How to fix Virtualbox error “Kernel driver not installed (rc=-1908)” on Ubuntu

By | July 25, 2020

Virtualbox

I recently installed the latest version of Virtualbox (4.3.12) by downloading the deb files from virtualbox.org on Ubuntu 14.04. The installation goes fine, but when trying to run Virtualbox, it reports the following error.

Kernel driver not installed (rc=-1908)

The VirtualBox Linux kernel driver (vboxdrv) is either not loaded or there is a permission problem with /dev/vboxdrv. Please reinstall the kernel module by executing

'/etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup'

as root. If it is available in your distribution, you should install the DKMS package first. This package keeps track of Linux kernel changes and recompiles the vboxdrv kernel module if necessary.

Looks like some kernel driver has to be compiled for Virtualbox to run properly. But this is easy enough on Ubuntu and does not require a lot of effort. And here are the steps to do the necessary.

First install the kernel headers and build tools.

$ sudo apt-get install build-essential module-assistant 
$ sudo m-a prepare

And now compile virtualbox kernel driver with the commanded as reported by the error message earlier.

$ sudo /etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup

The compilation should go fine and finish within a few minutes with an output similar to what is shown below.

$ sudo /etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup
Stopping VirtualBox kernel modules ...done.
Recompiling VirtualBox kernel modules ...done.
Starting VirtualBox kernel modules ...done.

Now run Virtualbox again and it should run fine.

Update

One of our readers pointed out a new solution for newer versions of Ubuntu. Check it here:

https://askubuntu.com/questions/760671/
About Silver Moon

A Tech Enthusiast, Blogger, Linux Fan and a Software Developer. Writes about Computer hardware, Linux and Open Source software and coding in Python, Php and Javascript. He can be reached at [email protected].

36 Comments

How to fix Virtualbox error “Kernel driver not installed (rc=-1908)” on Ubuntu
  1. Mandlha

    i get this error

    sudo /sbin/rcvboxdrv setup

    vboxdrv.sh: failed: modprobe vboxdrv failed. Please use ‘dmesg’ to find out why.

  2. Jackson

    Everything worked up until this step:

    “And now compile virtualbox kernel driver with the commanded as reported by the error message earlier.
    $ sudo /etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup”

    I am however using an external storage too hold my .iso if that means anything. Rather than “etc/init.d/vboxdrv” on the erroor message, it says “/sbin/vboxconfig”.
    When I type iin “$ sudo /sbin/vboxconfig setup” it says “Bad argument” and thats it. I wooould appreciate any help. Thanks.

  3. thiago

    Not work

    /etc/init.d/vboxdrv: /usr/share/virtualbox/src/vboxhost/do_dkms: not found
    …failed!
    (Failed, trying without DKMS)
    Recompiling VirtualBox kernel modules …failed!

      1. amiine

        i get sudo /etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup
        sudo: /etc/init.d/vboxdrv: command not found
        :( more than one weak and no solution !!!

  4. Sandile Nhlalo-Sibanda

    i’m getting….Please help with a possible solution

    Stopping VirtualBox kernel modules …done.
    Recompiling VirtualBox kernel modules …failed!
    (Look at /var/log/vbox-install.log to find out what went wrong)

  5. Brad McInnes

    I ran the first part, and I got the message “0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 202 not upgraded.” which I thought was rather strange. Then I ran the second part and I got ” /etc/init.d/vboxdrv: command not found”. Does anybody know why, or how to fix this?

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *