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I am trying to work out how to enable hibernation for my Windows Guest and this is what I get

C:\Windows\system32>powercfg.exe /hibernate on
Hibernation failed with the following error: The request is not supported.

The following items are preventing hibernation on this system.
The system firmware does not support hibernation.

I understand why suspend would not be implemented but as hibernation is mostly a software-based feature I can't understand why it would be disabled

My reasoning behind this is so I can clone my virtual machine states when my virtual machine is hibernated, I am troubleshooting an application in my virtual machine and it depends on my being able to do this

Powercfg controls a guest feature, typically found in laptops.

Is there some reason why you aren't just using the VirtualBox feature? Just click the close button on the VM window, and choose "Save the machine state" on the menu which appears.

as hibernation is mostly a software-based feature

Actually, hibernation is closely tied to hardware. Consider that whatever the hardware is doing when the user says to hibernate, the system must essentially shut down, all information on what was going on would be stored, then the hardware shuts off. Now when the computer is restarted, the drivers must be capable of restoring the hardware to exactly the same state it was in before hibernation, then letting the OS proceed as if nothing had happened. So drivers capable of hibernating from within the OS and restoring afterwards must be available. Virtualbox appears to have not provided that.

Sounds like Stephen.C is wanting to shut off his running guest, leaving it powered off but in a running state so it can come back on right where it left off, and clone it while it is in that "hibernated" state. Question is, can Virtualbox clone while the guest is save-stated?

scottgus1 wrote:Question is, can Virtualbox clone while the guest is save-stated?

I wouldn't recommend it, but yes I'm pretty sure it can.