No bootable medium found virtualbox windows

Sometimes when you are creating a new VM or when you are trying to start an existing VM, your VM cannot boot and you get the error:

No bootable medium found! System halted.

In this blog post, we will review all possible cases when this error can occur, as well as methods for resolving this issue.

Reasons Why You Can Get the No Bootable Medium Found in VirtualBox Error

Let’s consider the most popular reasons why you can get the No bootable medium found in VirtualBox error and review the algorithms of actions that can help you resolve this issue.

A bootable disk has been created incorrectly or is not bootable

If you want to boot from a CD/DVD disc or an ISO image, but find that the disc has been created incorrectly, you may get the No bootable medium found in VirtualBox error. If a physical CD/DVD disc was burned as a data disc without using the bootable disc option, you won’t be able to boot your machine by using this disc. The same situation may happen when an ISO image is created incorrectly without creating a disk boot area.

Possible solutions. Burn another bootable CD/DVD disc or create a bootable ISO disk image correctly and try to boot again. Check the media you have inserted into the optical drive attached to the VM. Sometimes it may happen that the wrong disc is inserted unintentionally. Verify the checksum of your file after downloading the ISO image by comparing with the reference checksum on the source site.

The disk on which an ISO file is stored is damaged

Sometimes a VM cannot boot from an ISO image when the hard disk on which the ISO image is stored gets damaged. If some fragments of the ISO disk image are located on bad (damaged) blocks of the HDD (hard disk drive), the ISO file can become unreadable and a VM will not be able to boot from this ISO file.

Possible solutions. Download another ISO installation image, clone a physical DVD disk to the ISO image, or create a new ISO bootable image manually. For example, manual creation of the bootable macOS installation ISO image is explained in the blog post about installing macOS on VMware ESXi. Unfortunately, in most cases it is impossible to repair a corrupted ISO file stored on the damaged HDD.

The CD/DVD disc is physically corrupted

VirtualBox allows VMs to use a physical CD/DVD drive of the host machine that can be connected to a VM in settings. Scratches and dirt on optical CD/DVD discs can make the disc data unreadable. This situation can be terrible if scratches are located near the center of the optical disc where the table of content and the lead-in area that includes information about disc tracks and sectors of the CD/DVD disc is recorded.

Possible Solutions. Try to clean the disc surface carefully, polishing the scratches with special sprays. If you have another disc that is the same, or you are able to record another copy of the disc – try these options.

The virtual optical drive is empty

There is no bootable ISO image or CD/DVD disc inserted to the virtual optical drive of the VM.

Possible solutions. Insert the appropriate bootable media into a virtual CD/DVD drive of the VM and reset (restart) the virtual machine. More specifically, the algorithm of checking the bootable media for your VM is as follows:

In the main VirtualBox window, select your virtual machine, go to Machine > Settings (Ctrl+S) and select Storage. In the list of the storage devices, check to see whether the boot optical disc or a boot disk image (ISO) is inserted into a physical or virtual optical drive attached to your VM. On the screenshot below, you can see that the optical drive of the VM is empty. In this case, it is necessary to choose a virtual optical disk ISO file, or select the host optical drive with a physical optical CD or DVD disc inserted.

When the correct boot disk image is inserted, the storage settings window looks as follows.

Inserting an ISO image to the virtual DVD drive of a VM was also mentioned in the previous blog posts: How to install Ubuntu on VirtualBox and How to install Kali on VirtualBox.

What is the purpose of the Live CD/DVD checkbox in the VirtualBox VM storage settings?

If you use a VM to boot from a live CD/DVD each time, tick the Live CD/DVD checkbox. When this option is enabled, a virtual CD/DVD disk image (ISO) is not removed from the virtual CD/DVD drive when the eject command is sent from the guest operating system. Hence, if you reboot the VM with the ticked Live CD/DVD checkbox, a VM will boot from the same ISO disk image. Otherwise, the virtual CD/DVD drive of the VM will be empty after ejecting from the guest OS (operating system) and further VM reboot, and you can get the fatal error in VirtualBox: No bootable medium found! System Halted.

Incorrect boot order in the VM settings

This can occur if you are looking to boot from the virtual disk where the OS is already installed, but the virtual optical drive is selected as a boot device and the virtual hard disk is not selected as a boot disk in the boot order list.

Another case when you can get the No bootable medium found in VirtualBox fatal error is when a virtual optical drive with a higher boot order contains the unbootable media. The disk drive that contains the correct boot image has the lower boot priority, and is disabled.

Possible solutions. You can change the boot order in the virtual machine settings (Machine > Settings) by going to the System section and selecting the Motherboard tab. Select the boot device, hitting the up and down arrows to change the boot order.

Disable the floppy drive, if it is not used, by unticking the checkbox. Similarly, you can enable or disable any other boot devices with checkboxes.

