message:

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VBoxManage.exe: error: Failed to create the VirtualBox object!
VBoxManage.exe: error: Code CO_E_SERVER_EXEC_FAILURE (0x80080005) - Server execution failed (extended info not available)
VBoxManage.exe: error: Most likely, the VirtualBox COM server is not running or failed to start.

Needless to say, the resolution is not available in the Virtual Box after this.

Can you suggest anything else I should try?

Thanks in advance for your help.

[Perryg]

Use the host+F toggle to go in to full screen. If you have not setup a manual size with your commands it will be the same resolution that the host uses.

Note: that is of course only going to work if yo have installed the guest additions in the guest.

[jak888]

Hi Perryg,

this worked fine.

I have read about the guest extensions before and i have already installed them into the virtual box manager, but not in the guest system. A look into the manual solved it, then.

Thanks a lot.

[mpack]

I have read about the guest extensions before and i have already installed them into the virtual box manager, but not in the guest system

"guest xxxx" is for the guest, so you didn't install "guest anything" in the host.

You install the extension pack (a.k.a VBox software plugins) in the host. You install Guest Additions (a.k.a. guest OS specific drivers and tools for VM hardware, including display drivers allowing you to resize the display) in the guest.