Configuring Headless VirtualBox Server on CentOS 6.x

If you are starting on a blank server, I would recommend first using my Server Provisioning Script to get the server secured and updated.

The most important thing is to make sure that you have the Source available for your current Kernel.

Get current kernel information:

[user@server] uname -r

2.6.32-358.6.2.el6.x86_64

Get which kernels are installed:

[user@server] rpm -qa | grep kernel

kernel-devel-2.6.32-358.18.1.el6.x86_64 kernel-firmware-2.6.32-358.18.1.el6.noarch kernel-headers-2.6.32-358.18.1.el6.x86_64 dracut-kernel-004-303.el6.noarch kernel-2.6.32-358.0.1.el6.x86_64 kernel-2.6.32-358.18.1.el6.x86_64 kernel-2.6.32-358.14.1.el6.x86_64

In the example above I am using kernel 2.6.32-358.6.2.el6.x86_64 while the rpms that are installed are for a newer version 2.6.32-358.18.1.el6.x86_64

So, in this example, we must remove the newer rpms (18.1) and install the ones that match our current kernel (6.2). Note: You should only have to do this for the headers and not devel.

sudo yum remove kernel-headers-2.6.32-358.18.1.el6.x86_64

Now we can install the ones to match:

sudo yum install kernel-headers-2.6.32-358.6.2.el6.x86_64

sudo yum install kernel-devel-2.6.32-358.6.2.el6.x86_64

Now we can get on with the rest:

cd /etc/yum.repos.d

sudo wget http://packages.sw.be/rpmforge-release/rpmforge-release-0.5.2-2.el6.rf.x86_64.rpm

sudo rpm -Uvh rpmforge-release-0.5.2-2.el6.rf.x86_64.rpm

sudo wget http://mirror.pnl.gov/epel/6/i386/epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm

sudo rpm -Uvh epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm

sudo yum -y --enablerepo rpmforge install dkms

sudo yum -y groupinstall "Development Tools"

sudo reboot

Once the server reboots:

cd /etc/yum.repos.d

sudo wget http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/rpm/rhel/virtualbox.repo

sudo yum -y install VirtualBox-4.2

cd /tmp

sudo wget http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/4.2.8/Oracle_VM_VirtualBox_Extension_Pack-4.2.8-83876.vbox-extpack

sudo VBoxManage extpack install Oracle_VM_VirtualBox_Extension_Pack-4.2.8-83876.vbox-extpack

That should be it! Now you have VirtualBox 4.2 installed and ready to rock!