Kali Linux Virtual Machine Installation on Windows - hawkinsw/CS5138 GitHub Wiki

Kali Linux Virtual Machine Installation on Windows

Installer Images

  1. Navigate to the link https://www.kali.org/get-kali/
  2. Select the Installer Images box OR scroll down to the Installer Images section. Select the version of Kali that you'd like to install: 64-bit or 32-bit (I downloaded the 64-bit version). There will be four options displayed: Installer, Weekly, Everything, and NetInstaller. Go with "Installer," the one with the Recommended badge underneath. The bottom left button is the download button. This will begin the download of the Kali ISO file. Select the appropriate download directory (E.g., downloads folder).

**NOTE: (Timothy Holstein): A reccomended VM software program to use would be VM work station. It is better for managing multiple virtual machines at once than VirtualBox. That said, it follows near identical install instructions in terms of grabbing an ISO and running a vm from there. I would make not in general as well to NEVER assign more than half the memory your pc has in total toward one vm. I speak from experience, the crashes will be nigh unberable.

**NOTE: This download may take several minutes

  1. Go to https://www.virtualbox.org/ and download the most updated version of VirtualBox.
  2. Once downloaded begin the installation process and select the location of where you are going to save it.
  3. Create entries and shortcuts
  4. Click install to install necessary files and packages
  5. Install certificates if prompted then click finish when the installation has completed
  6. Open VirtualBox and select the New button to create a new Virtual Machine (VM). A popup (dialog) box will open.
  7. Enter the name of the VM (E.g., "Kali"). Enter the folder in which the VM will reside (this may consume a large amount of space, so ensure a drive with plenty of space is selected). If on Windows, and want to change the folder where the VM will reside, make sure you run VirtualBox with administrator privileges. Select the machine type as Linux. Select the version as Ubuntu x-bit where x is the version of Kali that was installed (I selected 64-bit to match my Kali ISO file download).
  8. The dialog's next page is for memory allocation. The value one enters for this will be dependent upon his/her system. For me, I entered 4096MB. As a recommendation, if you have at least 8GB of ram, set the memory size to at least 2048MB.
  9. On the next page, I selected “Create a virtual hard disk now” and clicked Create.
  10. On the next page, I had “VDI (VirtualBox Disk Image)” selected as the hard disk file type.
  11. The next page is titled “Storage on physical hard disk.” I selected “Dynamically allocated” and clicked Next.
  12. For the size of the VM, like with the memory allocation, what one enters will be dependent upon his/her system (**NOTE: This means it will take physical space on your drive, so enter how much you want allocated. Ensure you have more than this amount of space available before proceeding. If you are running out of space, use an external disk). I entered 25GB.
  13. The Kali VM that was just created should now be visible in the left section of the VirtualBox window. To install the VMs, one must now select the Kali VM (it should be highlighted when selected) > Settings (button at the top in the right section) > Storage.
  14. In this section, under “Storage Devices,” the text should read “Controller: IDE”. To the right of this text are two icons. Click the round icon.
  15. In the dialog that appears, select Add. The file explorer will appear. Navigate to the Kali ISO file that was downloaded earlier and select Open. Now select the ISO that was just opened and click OK. --- NOTE: For one student, the path was was "Choose Disk" -> "Add" (top left) -> -> "Choose" -> "OK"
  16. Now, while the Kali VM is highlighted in the left section, select the green arrow Start icon in the right section. The VM will start.
  17. Upon starting, a “Select startup disk” dialog may appear with a drop down. Select the kali ISO file from the drop down.
  18. Continue with the Graphical Install option when the BIOS menu pops up.
  19. From there, follow the setup instructions. Once completed, Kali will be installed and available to use on your system.
  20. After installation, there are multiple settings you can twist to optimize the performance or make it more convenient. One of them is to enable the bidirectional clipboard and drag-n-drop. To do so, select your Kali Linux VM on Virtual Box -> Settings -> General -> Advanced -> Change to "Bidirectional" for Shared Clipboard and Drag'n'Drop
  21. INSTRUCTIONS DOUBLE CHECKED: Yes [X] No []

Prebuilt Image

  1. Download and install the most appropriate VirtualBox version for your machine: https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads
  2. Navigate to https://www.kali.org/get-kali/#kali-virtual-machines
  3. Select/download the VirtualBox image (VirtualBox 64-bit is recommended)
  4. After download completes, unzip the folder
  5. From the Virtual Box welcome menu select the Add option
  6. Navigate to and select the previous .vbox file you unziped (I would recommend moving this to a better location than Downloads, maybe C:/User/programfiles)
  7. You may edit the settings for the Virtual Machine to your liking. I would recommend setting Shared Clipboard and Drag'n'Drop to bidirectional, in general > advanced. You may also give your Virtual Machine more memory, if your computer is able to support it, and additional CPU cores (up to 4). Most imported settings should be acceptable, however.
  8. Run the virtual machine as normal
  9. The default credentials for this virtual machine are:
  • Username: kali
  • Password: kali

Troubleshooting

  • When starting your VM for the first time, if you get an error something along the lines of "not in hypervisor partition", you may have to change some settings in your BIOS. Follow these steps for more details: https://techsupportwhale.com/not-in-a-hypervisor-partition/
  • If you are having issues with your VM's screen resolution, you can modify the default preferences via the "View" tab in the top left of your VM's window