Unrecoverable system error when try to install Kali Linux on VirtualBox running on Windows 7

Question

Downloaded kali-linux-1.0.2-i386.torrent and mounted ISO on a virtual drive.

Followed directions on http://docs.kali.org/installation/kali-linux-hard-disk-install to install Kali on VirtualBox running on Windows 7. When I try to boot in regular mode I get the Kali splash screen and then the error:

Oh no! Something has gone wrong. A problem has occurred and the system can't recover. Please contact a system administrator.

I can boot in recovery mode, but I'm unsure what I should try next.

Your help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks, Kevin

Answer 1

I ran into this as well with Kali 1.0.3 (amd64) on VirtualBox.

I encountered the error at the end of the install as well as on reboot.

Things I tried:

• I enabled PAE/NX (default was off), but did not effect a change.
• I noticed that the error was issued by the window manager. CTRL-ALT-F2 will bring to a text console.
• Using df -h, I could see that my virtual hard drive (8GB) was full.

I reinstalled with a fresh 16GB (as opposed to 8GB recommended by the tutorial) virtual HDD, and it now seems to be running fine so far. (note: PAE/NX was left enabled)

Answer 2

Make sure you've enabled PAE/NX under the System/Processor settings tab in VirtualBox.

Answer 3

This is probably a little late but for other people check the minimum requirements for kali @

http://docs.kali.org/installation/kali-linux-hard-disk-install

the minimum disk space requirements for kali is 10 GB now so when you create a virtual machine the default space is 8 GB so increase it to anything above 10 GB (my suggestion) should fix the problem.

posted Aug 15, 2014