Running a 64-bit VirtualBox archive on a 32-bit machine

Question

I received a VirtualBox archive that should import a virtual machine. The archive was created using Mac OS X.

The problem is that it works on 64-bit machines, but not on 32-bit.

On 32-bit machines, it launches the machine but nothing loads. All I get is an empty screen.

How can I make it work on 32-bit machines?

Solution

You cannot run a 64bit guest on a host that only has a 32bit processor.

http://www.virtualbox.org/manual/ch03.html#intro-64bitguests

VirtualBox supports 64-bit guest operating systems, even on 32-bit host operating systems, provided that the following conditions are met:

You need a 64-bit processor with hardware virtualization support (see the section called “Hardware vs. software virtualization”).