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I have installed Oracle VM VirtualBox 5.0.12, and now trying to start it up.

But shortly after trying to power it up, I get an error message saying:

VT-x is disabled in the BIOS for all CPU modes (VERR_VMX_MSR_ALL_VMX_DISABLED)

Have other readers experienced the same issue and resolved it successfully? Please let me know. I have checked out other threads on Stackoverflow which report the same error message, and tried out the suggestions mentioned there, but none of them is working for me.

If it would help, I am running Windows 7 Enterprise edition SP1 64 bit.

Does anyone have an idea what the problem could be?

A cool bull
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10 Answers10

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You may have virtualization disabled on the host computer. To enable:

  • Go to your host computer's BIOS (during reboot, press F12, or Delete, or F2, ... depends on computer).
  • Find some options regarding virtualization. E.g. recent Lenovo's have it under Security / Virtualization.
  • Enable what's there to enable. E.g. VT-d technology [Enable].

This made it work for me.

Ondra Žižka
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    This was the solution for me. I don't know how others have managed to solve it with just adding or removing ram, but it did not work for me. – Martin Spasov Apr 08 '17 at 15:01
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Try going to Settings -> System -> Motherboard on VirtualBox and change the RAM size.

Increase the RAM size and try to start it up again. It worked for me, hope it works for you as well!

Joonu Thomas
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    That worked, thanks! :) – A cool bull Jan 13 '16 at 09:20
  • Easy and Effective solution.Thanks – Jatin Khattar Aug 13 '16 at 22:05
  • its currently set to 2048 MB, what size should I set? – dexter Sep 23 '16 at 07:17
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    For me it was the complete oposit. When I tried to start an Win XP 32 bit with 4GB RAM the error occured, when turning it down to 2GB it worked fine – Sarkkhan Dec 04 '16 at 20:42
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    Same here. I had to reduce the amount of RAM allocated for the VM. – Antonio Sesto Dec 15 '16 at 15:55
  • I recommend making sure your bios is properly set to allow virtualization (see the other high-vote answer) – jgreen May 30 '17 at 20:13
  • with ubuntu/artful32 I need exactly 2048mb for it to work and @jgreen I couldn't change the BIOS (no rights to do so). That's not always and option. If it is I agreed to that being the right solution – Rune FS Jun 02 '17 at 08:22
  • For my case for windows 10, processor i5-7300, VirtuaBox version 5.4.2, I changed Virtualization as mentioned below, and in VirtualBox, the Settings -> System -> Processor, the PAE/NX is selected by default, all do not fix the problem, and change the VirtualBox RAM size as mentioned here solved the issue. Thanks – zhihong Nov 05 '17 at 22:55
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I ran into this issue with both of my ThinkPads (T450s and X1 Carbon), but this probably applies to other machines with Intel hardware.

One solution is to enable virtualization options in the BIOS of the host machine (not the guest VM).

  1. Reboot and enter the BIOS (F12 usually)
  2. Navigate to the virtualization settings. The exact menu navigation may vary based on your particular BIOS and version. For me it was Security -> Virtualization.
  3. In my case there were two options, both of which were disabled:
    • Intel (R) Virtualization Technology
    • Intel (R) VT-d Feature
  4. Enable both options
  5. Save and exit (reboot)

This resolved the issue for me.

Matt
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When I opened Settings->System->Motherboard, suggested by the answer above, I realized that the .ova file I had downloaded into VirtualBox had settings that exceeded my old computer's RAM size (as suggested by the warning message at the bottom of the screen). Once I was within the capabilities of my machine, the system started adequately.

greatblueherron
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In my case, I had 4GB of ram for the Virtual Machine (my host machine has 8GB of ram, and I was getting that error. I've change the ram amount to 2GB ram and my Virtual Machine booted perfectly. However, I had already enabled virtualisation on my BIOS settings.

Dr3amcast3r
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Non of the solutions worked for me. Instead, I tried the following:

System -> Acceleration -> Uncheck Enable VT-x/AMD-V

emil.c
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changing the ram did not work for me so i found another solution

on virtualbox navigate to Settings -> System -> Processor and then click on (Enable PAE/NX). this solved my problem.

Elias Rub
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First, you should check if virtualization is enabled. You can use the free tool provided by SAS Support: http://support.sas.com/kb/46/250.html If virtualization is not enabled, then you have to enable VT-D function in BIOS (for my Asus Motherboard it was in Advanced-->System Agent Configuration settings). I also had to enable Intel Virtualization Technology in CPU settings. Now everything works seamlessly.

ChiaraM
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I have faced the same issue with Ubuntu 16.04 (xenial) at Dell Latitude E6500.

First I have updated the VB and my symptom changed. There was no option to create x64 machine at all and a user friendly message box while trying to deploy an old one.

I have found a similar story described here. And this link brought me there to the final solution.

In short words, for Dell BIOS you need to keep

Performance -> Trusted Execution = OFF

Community
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Kuba D
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I solved the problem by reducing the memory size in settings-> system

Dina Said
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