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Good day,

My desktop is running Ubuntu 18.04. 64-bit, Intel Core i3-4170 @3.70GHz, 16 GiB memory. It's about 3 years old. This is my every day use machine. It has VirtualBox 6, running two machines. One is Ubuntu 18.04 server. That runs the Pi Hole, and a couple of other functions. The second is Linux Mint. That runs the TVHeadend software used for video recording. I have found that the TVHeadend works best on its own machine.

I wanted to upgrade to kernel 5.4 from 5.0.0.36. I've used ukuu to upgrade the Linux kernel. I've never experienced an issue using the ukuu software like this in the 3 upgrades I have done in the past. (See screenshot)

enter image description here

After the install of the 5.4 kernel and reboot, the Virtualbox does not open. I got a popup that instructed me to run '/sbin/vboxconfig' as "root". I did so (see below).

  root@xxx:~# /sbin/vboxconfig
  vboxdrv.sh: Stopping VirtualBox services.
  vboxdrv.sh: Starting VirtualBox services.
  vboxdrv.sh: Building VirtualBox kernel modules.
  vboxdrv.sh: failed: Look at /var/log/vbox-setup.log to find out what went     wrong.

  There were problems setting up VirtualBox.  To re-start the set-up process,   run /sbin/vboxconfig as root.
root@xxx:~# exit
logout
  :~$ cat /var/log/vbox-setup.log
  Building the main VirtualBox module.
  Error building the module:
  make V=1 CONFIG_MODULE_SIG= -C /lib/modules/5.4.0-050400-generic/build   SUBDIRS=/tmp/vbox.0 SRCROOT=/tmp/vbox.0 -j4 modules
make[1]: warning: -jN forced in submake: disabling jobserver mode.
make -f ./Makefile syncconfig
make -f ./scripts/Makefile.build obj=scripts/basic
rm -f .tmp_quiet_recordmcount
make -f ./scripts/Makefile.build obj=scripts/kconfig syncconfig
  flex -oscripts/kconfig/lexer.lex.c -L scripts/kconfig/lexer.l
/bin/sh: 1: flex: not found
  bison -o scripts/kconfig/parser.tab.c --defines=scripts/kconfig/parser.tab.h -t -l scripts/kconfig/parser.y
/bin/sh: 1: bison: not found
scripts/Makefile.host:9: recipe for target 'scripts/kconfig/lexer.lex.c' failed
make[3]: *** [scripts/kconfig/lexer.lex.c] Error 127
make[3]: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs....
scripts/Makefile.host:17: recipe for target 'scripts/kconfig/parser.tab.h' failed
make[3]: *** [scripts/kconfig/parser.tab.h] Error 127
Makefile:567: recipe for target 'syncconfig' failed
make[2]: *** [syncconfig] Error 2
Makefile:678: recipe for target 'include/config/auto.conf.cmd' failed
make[1]: *** [include/config/auto.conf.cmd] Error 2
/tmp/vbox.0/Makefile.include.footer:106: recipe for target 'vboxdrv' failed
make: *** [vboxdrv] Error 2

I uninstalled the 5.4 kernel and tried the upgrade process again, and got the same result. I restarted the machine and booted from the old kernel. Then I purged the 5.4 kernel from my machine. I think I will want to upgrade to a newer kernel sooner than later...

Question: How do I upgrade to a newer kernel without the errors?

Update/Upgrade/Autormove for 2 December 2019

oneputtmike@:~$ apt list --upgradable
Listing... Done
libsqlite3-0/bionic-updates,bionic-security 3.22.0-1ubuntu0.2 amd64 
[upgradable from: 3.22.0-1ubuntu0.1]
linux-generic-hwe-18.04/bionic-updates 5.0.0.37.95 amd64 [upgradable 
from: 5.0.0.36.94]
linux-headers-generic/bionic-updates 4.15.0.72.74 amd64 [upgradable 
from: 4.15.0.70.72]
linux-headers-generic-hwe-18.04/bionic-updates 5.0.0.37.95 amd64 
[upgradable from: 5.0.0.36.94]
linux-image-generic-hwe-18.04/bionic-updates 5.0.0.37.95 amd64 
[upgradable from: 5.0.0.36.94]
linux-libc-dev/bionic-updates 4.15.0-72.81 amd64 [upgradable from: 
4.15.0-70.79]
linux-signed-generic-hwe-18.04/bionic-updates 5.0.0.37.95 amd64 
[upgradable from: 5.0.0.36.94]