Sometimes you may need to select the “Enable EFI” checkbox to boot modern operating systems and avoid the ‘No bootable medium found’ error.

A virtual CD/DVD drive is missing

It may happen that, for some reason, a virtual optical disc drive is missing in the VM configuration.

Possible solutions. Go to virtual machine settings and select the Storage tab. Click the Add storage controller icon, and in the opened menu, hit Add IDE controller.

Once a new storage controller has been added, click the Add optical drive icon, and in the pop-up window, hit Choose disk.

Click Add and browse the bootable ISO disk image. You can also select the ISO image from the list of recently used ISO files.

After that, you can check the boot order as explained above and, if everything is correct, hit OK to save settings and start the VM. Now the No bootable medium found in VirtualBox error should not occur.

Conclusion

As you can see, the VirtualBox No bootable medium found error is self-explanatory. This error usually occurs if a bootable disk is not defined or data cannot be read from a bootable disk. This blog post has covered most of the reasons why you may be faced with the No bootable medium found in VirtualBox error, and useful tips to help you resolve this issue. The methods of fixing such a boot error are not complex.

В этой статье будет рассказано о том что означает ошибка no bootable medium found, system halted VirtualBox, почему она возникает, а также как её обойти. Если вы знаете английский, то можете понять примерно следующее — система не может загрузится потому что загрузочный диск не найден.

Причин у такой ошибки может быть несколько. Обычно, она возникает при создании новой виртуальной машины и не зависит от операционной системы. Может встречаться в Windows, Linux и MacOS.

Эта ошибка означает, что загрузочный диск к виртуальной машине не подключён. Если это только что созданная виртуальная машина, то её жесткий диск ещё пуст, на нём ничего нет, и поэтому с него нельзя загрузится. Для того чтобы установить операционную систему надо подключить к машине ISO образ с установщиком и загрузится с него. Обычно при первом запуске VirtualBox автоматически предлагает выбрать образ с установщиком. Но если вы упустили этот момент, то надо сделать всё вручную.

Для этого кликните правой кнопкой мыши по нужной виртуальной машине и выберите пункт меню Настроить, в открывшемся окне перейдите на вкладку Носители:

Здесь есть раздел Контроллер IDE, кликните по значку рядом с ним Добавить привод оптических дисков:

Дальше кликните по кнопке Добавить и выберите файл образа, который надо подключить к виртуальной машине.

Этот файл появится в списке в предыдущем окне, просто кликните по нему и нажмите кнопку Выбрать внизу окна.

Если привод оптических дисков уже есть и там написано Пусто, то кликните по нему, а потом в правой части окна кликните по синей иконке с нарисованным на ней диском, а затем аналогично выберите образ диска:

После этого образ будет добавлен и вы можете снова пытаться загрузить свою виртуальную машину. На этот раз ошибки быть не должно и всё будет работать.

Если это не помогает, образ подключён, а вы всё ещё получаете ошибку, это может означать что образ повреждён или он не предназначен для загрузки. Вы можете заново скачать образ или проверить его контрольные сумы. Обычно для установщиков различных Linux дистрибутивов вместе с образом идёт файл с контрольными суммами.

Если образ не загрузочный, его можно попытаться записать на флешку, например, с помощью утилиты Etcher а потом загрузится с флешки. Обычно утилита обнаруживает загрузчик и делает флешку загрузочной. Для того чтобы загрузится с флешки вам понадобится добавить её в VirtualBox как реальный диск. Далее добавьте ваш новый диск к виртуальной машине так, как описано выше. Только на этот раз надо использовать контроллер SATA вместо IDE.

Выводы

Теперь вы знаете что делать если возникает ошибка no bootable medium found в VirtualBox. Как видите, есть целых два способа её решения. Знаете другие? Напишите в комментариях!

Обнаружили ошибку в тексте? Сообщите мне об этом. Выделите текст с ошибкой и нажмите Ctrl+Enter.

Статья распространяется под лицензией Creative Commons ShareAlike 4.0 при копировании материала ссылка на источник обязательна .

Об авторе

Основатель и администратор сайта losst.ru, увлекаюсь открытым программным обеспечением и операционной системой Linux. В качестве основной ОС сейчас использую Ubuntu. Кроме Linux, интересуюсь всем, что связано с информационными технологиями и современной наукой.

Одной из известных, пусть и не так часто встречающихся в VirtualBox ошибок является No bootable medium found. Исправить её очень просто.

Сообщением «No bootable medium found» VirtualBox сообщает, что загрузочный носитель не найден. В подавляющем большинстве случаев речь идёт о только что созданных виртуальных машинах. Их виртуальный жёсткий диск пока что пуст, соответственно, нужен какой-то загрузочный носитель, с которого будет произведена установка операционной системы (или её загрузка).

