[Lancaster] Using USB via VirtualBox

[Ken Hough]

As I've mentioned previously, I've been playing with VirtualBox. The most 
recent version of this (v2.1.0) include sfor access to USB, but I've had 
problems in getting USB to work under SUSE v11.1.

I kept getting the message :
"Could not load the Host USB Proxy Service (VERR_FILE_NOT_FOUND).
The service might be not installed on the host computer"

It seems that I'm not alone with this problem. Searches on the Internet showed 
that it is a recognised problem with both SUSE and Ubuntu (Gutsy at least). I 
haven't searched for other distros. Solutions to this problem have been 
posted as follows :

For SUSE:
<http://forums.opensuse.org/applications/391984-virtualbox.html>

For Ubuntu:
<http://blog.turbulentsky.com/2008/03/virtualbox-usb-proxy-service-on-ubuntu.html>

Having sorted this out on out my SUSE v11.1 system, I got virtualised SUSE 
v10.3 to access USB OK. So far, I haven't managed to get WIn XP to do 
likewise so I guess there's something that I'm still missing for the later. 
It seems that VirtualBox itself is now OK for USB access.

I've read several articles about using VirtualBox. They all refered to the 
availability of USB, but not to the problem mentioned above. Just goes to 
show that reviews (and reviewers?) should be taken with the proverbial pinch 
of salt.

Hope to be at the Britannia on Wednesday

Ken Hough