Today, I am going to talk about a serious issue where I came across this error.
Believe me, it took a lot of time to identify the reason and fix it.
Now, in this article, I will be discussing wslregisterdistribution failed with error: 0x80370102 and will also let you know what I did to fix this issue.
When I encountered this error:
I tried to switch from WSL 1 to WSL 2. In WSL 1, both Kali Linux and Ubuntu worked fine, but when I tried to upgrade them to WSL 2, neither would update successfully. I read that uninstalling and reinstalling might solve the problem. However, after reinstalling, my system now doesn’t recognize any installed distributions, even though they are installed. Trying to launch either Kali or Ubuntu results in the same error message.
It reads: “Installing, this may take a few minutes... WslRegisterDistribution failed with error: 0x80370102 Error: 0x80370102 The virtual machine could not be started because a required feature is not installed.“
I looked up this error and, according to Microsoft’s official WSL 2 installation guide, it’s usually due to the absence of virtualization in the BIOS settings. This baffles me because I’ve checked my BIOS settings multiple times, ensuring that virtualization is enabled. I’ve also confirmed that the NX feature is active. Even HWiNFO shows that virtualization is enabled on my system.
How to fix WslRegisterDistribution failed with error: 0x80370102
Turning on CPU virtualization in your BIOS is super important for a bunch of computer tasks. How you do this, depends on what kind of hardware you’ve got, especially the type of CPU.
If you’re using an AMD CPU, keep an eye out for a feature named “AMD Secure Virtual Machine” or “AMD SVM.” On the other hand, if you’ve got an Intel CPU, you’ll want to look for “Intel Virtualization Technology” or “Intel VT-x.”
Let’s say you’ve got an MSI motherboard. Here’s a simple guide to turn on SVM, which is crucial for CPU virtualization:
- Head over to the advanced settings in your BIOS.
- Find your way to the overclocking section.
- Jump into the CPU Features section.
- Spot and flip the switch on “SVM Mode” to get CPU virtualization up and running.
Next up, you’ll want to enable the Hyper-V Windows feature. It’s pretty easy:
- Just type “Windows Features” in the search bar on your taskbar.
- Scroll through until you find “Hyper-V.”
- Check the box to turn it on.
Once you’ve done all this, you should be all set and free from those pesky virtualization-related errors. Need more help or different ways to do this? A quick online search for “enable Hyper-V Windows feature” can point you to more info and tips.
If you are using Windows 11, this will be helpful
I managed to fix the problem by running the following command and then rebooting my system:
bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype auto