Разработчики VirtualBox предусматривают подобные ситуации, поэтому при первом запуске новой виртуальной машины программа предлагает выбрать загрузочный носитель. Если этот шаг пропустить, увидите ошибку «No bootable medium found».

Первым делом выключим виртуальную машину, нажав крестик в правом верхнем углу. Этот шаг не является обязательным, если у виртуальной машины уже есть виртуальный оптический привод, но всё же лучше выключить машину. Особенно, если вы не знаете, есть ли у неё этот самый привод или нет.

Выделите нужную виртуальную машину и щёлкните по кнопке Настроить в основном окне VirtualBox или щёлкните по машине правой кнопкой мыши и выберите одноимённый пункт в контекстном меню.

Перейдите в раздел Носители. Если привод оптических дисков уже имеется, и рядом с ним написано «Пусто», щёлкните по иконке оптического диска, которая на скриншоте отмечена стрелкой. Далее нужно будет выбрать образ диска или указать настоящий дисковод, в который вставлен загрузочный диск.

Если виртуальный дисковод оптических дисков отсутствует, выделите мышкой контроллер и нажмите на пиктограмму, обозначающую добавление дисковода.

Программа заботливо предложит выбрать образ с загрузочным диском.

Обычно этого достаточно, но старые системы могут потребовать от вас IDE или Floppy-контроллера вместо SATA. Для подобных случаев внизу окна есть кнопка добавления контроллера.

Контроллер добавлен. Теперь нужно добавить дисковод и указать образ или сделать проброс с настоящего дисковода.

В подавляющем большинстве случаев вышеописанных действий будет достаточно, чтобы ошибка «No bootable medium found» исчезла. Если этого не произошло, проблема может быть в «битом» образе. Попробуйте скачать образ заново или проверить его контрольные суммы, если они опубликованы.

A large number of users encounter the error “VirtualBox no bootable medium found” when trying to create a new VM. What causes this fatal no bootable medium found error? This post of MiniTool will analyze the possible reasons and provide corresponding solutions.

What Causes the VirtualBox No Bootable Medium Found Error

When trying to create a new VM or start an existing VM, lots of users fail to boot and get the error message “No bootable medium found system halted”. This error is reported to occur on Windows as well as Linux and Mac system.

What causes the VirtualBox no bootable medium found an error? According to the investigation, there are several common reasons that can lead to the VirtualBox fatal no bootable medium found error:

• The bootable ISO disk image is not bootable or has been created improperly. If the physical CD/DVD disc was burned as a data disc instead of a bootable disc, you will get the fatal no bootable medium found error when booting your VM by using the disc.
• The ISO image you have created is stored on a faulty disk. In some cases, you cannot boot the VM from an ISO image if it is stored a damaged hard disk drive. Since some fragments of the ISO image are coincidently located on bad blocks of the hard disk, the ISO image will be unreadable.
• The virtual optical drive is empty. If you insert the bootable disc into the virtual optical drive of VM incorrectly, the VirtualBox fatal no bootable medium found error can occur.
• The boot order in the VM settings is incorrect. If you haven’t selected the virtual hard disk as a boot device in the boot order list or the disk boot image contains lower boot priority, you can get the no bootable medium found VirtualBox fatal error.
• The virtual optical disc drive is missing. When the virtual CD/DVD drive is missing from VM configuration, you may get the no bootable medium found system halted error.
• The disk controller is configured on SATA. In many cases, SATA can only work properly when it has been used as the first controller. Otherwise, you need to burn the ISO image on an IDE controller to avoid the VirtualBox error.

The possible causes of the no bootable medium found error has been analyzed. Now, let’s start exploring methods to fix this vexing error.

First of all, you should check if the virtual optical drive is empty and the bootable media is inserted appropriately. Here are detailed steps to check them in the VM.

Step 1. Make sure you insert an appropriate bootable media into a virtual CD/DVD drive of the VM correctly and then restart your VM.

Step 2. In the main interface of the VirtualBox window, select your VM and then navigate to Machine > Settings and select Storage.

Step 3. Check if the ISO disk image or bootable optical disc is inserted into a virtual optical drive or physical CD/DVD disc drive properly in VM.

Step 4. If you find the optical drive is empty in VM, you have to click on Choose Virtual Optical Disk File and click on OK. Alternatively, you can select the host optical drive that contains a physical optical CD/DVD disc.

Once you inserted a correct boot disk image, try restarting the existing VM to see if the VirtualBox no bootable medium found error still persists.

Fix 2. Select the Live CD/DVD Checkbox

If you are using a live CD/DVD disc to boot your VM, make sure you select the checkbox for the Live CD/DVD. This is because a ticked Live CD/DVD ensures that a virtual CD/DVD disc image won’t be removed from the virtual CD/DVD drive.

