Assuming you have VirtualBox remote port forwarding engaged (which will forward ports into the VM, for example if you’re running Windows XP as a VirtuaBox VM and you want to RDP into it on port 3389), I discuss port forwarding on VirtualBox hosts, here. Though VirtualBox supports a quick and easy VRDP option to enable for easy RDPing into a box without having to do any of the complex port forwarding, my port-forwarding post explains how to forward other ports to your VM for any other applications or if you want to RDP into your Windows VM on a port other than 3389.

To engage the VM over an SSH session, simply type:

VBoxHeadless -startvm "Name of VM Here"

You can also force VirtualBox’s VRDP (virtual RDP) via command line by adding the switch “–vrdp on”, though it’s usually on by default.

If you’re not sure of the name of the VM, simply type

VBoxManage list vms

Once running, you can simply run …

rdesktop localhost:3389

Assuming you have a -L 3389:ip-address-of-VirtualBox-host:3389 in your original SSH command, and you can now RDP into your Windows XP box which would be running in a VM over Linux.

Source: HowToForge

Run these 3 commands from shell. SUDO not required.

VBoxManage setextradata “name of vm” “VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/ssh/HostPort” 2222

VBoxManage setextradata “name of vm” “VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/ssh/GuestPort” 22

VBoxManage setextradata “name of vm” “VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/ssh/Protocol” TCP

Where…

• “name of vm” is your virtual machine name
• ssh is the name of the service. This is _required_ to be unique among the three commands.
• Ports 2222, 22, TCP respectively with your desired host port, guest port, and protocol.

…then shutdown your VM and Virtualbox host application, and restart them.

To Confirm the above settings are in place:

VBoxManage getextradata “name of vm” enumerate

To remove the settings made above from the VM: (again substituting the variables as appropriate).

VBoxManage setextradata “name of vm” “VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/ssh/HostPort”

VBoxManage setextradata “name of vm” “VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/ssh/GuestPort”

VBoxManage setextradata “name of vm” “VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/ssh/Protocol”