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kasperd
Asked: 2016-11-14 07:22:24 +0800 CST

Can I create a virtual machine through ssh

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I am trying to configure VirtualBox on Ubuntu Server 14.04. But when I try to start a VM I get an error message saying:

VT-x is disabled in the BIOS.

Searching for this error message lead me to multiple pages suggesting to reboot the machine and change the settings in the BIOS. Unfortunately at the moment I only have ssh access to this server. Through ssh I can reboot the machine, but I don't know how to change the BIOS settings.

Is there any other way to get a virtual machine running on this server which I can only access through ssh? I tried disabling VT-x in VirtualBox but am told that is not a valid configuration when using a 64-bit guest.

14.04

2 Answers

  1. To be able to run a 64-bit guest we need both, a VT-x/AMD-V enabled CPU on the host, and enable the VT-x features of the guest.

    Host BIOS

    In case of a remote server we may not be able to change BIOS settings of the server to enable virtualization. See the following question on how to find out if the server is capable of hardware virtualization:

    Virtualbox settings

    Enabling VT-x for an existing virtual machine can be done from the command line with

    VBoxManage modifyvm <uuid|vmname> --hwvirtex on

    Create a new VM

    If we can't enable VT-x we can only create a 32-bit virtual machine. This can be done remotely through an SSH session, but it may be a much easier approach to create the VM locally to then export it to the server's instance of VirtualBox:

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  2. If your server has X11, you can ssh with X forwarding and run the virtualbox GUI:

    ssh user@host -X
virtualbox
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