If you want to use Oracle’s VirtualBox on Windows 10, you first need to disable Microsoft’s Hyper-V. I’ve used VirtualBox many times in the past but on the likes of Windows 7, where Hyper-V isn’t installed by default as part of the O/S. It seems on Windows 10 Enterprise, Hyper-V is installed by default and is started as part of the bootup.
Hyper-V blocks all other Hyper Visors like VirtualBox from calling VT hardware, therefore it’s required for it to be disabled.
To check
Run ‘bcdedit’ in Command Prompt as Admin:
C:\Users\anwarz>bcdedit Windows Boot Manager -------------------- identifier {bootmgr} device partition=\Device\HarddiskVolume2 path \EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi description Windows Boot Manager locale en-GB inherit {globalsettings} badmemoryaccess Yes isolatedcontext Yes default {current} resumeobject {a14884a8-6117-11e7-a334-f430b9153789} displayorder {current} toolsdisplayorder {memdiag} timeout 30 Windows Boot Loader ------------------- identifier {current} device partition=C: path \WINDOWS\system32\winload.efi description Windows 10 locale en-GB inherit {bootloadersettings} recoverysequence {a14884aa-6117-11e7-a334-f430b9153789} displaymessageoverride Recovery recoveryenabled Yes badmemoryaccess Yes isolatedcontext Yes allowedinmemorysettings 0x15000075 osdevice partition=C: systemroot \WINDOWS resumeobject {a14884a8-6117-11e7-a334-f430b9153789} nx OptIn bootmenupolicy Standard hypervisorlaunchtype Auto C:\Users\anwarz>
You’ll see it say ‘Auto‘ for hypervisorlaunchtype, this means it was enabled to load at boot. So if this option wasn’t changed since last boot, then Hyper-V is enabled.
To Disable
Run the following command in Command Prompt as Admin:
C:\Users\anwarz>bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype off The operation completed successfully. C:\Users\anwarz>bcdedit Windows Boot Manager -------------------- identifier {bootmgr} device partition=\Device\HarddiskVolume2 path \EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi description Windows Boot Manager locale en-GB inherit {globalsettings} badmemoryaccess Yes isolatedcontext Yes default {current} resumeobject {a14884a8-6117-11e7-a334-f430b9153789} displayorder {current} toolsdisplayorder {memdiag} timeout 30 Windows Boot Loader ------------------- identifier {current} device partition=C: path \WINDOWS\system32\winload.efi description Windows 10 locale en-GB inherit {bootloadersettings} recoverysequence {a14884aa-6117-11e7-a334-f430b9153789} displaymessageoverride Recovery recoveryenabled Yes badmemoryaccess Yes isolatedcontext Yes allowedinmemorysettings 0x15000075 osdevice partition=C: systemroot \WINDOWS resumeobject {a14884a8-6117-11e7-a334-f430b9153789} nx OptIn bootmenupolicy Standard hypervisorlaunchtype Off C:\Users\anwarz>
You’ll see it say ‘Off‘ for hypervisorlaunchtype, this means it is now disabled to load at boot. However, the current boot had this enabled and therefore requires you to reboot to not have Hyper-V loaded.
To Enable
Run the following command in Command Prompt as Admin:
C:\Users\anwarz>bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype auto The operation completed successfully. C:\Users\anwarz>bcdedit Windows Boot Manager -------------------- identifier {bootmgr} device partition=\Device\HarddiskVolume2 path \EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi description Windows Boot Manager locale en-GB inherit {globalsettings} badmemoryaccess Yes isolatedcontext Yes default {current} resumeobject {a14884a8-6117-11e7-a334-f430b9153789} displayorder {current} toolsdisplayorder {memdiag} timeout 30 Windows Boot Loader ------------------- identifier {current} device partition=C: path \WINDOWS\system32\winload.efi description Windows 10 locale en-GB inherit {bootloadersettings} recoverysequence {a14884aa-6117-11e7-a334-f430b9153789} displaymessageoverride Recovery recoveryenabled Yes badmemoryaccess Yes isolatedcontext Yes allowedinmemorysettings 0x15000075 osdevice partition=C: systemroot \WINDOWS resumeobject {a14884a8-6117-11e7-a334-f430b9153789} nx OptIn bootmenupolicy Standard hypervisorlaunchtype Auto C:\Users\anwarz>
You’ll see it say ‘Auto‘ for hypervisorlaunchtype, this means it is now enabled to load at boot. However, the current boot had this disabled and therefore requires you to reboot to have Hyper-V loaded.
Just a note, I’ve not got anything against Hyper-V, we use it quite frequently, it’s stable, however in this instance, I want to use VirtualBox which I am more accustomed for certain features 🙂
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Thanks
Zed DBA (Zahid Anwar)