Recently I lost the internal network card on my home desktop. Good news is I had a spare Wireless card! Bad news… the box is my groovyPost test box where I run several VM’s using Microsoft Virtual PC 2007.
After searching through several Microsoft Virtual PC documents, configuring my VM’s to use the wireless adapter at first started to look impossible. The problem I ran into was attempting to connect a Virtual Machine (Guest) using a physical Wireless Adapter that is also being used by the physical machine or Host. Each time I tried it I ran into a duplicate IP address issue… <GRR>. For some reason the virtual machine network services are unable to translate with the wireless DHCP server on your network. If you’re running XP there is a sketchy work around that involves deleting the Virtual Machine Additions on the Guest, but the same trick won’t work on a Vista Guest. So what’s the solution (other than being told by MrGroove to upgrade to Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2)?
Say “Hello” to the Microsoft Loopback Adapter.
The Microsoft Loopback Adapter was originally designed to be used as a virtual internal network for testing purposes. It acts just like a physical network adapter and “loops back” any settings connected to it. The neat thing about it is that you can install the Virtual Machine Network Services driver on it which allows a Virtual Guest to connect to it. So if you setup a Loopback adapter and then enable network connection sharing on your physical wireless adapter you can trick your Guest into thinking that it is connecting to a wired physical adapter. The limitation in this however is that the loopback adapter will bind the IP address of your Virtual Machine to 192.168.0.1, and it may interfere with any workgroups you have running on your network. If it does interfere, you can manually change your network to a 192.168.1.xxx subnet.
Read on below to explain the set-up process.
How to Enable a Microsoft Loopback Adapter and Internet Connection Sharing for use with Virtual Machines
1. Go to Start and Control Panel. Once in Control Panel Click Add Hardware.
2. The Add Hardware Wizard will pop-up. Click Next.
3. Check the Yes, I have already connected the hardware button, then Click Next.
4. Now Scroll DOWN to the bottom and Click Add a new hardware device.
Tip: You can get to it faster by hitting the A key once 
5. Now Click the Install the hardware that I manually select from a list (Advanced) button, then Click Next.
6. Click Network adapters from the list. Click Next.
7. On the left side Click Microsoft, on the right side Click Microsoft Loopback Adapter. Now Click Next.
On the next Screen Click Finished.
Now to set up Internet Connection Sharing (ICS)
1. Browse to your Network Connections, Right-Click your Physical Adapter, and Click Properties.
2. Click the Advanced tab, then Check the Allow other network users to connect through this computer’s internet connection button. Click OK to finish.
3. Now Open up your Virtual Machine’s settings, and Set its Network Connection to Use your new Microsoft Loopback Adapter.
All done!
Your virtual machine should now be able to connect to your network / internet using the Loopback adapter and your Wireless Network connection! Granted, this one is a bit complex so any comments for the How-To is welcome however any detailed questions should be posted to the groovy Community Forum.
Tags: how-to, wireless, loop-back, networking, virtual-pc, vm, virtual-machine, groovypost, groovedexter
Groovy article groovy dudes, I was wondering why I kept getting the Ip conflict problem using my wireless adapter with my VM.
Thanks a bunch! I was about to give up when i stumbled on this article! Great work!
It took a long time for me to solve the problem, But thanks to this simple but smart answe it solved all my VM’s NIC problems..
Thx very much for such a good work
Thanks a lot. The loop back adapter solution really works !!!!
Thank you very much, this helped me a lot!
Ilija
@Ilija Brajkovic – Thanks for the feedback Ilija!
I have a few questions with the walkthrough above.
—>>>Click the Advanced tab, then Check the Allow other network users to connect through this computer’s internet connection button. Click OK to finish.<<<—
I am using Vista and when I tick the box I have to ‘Select a private network connection’ of either Local Area Connection or Local Area Connection 2. Neither work.
Help with the above please.
Second problem is..
3. Now Open up your Virtual Machine’s settings, and Set its Network Connection to Use your new Microsoft Loopback Adapter.
A bit more information on how to do this please.
@Matt, for the solution for your first problem, set your physical card that connects to the internet to share connections with your loopback adapter connection.
For the solution to your second problem, in Virtual PC go to File > Settings and change the physical network card that your virtual machine will use to the loopback adapter.
If you are still having problems, make sure you installed the loopback adapter properly.
Vista won’t allow you to select a wireless adapter to share out as mentioned by Matt…is there a solution for this? Seems like it’ll on allow the sharing of wired connections.
I’m running Vista, and using VHD to allow me to run IE6 on a XP virtual machine. I tried following the steps above, but when I got past step 7, the wizard asked me to insert the XP CD rom. Now since I dont have a CD, this is a download from MS, what can I do?
@richard,
Hmm.. Check in your C:\WINDOWS\ServicePackFiles\i386 folders (or around it…). Usually you can get away with pointing your machine at these folders when your asked to provide the install CD. Keep us updated
I following along exactly what was mention but then after upgrading to WinXP SP3 (VM), it does not allow me to get on the internet..
I’m checking the vista host and im thinking i have to configure the ip address of what you said
“The limitation in this however is that the loopback adapter will bind the IP address of your Virtual Machine to 192.168.0.1, and it may interfere with any workgroups you have running on your network. If it does interfere, you can manually change your network to a 192.168.1.xxx subnet.”
not sure how sure how to do that.
thanks
-mike
[...] a cross-over Ethernet cable, and connecting virtual machines to the internet. We’ve covered setup for the loopback adapter in XP and Vista but for reasons unknown Microsoft annoyingly has decided to hide the “Add New Hardware [...]