[SOLVED] VirtualBox Guest connection to 3G mobile broadband?

Soadyheid · 07-28-2011, 03:51 AM

Hi, Ive got VirtualBox V4.0.10 sitting on a laptop running XP where I've got Fedora 15 and soon, (hopefully!)RHEL 5.3 as Guest OSs.

I'm wondering if it's possible to have the Guests connect to the internet via the Vodafone dongle I use for XP? I reckon the wired connection will be fine but it's unavailable in the environment I work in.

The VirtualBox set up is a sandbox for learning purposes only, not having an internet connection is obviously a big restriction.

My Netbook, running Ubuntu, connects fine with a Vodafone dongle using the Betavine network manager. Am I going to need something like his installed on each Guest, or is there some way to define a network path through VirtualBox which accesses the XP connection?

Thanks for your help.

Play Bonny!

TobiSGD · 07-28-2011, 09:01 PM

If you have internet connection on the host OS (regardless in which way you connect) you automatically have internet connection on the guest OS if you set your virtual network card to NAT. No need to install any drivers.

jefro · 07-28-2011, 09:55 PM

"VirtualBox set up is a sandbox" What exactly do you mean here? Is the networking "type" set to local or vm only?

As TobiSGD suggests, a choice of nat, bridged or local are normal choices. When nat is used, there is a software virtual router between your client(s) and the hosts network. In most cases when using nat you do nothing unless you use a proxy or you have to manually start some connection in xp. Otherwise on a constant on lan you just boot and go with the client.

Soadyheid · 07-29-2011, 03:41 AM

@TobiSGD

Spot on! Unfortunately, for reasons I can't explain, though they seemed logical at the time, I'd allocated the Dongle to the Guest OS within the setup section. What happens then is the 3G link goes down as the USB resource is "hard" connected and no longer belongs to the XP host. Doh!

Thanks for the clarification, it now works a treat!

@jefro

Quote:

The VirtualBox set up is a sandbox

All this means is that I'm using VirtualBox to allow me to "play" with the guest OSs, as in play in a sand box/sand pit. I'm not using the set up for anything heavy, like, er... proper production work, etc.
Thanks for explaining NAT and the virtual router concept. All is now clear!

Play Bonny!