Virtualbox module gone after latest update

[Stan Schymanski]

Hi Daniel,

This is great, thanks a lot! Just a small addition, the virtualbox guest 
additions had to be removed before installation, i.e.

1. remove all virtualbox packages from the host:

sudo apt remove --purge virtualbox virtualbox-dkms virtualbox-qt 
virtualbox-guest-additions-iso

Plus I got an error message asking to install sudo apt-get install 
libqt5x11extras5:amd64. After doing this, I was able to start my virtual 
machine again. THANK YOU!

Stan


On 02/16/2017 10:33 AM, Daniel Baumann wrote:
> Hi Stan,
>
> background
> ==========
>
> in general: virtualbox consists of several components, most prominently
> virtualbox (the application itself) and virtualbox-dkms (the kernel module).
>
> in order to run virtualbox, two things need to be done:
>
>    1. virtualbox and virtualbox-dkms need to be at the same version
>    2. virtualbox-dms and the kernel/kernel-headers need to be compatible
>
> for your specific case:
>
>    * you have a jessie system with debian-backports enabled.
>    * debian-backports ship random backports of various packages,
>      that not necessarily work together or are coordinated together.
>    * at the moment jessie-backports has linux 4.9.0 (which is the current
>      version), but only virtualbox 5.1.8 (which is outdated, the current
>      version would be 5.1.14).
>
> or in other words: the version of virtualbox is too old for your
> kernel/the kernel is too new for your virtualbox.
>
> this is one of the reasons that we maintain a list of "essential"
> backports ourself, to ensure that the whole stack works at all times
> together and is optimal in sync.
>
> unfortunatly, we stopped supporting jessie/jessie-backports in fall
> 2016, so you cannot use packages from us to update virtualbox.
>
>
> solution
> ========
>
> there are two ways to get it working again:
>
>    * either you downgrade your kernel (not recommended)
>    * or you install virtualbox 5.1.14 from virtualbox.org (recommended).
>
> installing virtualbox would work like that:
>
>    1. remove all virtualbox packages from the host:
>       sudo apt remove --purge virtualbox virtualbox-dkms virtualbox-qt
>
>    2. make sure you have the right kernel headers installed:
>       sudo apt install linux-headers-$(uname -r)
>
>    3. download virtualbox from https://virtualbox.org
>
>    4. install it with: sudo dpkg -i virtualbox*.deb
>
>    5. profit and world domination :)
>
> Hope that helps, otherwise don't hesitate to let us know.
>
> Regards,
> Daniel
>

-- 
___________________________________________

Dr. Stan Schymanski
ETH Zürich
Department of Environmental Systems Science
Soil and Terrestrial Environmental Physics
IBP-STEP
Universitätstrasse 16
8092 Zürich
Schweiz

Room: CHN E 50.2
Ph: +41 44 633 63 65
___________________________________________