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  1. I recently upgraded from Ubuntu 18.04 LTS to 19.10 running now on 4.15.0-1079-oem x86_64 kernel.
  2. Since the upgrade Virtualbox is not working anymore. I tried to install the shipped version from Ubuntu 6.0.14-dfsg-1 and I also tried the official version from Oracle by adding the correct apt sources and installed virtualbox-6.1 in version 6.1.4-136177~Ubuntu~eoan. But not working as explained later.
  3. Meanwhile I purged everything related to virtualbox and tried to install both Virtualbox packages clean. For both I still get the following errors during the installation and runtime.

Errors I get

During the start of a VM in Virtualbox I get:

Kernel driver not installed (rc=-1908)

The VirtualBox Linux kernel driver is either not loaded or not set up correctly. Please reinstall virtualbox-dkms package and load the kernel module by executing

'modprobe vboxdrv'

as root.

If your system has EFI Secure Boot enabled you may also need to sign the kernel modules (vboxdrv, vboxnetflt, vboxnetadp, vboxpci) before you can load them. Please see your Linux system's documentation for more information.

where: suplibOsInit what: 3 VERR_VM_DRIVER_NOT_INSTALLED (-1908) - The support driver is not installed. On linux, open returned ENOENT. 

If I follow the instruction and do the modprobe I get:

# sudo modprobe vboxdrv
modprobe: ERROR: could not insert 'vboxdrv': Exec format error

dmesg meanwhile shows:

[   50.877935] PKCS#7 signature not signed with a trusted key
[   50.878345] module: x86/modules: Skipping invalid relocation target, existing value is nonzero for type 1, loc 00000000ba2f4083, val ffffffffc10a4a7f

This error is weird, because I have Secure Boot disabled.

# mokutil --sb-state
SecureBoot disabled

and double checked by:

# mokutil --disable-validation

What I already found, but did not help

I was already googling around for hours.

  1. Some say, it's because of the binutils which got "bricked" since version > 2.30. I have 2.33-2ubuntu1.2 installed, but cannot downgrade in 19.10 without breaking everything.
  2. It says the current kernel has problems, as the full Retpoline fixes has not been fully added and --force-vermagic should be added to modprobe but this didn't help either.

Other kernel modules are working fine. I could install wireguard without any problems.

I come to a point, where I give up totally frustrated and hope I can find some help here.

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  • I think your problem might lie in a mismatch between the kernel headers you're using and the kernel files themselves. This, unix.stackexchange.com/a/541947/60747, appears to provide a solution. I'd purge all your header files (sudo apt remove linux-headers-*), make sure virtualbox-dkms is installed, and then reinstall your current kernel (from uname -a or just with sudo apt install --reinstall linux-image-$(uname -r)). Watch the output to make sure the vboxdrv.ko and other kernel files are made without error. Maybe go back to an earlier kernel if it still doesn't work.
    – pbhj
    Apr 11, 2020 at 21:58
  • thanks @pbhj, according to the logs everything worked well Trigger für linux-image-4.15.0-1079-oem (4.15.0-1079.89) werden verarbeitet ... /etc/kernel/postinst.d/dkms: * dkms: running auto installation service for kernel 4.15.0-1079-oem ...done. i double checked, the vboxdrv.ko is in /lib/modules/$(uname -r)/misc so should be processed. but still getting the same errors
    – f0sh
    Apr 14, 2020 at 7:56
  • Are you using the headers for "4.15.0-1079-oem" (ie packages.ubuntu.com/eoan-updates/linux-headers-4.15.0-1079-oem; I don't even know what this kernel is, presumably you have a computer with Linux pre-installed by a manufacturer?). Perhaps it won't work with that kernel and you need to use mainline kernel instead? If you've rebooted since the install what does lsmod | grep vbox show? Did the output of apt show that the vboxdr.ko and other vbox modules were built without error; is this module a new one, or a left over from before? I'm sorry I don't really have an answer.
    – pbhj
    Apr 14, 2020 at 15:22
  • yes, I'm using a Dell XPS with a preinstalled oem Ubuntu. Actually I also tried the unsigned kernel version, as you proposed with the shared link, but this didn't seem to help either. APT also reports errors during install, it's the same error that I mentioned in my first post. Therefore lsmod | grep vbox doesn't show anything as the kernel module could not be loaded due to incorrect signatures. It's really a strange error and I just can't figure out the root cause of it.
    – f0sh
    Apr 15, 2020 at 7:57

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