VirtualBox won't start any VMs (says kernel module is not loaded)

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13

Yes, i rebooted

14

Please provide the output of:

lsmod | grep vbox
15

I already followed these instructions and it doesn’t work

16

This doesn’t output anything

17

Then you have other problems …

18

Yes, thats why i created this thread.

19

That’s yer prawblem right there, then. if, as you claim, you followed:

completely, then it would’ve looked similar to:

$ lsmod | grep vbox
vboxnetflt             32768  0
vboxnetadp             28672  0
vboxdrv               581632  2 vboxnetadp,vboxnetflt

So my next question is, how did you install it?

20

If you really did following the guide - you would know that the correct command to reload the modules is

sudo vboxreload

You need to decide which host module package you will use.

If you go down the dkms road - the one I personally prefer - you need the headers for your running kernel - and the host module packages are mutually exclusive.

Assuming you go down the dkms road and you are using linux66

sudo pacman -Syu virtualbox-host-dkms dkms linux66-headers

This will build the required modules. Without rebooting

sudo vboxreload

Note: I have corrected the wiki to display the correct command

21

In the wiki it says vbox-reload, but vboxreload outputs:

Unloading modules: 
Loading modules: modprobe: FATAL: Module vboxnetadp not found in directory /lib/modules/6.6.23-1-MANJARO
modprobe: FATAL: Module vboxnetflt not found in directory /lib/modules/6.6.23-1-MANJARO
modprobe: FATAL: Module vboxdrv not found in directory /lib/modules/6.6.23-1-MANJARO
22

First i enabled svm (Amd Hardware Virtualization) in my bios, then i ran

sudo pacman -Syu virtualbox linux66-virtualbox-host-modules

and afterwards rebooted my system twice.

23

What happens (post the output of) when you run:

sudo modprobe vboxdrv
24

I tried this (didn’t explicitly install dmks and linux66-headers before), but after running sudo vboxreload is still get

Unloading modules: 
Loading modules: modprobe: FATAL: Module vboxnetadp not found in directory /lib/modules/6.6.23-1-MANJARO
modprobe: FATAL: Module vboxnetflt not found in directory /lib/modules/6.6.23-1-MANJARO
modprobe: FATAL: Module vboxdrv not found in directory /lib/modules/6.6.23-1-MANJARO
25 
modprobe: FATAL: Module vboxdrv not found in directory /lib/modules/6.6.23-1-MANJARO
26

There is something utterly out of whack with your system.

I am running the exact same kernel

15:32:06 ○ [fh@tiger] ~
 $ uname -a
Linux tiger 6.6.23-1-MANJARO #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Wed Mar 27 14:11:44 UTC 2024 x86_64 GNU/Linux

15:33:10 ○ [fh@tiger] ~
 $ sudo vboxreload
[sudo] password for fh: 
Unloading modules: vboxnetadp vboxnetflt vboxdrv 
Loading modules: vboxnetadp vboxnetflt vboxdrv

It is impossible to guess - since all your efforts are done the right way - I have no idea … completely blank.

27

Mmh, i don’t experience any other issues…

Well i guess i’ll try QEMU then if no one else has any ideas…

Thanks anyways!

28

You could do that - my last question is - do you by any chance use btrfs on your root filesystem?

29

Yes, i use btrfs.

Also my root is encrypted with luks, if that makes any difference.

30

Dang - I think your filesystem has gotten confused with all the adding and removing packages.

I have experienced that myself with btrfs - more than once … one of my main reassons for not running btrfs on production system.

Virtual machines hosted on btfs filesystem is a recipe for disaster - be sure to disable CoW for the partition or subvolume where you plan to store the VMs.

Possilby you need to do some maintenance on the filesystem - please see Btrfs Maintenance - Manjaro

Technically it shouldn’t make any difference…

31

Ok i’ll keep that in mind with QEMU and take a look into the maintenance article, thanks.

32

Please do fix the underlying issue before heading out for new adventures on the current system.