the "New Virtual Machine Wizard" is too restrictive with names

[Sameer Sahasrabuddhe]

The wizard for creating new virtual machines uses the name to guess the OS for the intended guest. But the current behaviour disallows arbitrary names (at least on a Windows 7 Enterprise 64-bit host). For example:

1. Do not enter any name, and try to select the OS Type. Only the combination for Windows XP 32-bit guest is available in the drop-down menus.

2. Enter a name starting with the letters "ub". The OS Type changes to Linux/Ubuntu. Now continue with an arbitrary string containing "64" (for example, "ubxx64"). The OS version changes to 64-bit and the 32-bit option is not available in the drop-down menu anymore.

3. Now remove the string "64" from the name (earlier example changes to "ubxx"). Now the 64-bit version is reverted to 32-bit, and cannot be manually set to 64-bit since that option is no longer present in the drop-down menu.

4. Cancel the current invocation of the wizard and start again (this is important). Now type the string "ub". The OS Type automatically changes to Ubuntu/Linux. Now continue typing "wi" (so that the machine name is "ubwi"). The OS Type changes back to Windows XP, and cannot be set to any other combination.

In conclusion, the wizard makes it impossible to have arbitrary names for various guest OS combinations. The name must contain specific strings that correspond to that combination.

[Klaus Espenlaub]

I don't understand the problem - here I can enter "ubwi" and get Windows XP as a guess, however there is no problem whatsoever with picking any other OS/Version combinatoion. Actually the manual picking of any other value disables the future guessing, as you already expressed your choice.

If the 64bit guest OS types are greyed out that most likely means your system doesn't meet the prerequisites for running 64bit guests.

[Sameer Sahasrabuddhe]

Ok. The real problem is that I can find no way to manually pick any combination for the guest OS/Version combination. It only changes when I fiddle with the name of the new VM.

The options are not grayed out, they are simply not present in the drop-down menus. The menus provide exactly one combination at any time, which correspond to the one guessed from the name. It's not about prerequisites, since I can't select a 32-bit version if the name contains the string "64". I am running 64-bit Windows 7 Enterprise on a Dell Latitude E6410 with a dual-core Intel i7 anyway.

I misinterpreted the symptoms that I see as a "feature" in the wizard, so my summary of the bug might have been wrong.

[Sameer Sahasrabuddhe]

Ok. I have done a lot more experimenting and discovered that there is no problem with the wizard. All the options are available under all circumstances.

The problem is different --- mouse clicks do not work on any drop-down menu anywhere in the GUI, not just the wizard. The options can be changed using arrow keys, but not by clicking on them.

Should I close this bug and file a new one instead? I couldn't find any way to change this bug.

[aeichner]

Please reopen if still relevant with a recent VirtualBox release.