But when I hook up the external hard drive, my ubuntu 9.10 can't see the external hard drive. Can you please tell me how to setup the external hard drive for my ubuntu 9.10 environment? Some times, you may wish to access USB drive in VirtualBox guest OS. If so, you are in luck. VirtualBox shared USB devices are quite easy to setup. We are going assume that you have already setup VirtualBox on your Windows or Linux host OS and VirtualBox guest additions on your Windows or Linux guest OS.
Assuming that I am NOT going to add NTFS drivers that allow read+write of NTFS partitions, I was wondering if the choice of filesystem when I partition an external USB drive matters. The choices appear to be HFS+ vs. For the time being, I simply created two half-sized paritions, one of each type.:) I plan to run various versions of Windows, and keep the VirtualBox files on the external drive. UPDATE: to clarify- I'm not concerned about letting my VirtualBox VMs mount this drive, I'm talking purely about using this drive as a place to stick my VirtualBox images, because my main drive is already pre-occupied. Go HFS+ If, as you say, you are not concerned about letting VirtualBox (or a real PC) mount this drive, there is absolutely no reason to use other filesystems. VirtualBox files are plain Mac OS files, and HFS+ is the 'normal'/'native' OsX filesystem, works well, is journaled (=less jamming/crashes) and has no strict filesize limits. Macs feel more 'comfortable' on it.
The reason you might consider FAT32 (keeping all files under 4GB) is if you want to be able to boot the same VM images also on a Windows computer (and on the Mac too). Also, using FAT32 and HFS on the same disk is not that ideal solution as it seems. In order to have Windows PCs see the FAT32 partition, the whole partition table must be of DOS/Win type (Master Boot Record), so you have an HD with a DOS partition table with a Mac HFS partition inside.
This is ok but has some limitations like booting (can't use it to boot the Mac). Using a 'GUID' (modern Macs) partition table is good for Mac partitions, but your FAT32 partition will not be seen by any PC, making it quite useless. Go HFS+, for the whole disk. Keep a 4GB thumb drive with FAT32 to move files around.
How it Works RELATED: VirtualBox must normally be installed to run. As a virtual machine program, it needs to install Windows kernel drivers and system services. Like most programs, it also saves its settings in system areas. It can’t just be installed to a USB drive and run on any computer you come across. Portable VirtualBox is a wrapper for VirtualBox that turns it into a you can install on a USB stick or external hard drive. When you launch Portable VirtualBox on a computer, it will automatically install the appropriate drivers and system services — administrator access is required for this — and automatically uninstall them from the computer when you’re done.
It also provides a graphical interface for downloading VirtualBox, setting it up in a portable environment, and changing its options. Portable VirtualBox is designed to run on Windows host PCs, so don’t expect it to run on Linux or Mac host systems.
Install Portable VirtualBox to an External Drive First, get started. Run the downloaded file and extract it to an external drive or wherever else you want to store your portable VirtualBox system. You can always move it later if you like. Launch the Portable-VirtualBox.exe program from here and you’ll be prompted to download and install VirtualBox’s program files on your external drive.
The tool can automatically download VirtualBox’s files for you. After it does, click the OK button to unpack them.
If the full version of VirtualBox is already installed on your computer, you won’t see this screen and VirtualBox will just open instead. You’ll want to uninstall VirtualBox first or set this up on a computer without VirtualBox installed. Launch the program again after it finishes unpacking files. After you agree to a, you’ll see the standard VirtualBox window. A VirtualBox system tray icon will appear while Portable VirtualBox is running. If you don’t see it, click the up arrow in your system tray to access the rest of the icons. Right-click this icon and select Settings or press Ctrl+5 to modify Portable VirtualBox’s settings.
Note that USB and Network support are disabled by default. To use these features, select the appropriate tab in the configuration window and enable either option. You’ll be prompted to install the appropriate drivers on the current system every time you open Portable VirtualBox. Settings you change here are saved in Portable VirtualBox’s directory, so they’ll follow you between computers. Create and Run Virtual Machines Creating a virtual machine is simple. Just click the New button in Portable VirtualBox and go through the wizard to create a new virtual machine and install an operating system in it.
Run Portable VirtualBox on another PC and your virtual machines will appear in the window, ready to use. By default, Portable VirtualBox will save your virtual machines to the Portable-VirtualBox data.VirtualBox Machines directory.
You should be able to have your external drive open them in Portable VirtualBox. RELATED: Be sure to quit VirtualBox and allow Portable VirtualBox to clean up before unplugging your USB drive. You should also safely before unplugging it from your computer. If you yank the USB drive out of your computer while a virtual machine is running, that virtual machine’s files may be corrupted. Portable VirtualBox can also be. You can then use it to run the Linux system on the USB drive from within Windows without even restarting your computer.