oneputtmike@:~$ sudo apt upgrade
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Calculating upgrade... Done
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer 
required:
  linux-headers-4.15.0-70 linux-headers-4.15.0-70-generic
Use 'sudo apt autoremove' to remove them.
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  linux-headers-4.15.0-72 linux-headers-4.15.0-72-generic
  linux-headers-5.0.0-37 linux-headers-5.0.0-37-generic
  linux-image-5.0.0-37-generic linux-modules-5.0.0-37-generic
  linux-modules-extra-5.0.0-37-generic
The following packages will be upgraded:
  libsqlite3-0 linux-generic-hwe-18.04 linux-headers-generic
  linux-headers-generic-hwe-18.04 linux-image-generic-hwe-18.04 linux- 
   libc-dev
      linux-signed-generic-hwe-18.04
    7 upgraded, 7 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
    Need to get 80.3 MB/80.8 MB of archives.
    After this operation, 421 MB of additional disk space will be 
used.
    Do you want to continue? [Y/n] Y

See the upgrade/update/autoremove output upgrade/update/autoremove output https://pastebin.com/GXxJDSnd

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2
  • 1
    There is always a mainline kernel thread over on Ubuntu forums. You can try to get help there. That being said, myself, I don't know what is wrong in your case. There were significant Ubuntu kernel configuration changes somewhere between kernel 5.4-rc2 and 5.4-rc6.
    – Doug Smythies
    Dec 2, 2019 at 14:38
  • Thank you Doug. I will check this thread out.
    – OnePuttMike
    Dec 3, 2019 at 2:10

2 Answers 2

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2

Mainline kernels are not officially supported in Ubuntu. You install them at your own risk and there is no guarantee that all software is compatible with mainline kernels.

And generally there is no reason to install mainline kernels to Ubuntu unless some very specific hardware issues. Upgrading a kernel just because it is new is not a good idea.

Ubuntu kernels get bug fixes and security updates backported from the latest mainline kernels.

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4
  • I'm obviously still learning Linux and the Ubuntu OS. With most things I am of the thinking "if it ain't broke don't fix it". On the other hand, when it comes to computing, I've been told updates should be done often and on the regular for security and performance.
    – OnePuttMike
    Dec 3, 2019 at 2:24
  • 1
    Ubuntu has a good update system. You don't have to update what is not supposed to be updated.
    – Pilot6
    Dec 3, 2019 at 6:49
  • 1
    This does not answer the OPs question.
    – Pedro Rodrigues
    Dec 4, 2019 at 13:15
  • 1
    This does answer the question. There reason of the error is that the 5.4 kernel is not supported by installed packages.
    – Pilot6
    Dec 4, 2019 at 15:42
1

So, I realize that question is super old and you've probably already got your situation sorted out, but for anyone else (like me) who just upgraded to to 18.04 and ran smack into this exact same issue, here's how to fix it.

Basically, you just need to install Virtual Box 6.0 instead of trying to continue running 5.x.

The install process removes the older version and (at least in my case) all previous Virtual Machine configs should get moved over.

Official download page here: https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Linux_Downloads

Additional instructions I found helpful here: https://linuxhint.com/install_virtualbox_6_ubuntu/

One important thing to note from that second article:

Enable Hardware Virtualization: Before you install VirtualBox 6.0, make sure hardware virtualization is enabled. If you’re using an Intel processor, then you have to enable VT-x or VT-d from the BIOS of your computer. If you’re using a AMD processor, then you have to enable AMD-v from the BIOS of your computer. This is very important. Without hardware virtualization enabled, your virtual machines will perform very badly.

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