How to enable virtualization on a Dell Optiplex 755 to run Hyper-V

34 Replies

I have been building some test Windows 2008 Hyper-V server’s on Dell Optiplex 755 workstations with 8GB of RAM recently, and I thought I would let you know what settings to change in the BIOS to make this work.

At first I was getting some errors like these below:

Hyper-V launch failed; Either VMX not present or not enabled in BIOS.
Hyper-V launch failed; at least one of the processors in the system does not appear to provide a virtualization platform supported by Hyper-V.

This was happening because I had missed the Execute disable setting in the BIOS. To fix this, boot the computer and press F2 to enter the BIOS.

In the BIOS you need to change the following settings

Security > Execute Disable (set to On)
Performance > Virtualization (set to On)
Performance > VT for Direct I/O Access (set to On)
Performance > Trusted Execution (set to Off)

Save and exit the BIOS, then power the computer down. You must power it down for the settings to take affect.

You will now being able to run Hyper-V on your Dell workstation!

34 thoughts on “How to enable virtualization on a Dell Optiplex 755 to run Hyper-V”

Roger January 17, 2009 at 3:15 am

Thanks for the post – setting performance, trusted execution to off was the key for me, and was non-intutive- seemed like something you’d want on! I now have 2008 Server R2 Beta up and running om my 755.

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rob_M January 30, 2009 at 1:14 am

Hi,
I tried these settings and was able to setup Hyper-v on a 755. But now when I start a virtual machine, it says that Hypervisor is not running amd I can’t seem to enable Hypervisor. Got any clue?

Thanks.

RM

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Lee Robinson February 25, 2009 at 8:58 am

Works great! Low budget virtualization here we come!

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rob_M March 4, 2009 at 2:13 am

Update -I overlooked that the Trusted Execution in BIOS was set to on. Turned it off and everything worked.

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S Law March 26, 2009 at 9:10 pm

Looks similar to my notes from last year, except I had it down as Turn off and UNPLUG.
Seemed to make a difference for whatever reason at the time.

Anyway, be careful of new Optiplex 760 (and other models).
Make sure you get an E6x00 or E8x00 CPU that supports IntelVT
http://www.intel.com/products/processor/core2duo/specifications.htm
I believe the Quad cores have it… but don’t have one sitting around for testing.

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Liesa March 31, 2009 at 3:29 am

Bueno!! Thanks for the post. Saved me lots of hair pulling, TxT is now Off!

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FAhmed April 29, 2009 at 9:30 am

Thanks for posting this.
Helped me right off the bat.
I spent half a day to figure out this issue on my opti-755.
No valuable info on Intel, Dell, or VMWare sites.
This resolved it for me. Thanks again.

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Jeff May 8, 2009 at 1:05 am

I don’t even see the following on my Optiplex 755 (bios A11 or A13)

* Performance > Virtualization (set to On)
* Performance > Trusted Execution (set to Off)

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1. shnake Post authorMay 8, 2009 at 2:51 pm
  
  What processor do you have in the box?? It should be there in either BIOS.
  
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skyone June 1, 2009 at 7:13 pm

Anybody running Win2008 Hyper-V / Win7 Virtual PC on Optiplex 760?
I’m planning to buy one with Q9400 CPU, wanna check if it’s supported.

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borki June 17, 2009 at 12:10 pm

I have a E4600 processor. I got the same issue as Jeff: can’t find those 2 settings in the BIOS. I get an error saying “.. there is no hardware assisted virtualization support in the system…”. Checking the Intel list referred to above, I can see that the E4600 is not supported. I guess I will be swapping boxes, as there are some 755s with an E6550s around…

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suri August 7, 2009 at 4:19 pm

Thanks for posting this, worked like charm to me.

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Adi August 26, 2009 at 5:06 pm

Nice..work perfectly

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John H August 28, 2009 at 1:13 am

Worked like a charm for me. Thanks so much for sharing.

