virtualbox.org

I've both Googled and searched here about something which would seem to be obvious - but apparently isn't. That is - how does one format and write to CD/DVDs and DVD-RAM from a Windows Guest in V-Box, running in a Linux Host?

The Windows Guest is Win2k-SP4. The Host is PCLinuxOS-2007. (Not running Beryl / Compiz, etc.)

The V-Box version is the current Sun Site version with USB-etc.

Guest Additions are in, and both USB and Shared Directory are working.

The application I'm attempting to run from Win2k is Roxio-6.1. While now 5 years old, it works 100% - including with DVD-RAM - in the 98SE I'm dual-booting with Linux. It does also work in installed Win2k.

I also have Roxio-7 - at present in another PC, but that could be shifted.

Any help would be very much appreciated, thanks.

Regards, Dave.

There have been quite a few posts on the limitations in VBox CD/DVD support. If you look at the code for the DVD storage device, this really only supports reading from ISO files, so CD/DVD authoring will not work, and neither will CD audio ripping. All I can suggest is that you register with the trac system and add your comments to http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/903

Terry - Thanks for your attention.

Maybe the new version of Wine will allow such functions.

> I'd buy Crossover Linux if that did it.

Thanks again.

Regards, Dave.

You know k3b, k9copy, lxdvdrip, brasero, ...?

Stefan - I'm running Windows 2000 in V-Box with PCLinuxOS as the Host.

I wanted to be able to write DVDs, etc from Win2k...

PCLOS as a Linux O/S has all of the things you mention - but none of them work from Win2k...

Regards, Dave.

Yes. But you can burn with Linux. Why using Windows to burn?

Yes Wine 1.1 might give you what you want. The other alternative is to use say samba-server on your PCLinuxOS to offer up a fileshare (this seems to be a tad more stable than VBox filesharing) and mount this in your W2K VM. If you W2K authoring S/W can create an ISO (which most can do) on this share instead of a burn, then as long as you have the spare HDD space you can use a two step process: create the ISO in W2K, then burn it to DVD using the sort of package that Stefan mentioned. An 8Gb memory stick is another alternative.

Perhaps a bit slower and slightly more complex, but this way you get to keep your W2K app functionality and can burn to disk.

I have been able to authorise and burn a DVD from Nero (Nero Vision) using a guest Windows XP. My host system was Mandriva 2008.1. The resulting DVD was perfectly playable in my portable DVD player.

The only thing I had to do is to enable Passtrough in the CD/DVD-ROM settings. I also made sure my DVD was not automatically mounted in my host system. As far as I know VirtualBox accesses the hardware as device (like /dev/hda) and not as mounted apparatus (like /mount/cdrom). If the host system automatically mounts /dev/hda to /mount/cdrom there could be some troubles writing the hardware directly. Again - I am not sure this is the case, but everything seems to work if I choose this setup.

Notice I only tested the above settings using a IDE DVD-burner. If this also works if you are using a SATA device I cannot say.

In Linux you can indeed use K3B (or Nero Linux if you want to pay some money). DVD authoring software is also available for Linux, but I must say it is rather primitive and a bit buggy at this moment. You can try out QDVDAuthor, DeVeDe, todiscGUI or DVD Author Wizzard. Copying a DVD can be done with K9copy and just ripping a DVD with dvd::rip.

So - here are several solutions. I hope this is helpfull..

Thanks for the steer. I guess that I need to look at the Passthough code a little closer. The learning journey continues.