Virtual Box Windows 7 64bit

Megaman0 · 05 Sep 2010

Hello all!

I have recently used Virtual Box to emulate my Windows 7 image created by virtual box. The first time I booted into Windows 7, through Virtual Box, it says that windows has been shutdown improperly. How is that possible when that is the first time I used VirtualBox on this computer? Even after"shutting down the virtual OS", when I start it back up again, I still get the "Windows has been shut down improperly screen".

Even when emulating other OS's on other computers, I still get the same message when first booting up the Virtual Os" Windows has been shut down improperly. Is that regular behavior for Virtual Box, or does a specific setting have to be set. It's really annoying.

Thanks everyone!

Pusspa · 05 Sep 2010

this is not normal VirtualBox behaviour. when you say you are using a Win7 image, do you mean an iso image? I have Ubuntu and WinXP as guests on my Win7 host and have not had this problem. Have you tried restarting your Win7 guest using the guest Win7 menu and not the VirtualBox menu?

Night Hawk · 05 Sep 2010

If you simply closed it out by clicking on the X in the upper right hand corner the machine is not shut down properly. That would cause errors like this. When going to close out VBox you first have to shut the particular VM down by the shutdown option found on the main menu bar for the VM open at the time.

Megaman0 · 09 Sep 2010

Guys... I always shut down the virtual box properly... but I still get the windows has not been shut down normal screen. This was "out of the box" behavior. This occurred when I first engaged the image for the first time. This was not my fault. What can I do to prevent this from happening?

Night Hawk · 09 Sep 2010

If you have Windows on VBox you would first want to use the shutdown option as you would with a normal installation on your main drive. The custom install of Windows should only see the restart option however.

From there you click on the menu bar>Machine>close option where you see the 3 choices for saving the machine state, sending the shutdown signal, and simply powering off the VM itself for seeing it closed up.

That only closes up that particular VM bringing you back to the main screen for VBox itself where you can then start up another VM or close the main program. The Windows error is a common annoyance seen with any custom install of Windows on VB for some reason and nothing major.

The solution for this error since VBox has to see the VM and not Windows closed is to simply restart the custom install to reboot and clear the error first before you go to close the VM up. The next time you shouldn't run into this at all. At least that's how it was resolved here when trying XP, Vista, and originally the 32bit 7 RC on it.

Pusspa · 09 Sep 2010

Pusspa said:

...Have you tried restarting your Win7 guest using the guest Win7 menu and not the VirtualBox menu?

Night Hawk said:

...The solution for this error since VBox has to see the VM and not Windows closed is to simply restart the custom install to reboot...

finally we agree!

Night Hawk · 09 Sep 2010

The only version of Windows where this particular "annoyaance" wasn't seen believe it or not was when having custom installed 98SE on VB!

Leave it to an old Legacy version!

Megaman0 · 11 Sep 2010

I also keep getting an E ACCESS Violation every time I start Windows 7 64bit in virtual box. Is that normal behavior as well? ]=

Megaman0 · 11 Sep 2010

And Night Hawk, I tried each of the three selections after clicking close; however, I am still getting the Windows has been shut down improperly boot screen within the virtual box. Not to mention the EPU-4 Engine EAccess Violation. =\

Night Hawk · 11 Sep 2010

I think the main reason you are continuing to still see the error is trying to run the 64bit not 32bit Windows on VBox. I had one quickie install on VB here for short period while most VM wares expect a 32bit OS not 64bit to be run on them.

With the VPC even on the 64bit 7 you can only run the 32bit Vista or 7 on a VHD due to this limitation. I got away with the temp install at the time simply since VB is a little more flexible. One other thing I noticed when custom installing 7 on VB as well as with a few attempts with Vista is that afer a certain amount of time the Windows installs simply would no longer run.

As for the e access error that's seen most often with an outdated device driver or some program on the startup list trying to access invalid memory addresses. Another annoyance is having Windows activated on a VHD and later seeing it activated for a dual boot on the second drive invalidating the first VHD install.

The VHD saw Vista for example installed, activated, and both SPs installed but now shows the activation prompt when not having been run in some time since Vista saw a custom install on the second drive here.