AMD PCnet Ethernet Driver is missing

[Clemens Fuchslocher]

The UserManual.pdf of 2.1.4 states:

Windows Vista no longer ships a driver for the AMD PCnet Ethernet card that VirtualBox provides to the guest by default [...]. As a convenience, VirtualBox ships with a 32-bit driver for the AMD PCnet card, which comes with the Windows Guest Additions. [...] Then, start the Windows Hardware Wizard and direct it to the Guest Additions CD where a driver for the PCnet card can be found in the directory 32bit\Windows\3rdParty\AMD_PCnet.

But the directory 32bit\Windows\3rdParty\AMD_PCnet doesn't exist anymore in the iso image of the guest additions.

It was still there in 2.1.0 but disappeared in 2.1.2:

2.1.0

2.1.0$ md5sum VirtualBox-2.1.0-41146-Linux_x86.run
1f9b356338085643867c41fad4377c31  VirtualBox-2.1.0-41146-Linux_x86.run
2.1.0$ bash VirtualBox-2.1.0-41146-Linux_x86.run --tar xvf
2.1.0$ tar -jxvf VirtualBox.tar.bz2
2.1.0$ isoinfo -J -f -i additions/VBoxGuestAdditions.iso | grep AMD_PCnet
/32Bit/Windows/3rdParty/AMD_PCnet
/32Bit/Windows/3rdParty/AMD_PCnet/PCNTPCI5.sys
/32Bit/Windows/3rdParty/AMD_PCnet/netamd.inf
/32Bit/Windows/3rdParty/AMD_PCnet/pcntpci5.cat

2.1.2

2.1.2$ md5sum VirtualBox-2.1.2-41885-Linux_x86.run 
0e04a8073cd927ac7f2133f70b91482d  VirtualBox-2.1.2-41885-Linux_x86.run
2.1.2$ bash VirtualBox-2.1.2-41885-Linux_x86.run --tar xvf
2.1.2$ tar -jxvf VirtualBox.tar.bz2
2.1.2$ isoinfo -J -f -i additions/VBoxGuestAdditions.iso | grep AMD_PCnet

2.1.4

2.1.4$ md5sum VirtualBox-2.1.4-42893-Linux_x86.run
45c689215a37f274b5b4fe8c7cd7b288  VirtualBox-2.1.4-42893-Linux_x86.run
2.1.4$ bash VirtualBox-2.1.4-42893-Linux_x86.run --tar xvf
2.1.4$ tar -jxvf VirtualBox.tar.bz2
2.1.4$ isoinfo -J -f -i additions/VBoxGuestAdditions.iso | grep AMD_PCnet

Installing the driver manually from ​http://www.amd.com/us-en/assets/content_type/utilities/V4.51.zip works fine for me.

$ unzip -l V4.51.zip
Archive:  V4.51.zip
  Length     Date   Time    Name
 --------    ----   ----    ----
    26582  07-07-04 12:01   WinXP_SignedDriver/netamd.inf
     9136  07-19-04 12:02   WinXP_SignedDriver/pcntpci5.cat
    36352  07-07-04 12:01   WinXP_SignedDriver/PCNTPCI5.sys
    26582  07-07-04 12:01   WinServer2003_SignedDriver/netamd.inf
     9136  07-19-04 13:17   WinServer2003_SignedDriver/pcntpci5.cat
    36352  07-07-04 12:01   WinServer2003_SignedDriver/PCNTPCI5.sys
     7361  08-02-04 16:23   readme.rtf
 --------                   -------
   151501                   7 files

[Sander van Leeuwen]

You have to extract them from the installation executable as documented in the manual.

[Clemens Fuchslocher]

I have quoted the relevant part of the UserManual.pdf in the ticket above. Which part of the manual did you mean?

If you follow these instructions, then you will not find the ethernet driver at the described location.

I also showed that the driver is part of the 2.1.0 package but is missed in 2.1.2 and 2.1.4.

• ​VirtualBox-2.1.4-42893-Linux_x86.run
• ​VirtualBox-2.1.2-41885-Linux_x86.run
• ​VirtualBox-2.1.0-41146-Linux_x86.run

So please check it again.

$ md5sum VirtualBox-2.1.4-42893-Linux_x86.run
45c689215a37f274b5b4fe8c7cd7b288  VirtualBox-2.1.4-42893-Linux_x86.run

$ md5sum UserManual.pdf 
6d6709fa2a9cb3dfad8c7ad7cd43be32  UserManual.pdf

[Frank Mehnert]

The answer for your problem is that you have to extract these files manually from VBoxWindowsAdditions-x86.exe doing

D:\VBoxWindowsAdditions-x86.exe /extract /D=where_to_put_the_files

The reason was to save space on the additions .ISO image. This will be better documented in the next release.