Vagrant up - VBoxManage.exe error: VT-x is not ava

Question

Machine: Window10 (64bit).

I downloaded the latest VirtualBox, Vagrant and initialized CentOS 6.7 64bit image/url.

The following worked successfully in Git-Bash session.
1. vagrant box add "centos67x64" "https://github.com/CommanderK5/packer-centos-template/releases/download/0.6.7/vagrant-centos-6.7.box"
2. vagrant init
3. Updated Vagrantfile (and turned vb.gui option i.e. uncommented that config section in the file).

  config.vm.provider "virtualbox" do |vb|
    # Display the VirtualBox GUI when booting the machine
    vb.gui = true

    # Customize the amount of memory on the VM:
    vb.memory = "2048"
  end

After that, I tried the following command but I'm getting this error message.

$ vagrant up
Bringing machine 'default' up with 'virtualbox' provider...
==> default: Importing base box 'centos67x64'...
==> default: Matching MAC address for NAT networking...
==> default: Setting the name of the VM: vv_default_1466548735200_80300
==> default: Clearing any previously set network interfaces...
==> default: Preparing network interfaces based on configuration...
    default: Adapter 1: nat
==> default: Forwarding ports...
    default: 22 (guest) => 2222 (host) (adapter 1)
==> default: Running 'pre-boot' VM customizations...
==> default: Booting VM...
There was an error while executing `VBoxManage`, a CLI used by Vagrant
for controlling VirtualBox. The command and stderr is shown below.

Command: ["startvm", "ae74ebaa-8f01-48cf-bdad-956c59ef1208", "--type", "gui"]

Stderr: VBoxManage.exe: error: VT-x is not available (VERR_VMX_NO_VMX)
VBoxManage.exe: error: Details: code E_FAIL (0x80004005), component ConsoleWrap, interface IConsole

If I turn/comment off the whole Vagrantfile respective section, I'm still getting the following error.

$ vagrant up
Bringing machine 'default' up with 'virtualbox' provider...
==> default: Clearing any previously set forwarded ports...
==> default: Clearing any previously set network interfaces...
==> default: Preparing network interfaces based on configuration...
    default: Adapter 1: nat
==> default: Forwarding ports...
    default: 22 (guest) => 2222 (host) (adapter 1)
==> default: Running 'pre-boot' VM customizations...
==> default: Booting VM...
There was an error while executing `VBoxManage`, a CLI used by Vagrant
for controlling VirtualBox. The command and stderr is shown below.

Command: ["startvm", "ae74ebaa-8f01-48cf-bdad-956c59ef1208", "--type", "headless"]

Stderr: VBoxManage.exe: error: VT-x is not available (VERR_VMX_NO_VMX)
VBoxManage.exe: error: Details: code E_FAIL (0x80004005), component ConsoleWrap, interface IConsole

Any ideas! I looked into other posts but couldn't find how to resolve in my case.

As I got some hints, I tried one of the solution.

1. TURN off the Hyper-V which is turned of by default I guess in Windows10.

2. To do this, I Went to Control panel in Windows10 and looked here and found this.

3. Then, I turned Hyper-V off by unchecking (the tick mark, or black box).

4. Windows10 told me to RESTART, I said "No" (later).

5. Tried running "vagrant up" again (without or without any changes or the above mentioned config.vm... changes to the Vagrantfile). It didn't work and gave me the same --headless error message.

6. OK, time to restart. Restarted Windows10. After the restart, I saw bunch of Virtual Box error messages popups (few of them are shown below).

7. Once I clicked on OK button on all of those Virtual Box popup windows, I tried to run Virtual Box on my machine, it came up fine(successfully).
8. Now, I opened Git-BASH and again went to the directory where Vagrantfile was present. Tried tweaking the settings on / off or commenting/uncommenting the Vagrantfile respective section (as I described above).

STILL getting the the same error messages for running "vagrant up" (even after turning the Hyper-V off as well).

Answer 1

If you are getting the above error on Windows 10 Pro then you can disable the Hyper-V. Hyper-V is default enable in the Windows 10. You can either use Hyper-V or Virtual Box. So, to use the Virtual box you have to disable hyper-v in windows, you can follow following steps to do -

1. Search Control Panel
2. Click on Uninstall a program
3. Turn Windows features on or off
4. Unselect the Hyper-V option.
5. Click on OK
6. Restart the system to apply the changes.

Answer 2

Besides turning on virtualization features of the processor and turning off Hyper-V, here's another thing, related to Windows' Virtualization-Based Security features:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/design/device-experiences/oem-vbs

VBS (and the associated security features) must be disabled to avoid conflicting hypervisors. Here is a solution from VMware, which also seems valid for the VirtualBox issue":

https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/2146361

Answer 3

Although this is an old question, but I've still encounter it recently.

This is what worked for me on my i7-3770 3.40GHz, Z77 extreme motherboard running Windows 10.

In Windows, disable Hyper-V:

1. Open up a PowerShell or CMD session as Administrator.
2. Type the following command: dism.exe /Online /Disable-Feature:Microsoft-Hyper-V-All
3. Windows will ask you to restart.

In the bios:

1. Disable >>> Intel Virtualization Technology, vt-d
2. Save the bios settings and allow it to restart and boot into Windows.
3. Shutdown the computer (I've tried just restarting and it didn't work)
4. Power up the computer, go into the bios and re-enable the above disabled settings.
5. Save, restart.

Download the Intel Utility to check.

You should now see it been supported:

If it still doesn't work, try re-enabling Hyper-V first then following the steps above.

Answer 4

Stop hyper-v service running by default in Windows 8/10, since it blocks all other calls to VT hardware.

Additional explanation here: https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/118561b9-7155-46e3-a874-6a38b35c67fd/hyperv-disables-vtx-for-other-hypervisors?forum=w8itprogeneral

Also as you have mentioned, if not already enabled, turn on Intel VT virtualization in BIOS settings and restart the machine.

Answer 5

I just solved this problem by disabling(uncheck) Hyper-V. Seems Hyper-V was enabled when I installed Docker

Control Panel -> Program And Features -> Turn Windows Features on or off.

You may need to reboot afterwords.

Warning: Vagrant with VirtualBox cannot work with Docker at the same time.

Answer 6

Docker can be the culprit. I had same issue after installing docker. Docker uses Windows hyper-v driver to create containers. Hence Docker and Virtual Box may not work together!