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Dell Suck September 1, 2009 at 7:55 am

Does not work for Dell 760

E7300 won’t support it

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L84DNR October 15, 2009 at 5:30 am

THANK YOU! for taking the time to post that info. I was about to go off on some wild hair and buy new gear. Everything pointed to “This should be working” but no dice.
•Performance > Trusted Execution (set to Off)…REALLY???
that’s what got me up and running.

High five, knuckle punch, chest bump, hug… Thanks man!

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xi0n October 26, 2009 at 7:05 pm

I cannot find these options in my dell optiplex 760 with bios version A05 … did anyone find the solution for enablig the virtualization on this model’s version?

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internet security test December 22, 2009 at 8:37 am

Thanks so much for the great post. This was exactly what I needed today

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Matt December 28, 2009 at 4:21 pm

Performance > Trusted Execution (set to Off)

This was what fixed it for me, too. Thank you!

(My Dell Optiplex 755 Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 was telling me Hypervisor was not running because I had Trusted Execution set to On.)

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Sathish December 30, 2009 at 4:02 pm

Sorry guys, I am not using any high end server boxes here, I am trying to install Ubuntu on my personal computer via VMWare, seems my T4200 Intel processor doesn’t support virtualization, is there any way I can still add this feature using some firmware or some kind?

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NLDude January 12, 2010 at 7:25 pm

Perfect! Thank you so much!

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Satheesh Donthy January 14, 2010 at 5:48 am

Hi

I did not see this article before. I should have.

I turned on all settings under BIOS->Performance Section. Now the PC does not even get to the BIOS Menu. It is hanging. Is there a way to undo my bios changes?

Please save me from the hung PC.

Thanks
Satheesh

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Jason February 27, 2010 at 7:10 am

This was the setting that was causing me problems:

Performance > Trusted Execution (set to Off)

I don’t understand why that needs to be off, but thanks for having the answer!

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Dan July 3, 2010 at 6:03 am

Just had to post a response to this thread. Thank you so much. This also solves the problem with Virtual Box. I was receiving a nonsense error that Visualization was not enabled in the BIOS (but it was). I also could not install a 64 bit OS inside a virtual machine. But this trick solved all my issues. I was using a Dell Optiplex 755. I agree that it doesn’t make sense that you have to have Trusted Execution set to off, but it does work.

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Stuart October 15, 2010 at 8:32 pm

Thank you! Been trying to get a customers Dell 755 running Mac OS x within a Virtualbox environment for a day now. Read this, did the steps and hey presto its working.

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Jay Connor October 30, 2010 at 12:36 pm

Thanks

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Bryce November 6, 2010 at 2:08 am

Worked like a charm for Virtal Box, i was overlooking the Trusted Execution as well. Thank you!

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Muddassar November 25, 2010 at 2:09 pm

can these setting work work the same with optiplex 780??

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Andrew B December 27, 2010 at 10:11 pm

You do know that the dell optoplex 755 will run Mac OSX 10.5 Nativity right?

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Martin Adamsson January 25, 2011 at 7:59 am

Confiming that Hyper-V on Server 2008 R2 Datacenter are running just fine on Dell Optiplex 780. Switch off the TPM in BIOS before running Hyper-V
/Martin

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Dave Pashby January 29, 2011 at 5:21 am

Very useful – and just the piece of info I needed. Running VirtualBox with OpenSuse11.3 to virtualise Windows 2008 R2.

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ste April 9, 2011 at 12:54 pm

Some CPU’s that Dell shipped with the 755 do NOT support Virtualization / Hyperthreading.
e.g. My 755 has a Intel Core 2 Duo E4600 (2.4 GHz).

On CPU’s that do NOT support virtualization / Hyperthreading you will not have the following options in BIOS:

Performance > Virtualization (set to On)
Performance > Trusted Execution (set to Off)

Buy a better CPU / PC

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