Win11 guest created with 6.x virtualbox no longer booting on 7.x

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1

Kernel on host is 6.0.15-1. Problem as in subject line.

When I try to start the VM, I get:

Failed to load the NVRAM store from the file (VERR_VFS_UNSUPPORTED_FORMAT).

Can't attach Nvram Storage driver (VERR_VFS_UNSUPPORTED_FORMAT).

|Result Code:|NS_ERROR_FAILURE (0X80004005)|
| --- | --- |
|Component:|ConsoleWrap|
|Interface:|IConsole {6ac83d89-6ee7-4e33-8ae6-b257b2e81be8}|
2

I noticed that my extensions were 7.0.2 but my virtualbox is 7.0.4. I updated, hoping that this would make the issue go away, but it didn’t.

4

you misunderstood me, I already updated my virtualbox extensions, but the problem persists.

5

someone else experienced the same error recently but did not disclose the solution:

6

Someone else reported this issue on the virtualbox forum

https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=108234

and found that changing the name of the VM made the error go away. I tried this, but the error persists.

7

I don’t know if virtualbox uses semantic versioning - if they do - the major release number usually signals breaking changes - no backwards compatibility.

If I recall - the efi image which has changed from v6 to v7.

The change has to do with the requirements of win11 - tpm and secureboot.

Without any way of testing - as there may be implications involvning your activation key - you could try the following

  1. Open the folder with your current win11 vm.
  2. Assuming your current vm’s name is win11
  3. Create a backup copy of the win11.nvram file
    cp win11.nvram win11.nvram.bak
  4. Create a new win11 named win11vbox7
  5. don’t install or boot it - the only interesting about the vm is the .nvram file.
  6. Open the folder with the new vm
  7. Copy the new nvram file to your existing vm
  8. Replace your current win11.nvram with the newname.nvram file e.g.
    cp win11vbox7.nvram ../win11/win11.nvram
  9. Start your old vm

If it works - then

:partying_face:

1 Like
8

It worked :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile:

The win11 guest started booting again after this.

(It froze during the boot process though; but another site that talked about win11 guests no longer booting about the 6->7 VB upgrade recommended turning off 3d acceleration, and that worked for me too. )

9

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