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I'm trying to install Windows XP Service Pack 1 from an original DVD dated 2002. The host is a 27" iMac running OSX 10.6.8 connected to the internet via wi-fi. The problem is I cannot get XP to connect to the internet.

I'm very familiar with OSX, but know next to nothing about XP. This is what I've done:

1. Installed the latest VirtualBox.
2. Installed XP from the DVD, selecting 64-bit. Should I have selected 32-bit?
3. Ran XP and went to VB > Devices > Insert Guest Additions and selected the Desktop as the location. I now have a folder called VirtualBox Guest Additions on the Desktop.
4. Windows says I have 30 days remaining, but when I clicked on the "To Activate" button it eventually comes back that I am not online so I can't activate.
5. I tried to set up the internet within XP, but I am unable to do so.
6. I've spent an hour or so reading about NAT and Bridging and all sorts of other things that I don't understand and which I don't know where to find in XP or how to set them up.

QUES 1
Am I able to connect to the internet via wifi with what I have done above? If so, I would appreciate clear instructions as to how I go about it within XP. But please, instructions like "Select NAT" mean nothing to me. I need to know exactly how to find such a thing.

QUES 2
I have some firewire external drives formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Will I be able to access data on them from XP?

QUES 3
I have an external drive formatted to NTFS, connected bia USB. Will I be able to access it from XP?

None of the drives mentioned above appear under "My Computer" within XP.

I have not rebooted the computer after setting up XP within VB (downloading a 90-day version of Windows 7 is taking several hours). Could that be the problem?

Thanks in advance for any assistance.

guyburns wrote:I'm trying to install Windows XP Service Pack 1 from an original DVD dated 2002. The host is a 27" iMac running OSX 10.6.8 connected to the internet via wi-fi. The problem is I cannot get XP to connect to the internet.

I'm very familiar with OSX, but know next to nothing about XP. This is what I've done:

1. Installed the latest VirtualBox.
2. Installed XP from the DVD, selecting 64-bit. Should I have selected 32-bit?
3. Ran XP and went to VB > Devices > Insert Guest Additions and selected the Desktop as the location. I now have a folder called VirtualBox Guest Additions on the Desktop.
4. Windows says I have 30 days remaining, but when I clicked on the "To Activate" button it eventually comes back that I am not online so I can't activate.
5. I tried to set up the internet within XP, but I am unable to do so.
6. I've spent an hour or so reading about NAT and Bridging and all sorts of other things that I don't understand and which I don't know where to find in XP or how to set them up.

The default Windows XP 64-bit is fine.

QUES 1
Am I able to connect to the internet via wifi with what I have done above? If so, I would appreciate clear instructions as to how I go about it within XP. But please, instructions like "Select NAT" mean nothing to me. I need to know exactly how to find such a thing.

NAT is the default setting. So if you did not change anything then your VM should already be configured to use NAT. NAT should work out of the box if your host is somehow connected to the Internet. Make sure that your host has Internet access when you boot the VM. The VM window also has several small icons in the status bar. One of them is the networking icon. Check if there is text like "Adapter 1 (NAT): connected".

QUES 2
I have some firewire external drives formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Will I be able to access data on them from XP?

VirtualBox is not able to talk to firewire devices. But you might want to mount your external device to your host and share the mount point (== the directory where your external device is mounted) with the guest. This can be done using the Guest Additions / Shared Folders. But this is explained in the user manual.

QUES 3
I have an external drive formatted to NTFS, connected bia USB. Will I be able to access it from XP?

That probably works with USB.

None of the drives mentioned above appear under "My Computer" within XP.

I have not rebooted the computer after setting up XP within VB (downloading a 90-day version of Windows 7 is taking several hours). Could that be the problem?

Thanks in advance for any assistance.