Otherwise, the virtual CD/DVD drive of VM will be empty and you will get the fatal error “no bootable medium found system halted” in VirtualBox when rebooting VM.

So, if you are using a Live CD/DVD disc, please make sure you select the Live CD/DVD checkbox. Here’s how to do that:

Step 1. Open the VM and select the Settings > Storage option.

Step 2. Click on the Empty word under the Storage Devices There should be a CD/DVD icon next to Empty.

Step 3. Select the checkbox for Live CD/DVD under the Attributes section.

Step 4. Click on the CD icon next to the Optical Drive and select Choose virtual optical disk file from the context menu.

Step 5. After that, click on the OK button and exit the window.

Now, you can use the live CD/DVD to boot the VM and see if the error “No bootable medium found VirtualBox” is fixed.

Fix 3. Change the Boot Order in VM Settings

This error will also occur when the boot order is incorrect in the VM settings. To fix the issue, you can follow the steps below to change the boot order.

Step 1. Open your VM, and then navigate to Machine > Settings.

Step 2. In the Settings window, select the System option in the left side, and then navigate to the Motherboard tab on the right side.

Step 3. Change the Boot Order by pressing the up and down arrow keys. After that, click on the OK button.

Fix 4. Add IDE Controller

If the virtual optical drive is missing or the storage device controller is configured as SATA, it can trigger the VirtualBox fatal no bootable medium found error. You can fix it by adding an IDE controller manually. Here’s how:

Step 1. Open your VM, and then navigate to Machine > Settings.

Step 2. Navigate to the Storage tab, and then click on the Add storage controller icon and select the Add IDE controller section from the opened menu.

Step 3. After adding the IDE controller, click on the Add optical drive icon and then click on the Choose Disk button in the pop-up window.

Step 4. Then click on Add to view the bootable ISO disk image or you can select the ISO image from the list of ISO images.

Step 5. Now, you can check the boot order through the above steps. If the boot order is correct, click on OK to save the settings and start the VM to check if the VirtualBox fatal no bootable medium found disappears. 

Fix 5. Clean Your CD/DVD Disc

So, you can try cleaning the disc surface carefully by using the soft sponge and polish the scratches by using a special spray. If the CD/DVD still can’t be read by your host machine, you have to consider burning another disc via the following method.

Fix 6. Burn Another Bootable CD/DVD Disc   

If the physical CD/DVD disc was burned as a data disc instead of a boot disc or it got corrupted/damaged, you need to burn another one. How to burn a bootable CD/DVD disc?

There is some free CD/DVD disc burning software such as Ubuntu, BurnAware, Rufus, etc. You can choose one from them to burn a bootable CD/DVD disc on VirtualBox.

There are many instructions about how to burn a bootable CD/DVD disc that you can search for them online. The operating guide varies depending on different burning software. For example, if you want to create a virtual Windows 10 OS on VirtualBox, you can utilize a Windows media creation tool.

Fix 7. Create a New Bootable ISO Disk Image   

If you are using a bootable ISO disk image that’s stored on a faulty hard disk by chance, the image will be unreadable. So, your VM won’t boot from the ISO disk image and pops up the error message “no bootable medium found system halted”.

At this time, you need to check if there are any bad sectors on your hard disk first. Here you can utilize a professional disk management tool – MiniTool Partition Wizard. This utility can help you check hard disk easily. Besides, it has helped lots of users fix tricky problems such as e_invalidarg error code in Virtual box, BSOD, disk not showing, etc.

MiniTool Partition Wizard FreeClick to Download100%Clean & Safe

Note: If there are a large number of blocks marked with red color, it indicates that your hard disk is damaged seriously. To avoid worse situations, please back up the whole disk as soon as possible.

As you know, it is not possible to restore a corrupted ISO disk image that stored on a damaged hard disk. So, if you find the disk is damaged, the first thing you must do is to transfer all important data to another storage device and then to create a new bootable ISO disk image.

Step 1. To create a bootable ISO image, you need to prepare an external storage device such as USB flash drive, CD/DVD, and external hard drive and connect it to your computer.

Step 2. Then you can create a bootable ISO image by reading this post where detailed steps are provided.

Step 3. Once the bootable ISO image was created, you can use it to create a new VM or start the existing VM on VirtualBox. You can click here to know more details about how to create a VM on VirtualBox.

When I was creating a VM on VirtualBox, an error message “no bootable medium found system halted” pops up. This post provides 7 effective solutions to fix the issue. If you are also troubled by this error, this post is what you need!Click to Tweet

Have a Try Now

Here comes the end of the post. Top 7 troubleshooting methods for the VirtualBox no bootable medium found error has been elaborated to you. Now, it’s your turn to have a try. If you have any questions about MiniTool Partition Wizard, please send us an e-mail via [email protected]. We also appreciate any opinions about this topic left in the comment area.

VirtualBox No Bootable Medium Found FAQ