Windows 8 Host: No network adapters after resume from sleep

[Andrew]

I am running Oracle VirtualBox 4.1.8 r75467 on a Thinkpad T510. When I put my computer to sleep, the only way to get functioning NIC's on my host after resume is to go into device manager, uninstall the NIC and then scan for hardware changes to re-install the NIC. I disabled the VirtualBox Bridged Network Driver on each NIC and I no longer have this problem.

[jmbpiano]

I have the same exact problem ever since I installed VB 4.1.8 on my Gateway FX6800-11. Sleep or Hibernate will always cause the NIC to stop working. In one instance it wasn't working after a normal shutdown. An alternative method of temporarily fixing the problem is to run Windows Network Diagnostics and allow it to automatically repair issues.

My on-board NIC is an Intel 82567LF-2 Gigabit Network device. Switching from the Microsoft provided drivers to the drivers available from the Gateway support page made no difference.

Disabling the bridged network driver as the OP suggested appears to work.

[vbaderks]

I have the same problem on 2 different machines with Windows 8 Consumer Preview installed. Workaround by disabling the Bridged Network Driver works.

Due to the fact that the hosted network that virtualbox also installed is always not connected Windows 8 also shows always 'a not connected' icon in the lower right corner. I had to disable the 'hosted' network to resolve that.

[Andrew]

I can confirm this issue exists in 4.1.10 r76836 as well.

[cpqalve]

I can confirm the issue exists in 4.1.10 as well.

[Andrew]

This issue still exists in 4.1.12 r77245.

[LeoStorm85]

Issue still existing in 4.2.0 r80737

[Andrew]

Still a problem. Windows 8 Enterprise and VirtualBox 4.2.4 r81684.

[Andrew]

If you need to use the bridged adapter on Windows 8 and you also need sleep/hibernate on your host, you can always disable and re-enable the NIC after resuming. I know Microsoft did a lot of work to the network stack in Windows 8 to speed up reconnecting upon resume which probably led to the regression. Below is how I automated this so I didn't have to screw with it anymore.

Workaround/Bandaid/Hack

I created a powershell script that automates this process on a schedule. The trick was to comb the System Event Log for Informational event ID 1 where the source is Power-Troubleshooter. Once I found that, I right-clicked and added a task. When the event is fired, my script is triggered and disables all physical, enabled nics before re-enabling them.

Script

gwmi Win32_NetworkAdapter -EnableAllPrivileges | ? { $_.PhysicalAdapter -and $_.NetEnabled } | % { $_.Disable(); $_.Enable() }

Seems to work thus far. It is obviously sub-optimal but at least I don't have to manually carry out the tasks any longer and I can use my bridged adapter on my laptop.

Please fix so I can remove this hack/workaround/bandaid.

[mahop]

I also have this Problem. But I have it also with other Programms adding Network Adapters... Like the Microsoft Network Monitor... Looks like it is a Windows 8 problem...???

[anshul makkar]

Is there any other network filter(antivirus etc) driver installed apart from vboxnetflt driver in the problematic scenario.

[Andrew]

No. Out of the box Windows 8.

Replying to anshul makkar:

Is there any other network filter(antivirus etc) driver installed apart from vboxnetflt driver in the problematic scenario.

[mitrov]

I am having the same problem with VB 4.2.16, Windows 8.1 new install and Broadcom neXtreme adapter.

[billsey]

I'm seeing the problem with the latest Virtual Box (4.3.2) when the computer is restarted. I'm not using sleep or hibernate but any reboot has the issue. It looks like the VB Host-Only Network is getting initialized before the physical adapter, and then gets in the way of the physical adapter to start.

[c0nsaw]

I am also having this issue, nothing I do will help reconnect my pc to internet. I have tried lots of workarounds, even system restore wont get me back to a working connection. I have only recently started using vagrant and vb to spin up vm's for learning. I have had to re-install windows several times to get back working again, talk about a sledge hammer to a nut

[bulrush]

This problem still exists in Virtualbox 4.3.12. Vbox 4.3.14 doesn't run the guest (Ubuntu) at all.

Host: Windows 8.0 on HP Envy 700-074 Guest: Ubuntu 14.04.1 server

Detailed specs via Speccy available on request.

Steps:

• Install Virtualbox 4.3.14 on Windows 8. Then installed Ubuntu 14.04.1 desktop.
• Found Vbix does not run the guest OS (Ubuntu) at all.
• I was also getting an error about piix4.
• Uninstalled Vbox, rebooted PC.
• Installed Vbox 4.3.12. Installed Ubuntu 14.04.1 server this time (it's smaller and does not include the desktop)
• My keyboard puts PC into suspend mode, where the memory is written to disk. When I come out of suspend, there is no network connection to the internet.
• Reboot PC and internet works fine.
• Try "sleep" mode, which doesn't completely power down PC, come out of sleep mode, and internet works fine.
• I never had a problem before installing Virtualbox.

[jaydouglass]

I tried the above remedies but none worked on Windows 8.1 / vbox 4.3.22.

Clicking 'Scan for hardware changes' in Device Manager added the network adapter back to my devices. I'm working on a script to do this automatically.

[Andrew_885]

Same here. Tried to set up new machine for ​http://buywebsitetrafficreviews.org/ development, but network adapters disappeared after resuming from sleep mode.