Countdown to 2023... VirtualBox versus Hyper-V on Windows 10 and 11

Countdown / Datatalk / VirtualBox.

The countdown to 2023 has started. And I haven't reached my one hundred posts this year yet! Well, counting down is fine, but I prefer the majority of my posts to have some kind of usefulness... Some kind. Sort of 😏

So, 11 days... Let's start with VirtualBox 6.1.40 and spontaneous freezes on Windows 11...

Symptoms / requirements

• Windows guest spontaneously freezes, sometimes it works fine for weeks, sometimes it won't even go through boot
• The host OS is Windows 10 or Windows 11
• The guest OS is something 64 bit (I'm just running Windows, so I don't know how it affects another OS)
• Your machine is able to run Hyper-V

But... especially seeing this (or actually not seeing this)...

If you don't see the blue 'V' but a green turtle instead, then you're using Hyper-V. Which doesn't work (well) (yet) with 

Culprit

VirtualBox doesn't like the Hyper-V that might be installed by Windows 10 / 11. Although VirtualBox has implemented some kind of Hyper-V support, it isn't 100% working, and MS keeps changing stuff around, making it a moving target.

Solution

Get rid of Microsoft Hyper-V

This may reduce your machine security somewhat. If that is acceptable to you is something you have to figure out yourself.

Unfortunately, there can be multiple reasons why Hyper-V gets activated.  Try each of the steps below, reboot the machine, launch the VM, and see 

Steps

1. Elevated command prompt

2. bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype off

3. DISM /Online /Disable-Feature:Microsoft-Hyper-V

4. gpedit.msc Local Computer Policy > Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > System > Device Guard > Turn on Virtualization Based Security = Disabled

5. Windows Settings > Device Security > Core Isolation Details > Memory Integrity = Off

Links

• VirtualBox Forum - 1
• VirtualBox Forum - 2
• VirtualBox Forum - 3