As I said above, when you boot your guest then make sure that the host is connected to the Internet. And also make sure that the Guest Additions are correctly installed. How this can be done is described in the user manual as well. The Guest Additions are not required for networking but for shared folders.

assuming you didn't change anything in the network settings inside the XP guest you can't fix, you need to shutdown the guest, open VirtualBox, in the Network settings for the guest It doesn't matter if you use NAT or Bridged but where the drop down menu which says "Name:" you need to select the Wi-Fi (AirPort) option. Then you should be good to go as far as connecting.

I would stick with what Frank suggested: the "Attached to" field in that dialog should say "NAT".

Thanks for the responses. Because I couldn't register it, I'd actually given up on Windows XP and removed it from VB. I then downloaded a 90-day version of Windows 7 which installed easily and automatically connected to the internet. But… Windows XP was only about 600MB on disk, whereas Windows 7 was 10 times that, so I've deleted Windows 7 and will try again with XP right now.

Back again, but no luck with the internet. I followed the instructions above, and when I look at the VirtualBox Manager window, under Network it says:

"Adapter 1: IntelPRO/1000 MT Desktop (Bridged Adapter, en1: Airport)"

But there is no internet connection and Windows is counting down the days remaining to activate. Any other suggestions, given that Windows 7 was able to connect to the internet without me doing anything.

Might the problem be with Internet Explorer? The version I have dates from 2002. Should I try Google Chrome or Firefox?

guyburns wrote:Back again, but no luck with the internet. I followed the instructions above, and when I look at the VirtualBox Manager window, under Network it says:

"Adapter 1: IntelPRO/1000 MT Desktop (Bridged Adapter, en1: Airport)"

But there is no internet connection and Windows is counting down the days remaining to activate. Any other suggestions, given that Windows 7 was able to connect to the internet without me doing anything.

Might the problem be with Internet Explorer? The version I have dates from 2002. Should I try Google Chrome or Firefox?

nothing to do with what browser you use. since Windows 7 connected without a problem I'm thinking you should try changing the adapter1 type to PCnet-FAST III under Advanced . Might help.

loukingjr wrote:nothing to do with what browser you use. since Windows 7 connected without a problem I'm thinking you should try changing the adapter1 type to PCnet-FAST III under Advanced . Might help.

I think you may be correct. I believe that SP1 of Win XP does not have a driver for the IntelPRO/1000 MT Desktop adapter. The OP will need to connect using the PCnet-FAST III and then update Win XP.

It's now all go thanks to the knowledgeable responses above. Pity it's so difficult to do. I found that all drives, Firewire and USB, can be shared.

For my future reference, and for any other novice interested in running Windows XP or 7 on a Mac under OSX 10.6.8, here's how to do it with VirtualBox:

Windows XP
1. Open VirtualBox and click New inside the Oracle VM VirtualBox Manager window.

2. Give the new OS a name and location. It can be installed anywhere.

3. Select the install disk or .iso file and click Start to begin the installation.

4. Windows XP will not automatically connect to the internet, though Windows 7 will. To set up internet connection via Airport:
a. Shut down VirtualBox and reopen
b. Navigate to Settings > Network and set these options:
• Attached to: Bridged Adapter
• Name: en1: Airport
• Advanced > Adapter Type: PCnet-Fast 111 (Am79C973). All other settings at default.

5. When Windows XP is installed there is no capability for storage or reading from disks. Shared folders (where files can be stored or retrieved) have to be set up by the Guest Additions package called VBoxGuestAdditions.iso file contained with the VirtualBox application. Luckily, Windows XP can set up shared folders semi-automatically. Not so for Windows 7 (see below).

6. Run Windows XP from within VirtualBox.

7. Go to Devices > Insert Guest Additions CD Image … A Setup Wizard will appear. Do as the instructions say. Messages from Windows will appear saying that this software has not passed certain tests. Install anyway.

8. Select Reboot when asked.

9. To allow Windows to see drives or folders, shut down Windows and within the VirtualBox Manager window click on Settings > Shared Folders > Add folders (“+” sign to the right) > Folder Path > Other, navigate to the disk or folder and select Auto-Mount. To add additional folders, hit the “+” sign on the right side of the window.

