Hello LQ World,
I've added Vboxmanage to my rc.local file as shown below. The Win 7 VM starts normally when I run /etc/rc.d/rc.local as root or using sudo, but it does not start after a reboot.
Any help or pointers appreciated.

#!/bin/sh
#
# This script will be executed *after* all the other init scripts.
# You can put your own initialization stuff in here if you don't
# want to do the full Sys V style init stuff.
#
touch /var/lock/subsys/local
# Start Windows 7 Guest VM - owned by root.

VBoxManage startvm WIN7R


Thanks,
zapo

For VirtualBox to start a VM with a screen it needs an X display to show it on. rc.local runs outside the X environment.

You have two options: either start the VM with --type set to something that does not need a display such as headless or move the VBoxManage command from rc.local to your desktop Autostart so it starts when you log on. Details depend on which desktop you are running.

1 members found this post helpful.

Thank you very much for your help and shedding some light on this problem. I think I'll try auto starting the VM as headless now that I have it running.

Hi Catkin,
I've tried --type headless and it works great - thanks again. The VM is owned by root - I don't think this is good for security, how can I make a VM owned another acount start from rc.local at boot up?

Thanks,
zapo

su - <user name> VBoxManage startvm WIN7R --type headless