I’ve been running Ubuntu Linux 10.03 on a VirtualBox VM with the Windows 7 host PC. Works fine. Updated to Ubuntu 10.10 – the Maverick Meekat, restarted the system, and now it comes up in console mode and asks for a user/pass. I give it what I have, and it doesn’t accept it. Hosed. Gee ain’t Linux grand.
Hmmm. Let me try again. Ah, it accepted another username/password, which is not the one in my Keepass database, now that needs maintenance.
GUI
But, now how do I get the Ubuntu gui back. Tried to reinstall the Guest Additions. Nope, even though I do the Devices->Install Guest Additions, I don’t see the CD in /media/cdrom folder.
At the end of this blog post the author has:
The Unixmen’s site has a workaround to the X Window issue. Run the following commands:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install build-essential linux-headers-$(uname -r)
sudo apt-get install virtualbox-ose-guest-x11
I was prompted whether or not I wanted to keep my current configuration file or replace it, I chose to keep it.
Once the last command finishes reboot the virtual machine. The display can then be resized.
It works! Ubuntu is back to normal.
Incidentally, I also had to remove etckeeper. Its been giving some trouble for a while now.
Update:
11Oct10: Oracle just released VirtualBox 3.2.10, that probably fixes this issue.
Thanks for the article! Saved my life.
Just thought you might like to know, VirtualBox 3.2.10 does not fix this problem.
Cheers.
@Tony and anyone else
the Guest additions v3.2.10 works for me. You’ll have to install the guest additions too, not just update Virtualbox itself.
I had the same problem and followed the suggested way above to solve it, which it did. After another reboot, I installed the newest Guest additions which removed the OSE-guest additions previously installed and the problem didn’t reoccure.