Posted: 7/5/2013 12:29:44 PM EDT
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My SSD recently hiccuped and zimmermaned all data. As in totally erased all partitions. Tried three different partition recovery programs, to no avail. Just poof, gone. SO... great time to just go over to the nerd side and use linux...
I'm running ubuntu 12.04 LTS I've got virtualbox installed and running a Windows 7 64bit virtual OS on it. The virtual disk for this VM is a 50gig virtual disk file saved on an old 80 gig HDD I had sitting in my PC doing nothing at the moment. My objective is to try to access and run stuff from my 1TB physical HDD that has all my old windows programs and documents on it. But I can't figure out how to make the windows VM "see" any other physical drives. I think it must be possible to do, since it does see my physical DVD read/write drive. Plz hep a noob. I don't know wtf I am doing. My sum total of experience with linux before this was running a free cnc control software on a dedicated controller box. I don't know any terminal commands or nuffin. |
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https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads Download the extension pack from there, and install it. Then open the settings for the virtual machine (or go to the devices menu if it's already running) and you'll be able to add your hard drive from there. If it's a USB hard drive, you can add it as a USB device. If it's a SATA (internal) hard drive you'll have to add it as a shared folder. |
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Quoted: Wow, I've got an oooold version. 4.1.12 That's what the ubuntu software center had so I just figured it was the latest... Installing the latest now then I'll get the extension pack. Thanks. Some stuff I'm liking about linux... other things, not so much. It's different. Takes some getting used to. |
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Quoted: You may want to look at Linux Mint, preferably the Cinnamon flavor. +1 on Mint in most situations. Used to love Ubuntu but since they have gotten kind of retarded, especially with the UI. It is still Ubuntu at the core however. Definitely stick with Debian based distros. |
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Quoted:
https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads Download the extension pack from there, and install it. Then open the settings for the virtual machine (or go to the devices menu if it's already running) and you'll be able to add your hard drive from there. If it's a USB hard drive, you can add it as a USB device. If it's a SATA (internal) hard drive you'll have to add it as a shared folder. Hm.. I'm still stuck. I've got the HDD in question selected as a shared folder in virtualbox control panel, but it still doesn't show it in the windows virtual OS. Not even under windows disk management. And I still haven't been able to find this mythical "devices" menu in virtualbox. I feel like I'm going crazy or I'm using some different program than anyone else. 
eta: RTFM helps... |
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Not sure if you got it or not, but the Devices menu I was talking about is on the menu bar of the VM window. For the shared folder part, this is from the Help files: In a Windows guest, shared folders are browseable and therefore visible in Windows Explorer. So, to attach the host's shared folder to your Windows guest, open Windows Explorer and look for it under "My Networking Places" -> "Entire Network" -> "VirtualBox Shared Folders". By right-clicking on a shared folder and selecting "Map network drive" from the menu that pops up, you can assign a drive letter to that shared folder. Alternatively, on the Windows command line, use the following: net use x: \\vboxsvr\sharename While <code class="computeroutput">vboxsvr</code> is a fixed name (note that <code class="computeroutput">vboxsrv</code> would also work), replace "x:" with the drive letter that you want to use for the share, and <code class="computeroutput">sharename</code> with the share name specified with <code class="computeroutput">VBoxManage.</code> |
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I wasn't able to find the devices menu for the virtual machine (seriously, it's just not there. Not visible), but I did find a tutorial that had a keyboard shortcut to it. host + D
That let me mount the vboxguestadditions.iso (in fact, it automatically mounted that particular image when I used the shortcut) so I could install the package within the windows OS that would allow shared folders to work. Roundabout way, but it works... Thanks. 
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Quoted:
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You may want to look at Linux Mint, preferably the Cinnamon flavor. +1 on Mint in most situations. Used to love Ubuntu but since they have gotten kind of retarded, especially with the UI. It is still Ubuntu at the core however. Definitely stick with Debian based distros. I prefer Mint 14+ Cinnamon as well. However, Ubuntu 12.10 and Mint 14 did not support my netbooks graphics card where 12.04 and Mint 13 did. Haven't had time to try 15 yet but my guess is the support will not appear until the next LTS version appears. Only real thing I prefer Ubuntu over Mint for is upgrading. You can't delta upgrade from one release to the next in Mint like you can in Ubuntu. |
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Quoted: I wasn't able to find the devices menu for the virtual machine (seriously, it's just not there. Not visible), but I did find a tutorial that had a keyboard shortcut to it. host + D That let me mount the vboxguestadditions.iso (in fact, it automatically mounted that particular image when I used the shortcut) so I could install the package within the windows OS that would allow shared folders to work. Roundabout way, but it works... Thanks. |
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Quoted:
Quoted:
I wasn't able to find the devices menu for the virtual machine (seriously, it's just not there. Not visible), but I did find a tutorial that had a keyboard shortcut to it. host + D That let me mount the vboxguestadditions.iso (in fact, it automatically mounted that particular image when I used the shortcut) so I could install the package within the windows OS that would allow shared folders to work. Roundabout way, but it works... Thanks. Thanks, I found that suggestion looking through google, but I must be stupid because even though it does change between compressed/non modes, it still doesn't show me that particular menu. You know, I'm actually having the same kind of problem in nautilus file system browser. People have suggestions that involve File->Preferences... but I can't see these menus. |