10. Within VirtualBox, and with Windows XP selected, choose Start to boot into Windows and the folders should appear under My Computer > Network Drives.

11. To uninstall VirtualBox run the uninstaller contained in the install package. It is a Terminal document which opens and runs to do the de-installation.

Windows 7
The auto install for the Guest Additions does not seem to work for Windows 7, it has to be installed manually. You will need the VBoxGuestAdditions.iso file contained with the VirtualBox application. Right click on the VirtualBox icon in Finder and choose Show Package Contents. The iso file is located in the Contents > MacOS folder. Extract it and save as part of the VirtualBox install files.

1. Go to Devices > CD/DVD Devices > Choose a virtual CD/DVD disk file. This will bring up Windows 7 and a dialog box. Navigate to VBoxGuestAdditions.iso and open it. This will present the file to Windows 7.

2. Within Windows 7 navigate to the newly installed file via My Computer. It will appear as a CD called VirtualBox Guest Additions. Double click to open it and follow the prompts. If the prompts don’t appear, close Windows (which will say it can’t close because the VirtualBox app is running), then choose Close and the app will appear. The relevant software will be installed in a minute or so. Tick the box that says “Accept files from Virtual Box” to speed the installation.

3. Reboot Windows to activate the Additions, then shut down Windows again, and reboot to add drives and folders.

guyburns wrote:I
For my future reference, and for any other novice interested in running Windows XP or 7 on a Mac under OSX 10.6.8, here's how to do it with VirtualBox:

I know you mean well but much of the information you posted is either incorrect, redundant or available in the user's manual or on the forum.

For example, as far as Windows 7 you only need to choose "Insert Guest Additions CD Image" from the Devices menu or press Host+D and the CD image will be mounted on the Windows 7 guest. At that point if it doesn't bring up the dialog window which asks if you want to run the program or open the folder to view the files, (which it does on my Windows 7 install), you just need to click on the image which is now mounted on the D: drive and dbl-click the VboxWindowsAdditions.exe file.

guyburns wrote:For my future reference...

ISTM that from the "First Steps" chapter of the user manual, "1.7 Creating your first virtual machine" does everything you attempted to do in that post. If people aren't reading the user manual or the GUI help then for sure they won't be reading your post either.

Hi guyburns,

Thanks for your post. I didn't realise that there was a option to change the hardware the virtual WinXP sees. Or that it wouldn't work with NAT. You are right, it really isn't apparent from the manual.
You helped me a bunch! Thank you!

Mittens wrote: I didn't realise that there was a option to change the hardware the virtual WinXP sees.

That what the settings in VirtualBox do for any OS, including XP.

Or that it wouldn't work with NAT.

XP certainly works with NAT. All guests work with NAT. It's why NAT is set as the default for all guests.

Mittens wrote:Or that it wouldn't work with NAT.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by that, but the above thread doesn't say that NAT doesn't work in XP, it says that the network adapter which the OP chose for the guest would not work in his installation of XP. The networking mode didn't really matter, though NAT is nearly always the easiest to get working.

The XP template for VirtualBox selects a network card which a standard XP install has native drivers for, and selects NAT as the default mode. As long as newbies leave the settings alone, and use legit XP install CDs then they shouldn't have any trouble.

Hello,

This is my first post here. I'd like to share how I solved this same problem I had. This is for the NAT configuration.

I installed WinXP and there was no internet connection... Then by reading this thread I had this idea.

What I did:

I - Installed guest additions
II - Configured the shared folders (In windows XP, accessed the network and browsed for the folder in the network)
III - Downloaded the driver for windows xp - Network Adapter Drivers for Windows XP*, Final Release - File name: PRO2K3XP_32.exe - link: (can't post it yet... but it is in the downloadcenter on intel website)
IV - Put the file in the shared folder
V - Accessed it and installed from the Windows XP VM.
VI - Happiness!