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At work I use a Windows 7 PC but I am a programmer and face problems in Windows while working on some types of development, so I want to have a virtual Ubuntu Linux machine that I can use when I encounter those problems.

I have tried VirtualBox and VMware and am able to install the latest Ubuntu and run it. Though when I try to restart / start the computer after it was shut down, I am unable to boot into Windows normally and end up having to go into Safe mode and then use the system restore to get my system back up and working.

I am puzzled by this and would appreciate if anyone has any idea why it would be doing this, I have searched on this but can't find anything. Thanks for any advice

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  • that's weird. maybe a virtualization driver or network driver is hanging during boot? can you install the software without trying to install the distro inside of it and reboot successfully? Feb 5, 2011 at 4:04
  • an additional note, is virtualpc out of bounds? it's free. linux can be made to run under this product. it shouldn't kill your boot process. Feb 5, 2011 at 5:04
  • What do you mean "unable to boot into windows normally"? Do you get any error messages? Does it reboot while trying to start?
    – Nick
    Feb 10, 2011 at 15:35
  • Ditto to what Nick said; we need more info. Bluescreen? Blackscreen? Error message? Sounds like it may be virtualization driver related. May 13, 2011 at 21:20

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If VT is enabled in your BIOS (it probably is), then an update to the BIOS may help to resolve this problem for you -- one of the jobs of the BIOS is to update microcode in the CPU before boot. The microcode updates to the CPU are lost when the power goes out, so the BIOS does this every time.

If one of the updates includes microcode updates for your CPU that resolve some strange issues with VT (or perhaps some other issues), then this may be the right solution for you.

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