Run existing windows install as a flatpaked VM
as the title says I want to run my windows install I have on a seperate nvme disk in a vm.
I will be using this just to run the odd windows app that does not play nicley in WINE. I do not need GPU passtrough or anything like that (I really don't even care about passing the disk natively as a pcie device for better performance)
ujust setup-virtualization uses virt-manager correct? this is kinda overkill for my use case.
would it be possible to achive what I want with the simple flatpaked gnome boxes?Solution:Jump to solution
welp
You cannot use the Flatpak/Flathub version as it doesn’t currently support emulating a TPM. so your limted to windows 10 it seems with boxes also suposidly usb pass trough doesn't work because flatpak38 Replies
gnome boxes dont think so, dont use it myself but gnome boxes is designed to be a more simplistic "i just want a VM, BOOM!" kinda gui so the configuration will be extremely limited.
This is why we default to virt-manager since it lets you configure like 90% of what you need (the remaining 10% being exotic things or experimental stuff which requires modifying the xml file and the majority of people will not need that)
yeah looking into boxes it seems it does have usb passthrough but thats it. I don't see any option to even inport a virtual machine image or anything much less specify a disk
in virt manager you can set the disk to raw and point to the whole disk (not partition), let me grab a screenshot example
the next setup up would be orcale virtualbox but that would have to be overlayed as well i think so at that point im better off with virt manager
type="raw"
use SATA as the bus type since its an existing install
yeah back when i was using garuda I had it setup with virtmanger. I just wanted to avoid overlaying more stuff and the worning about updates being slower concerns me as updates are already pretty slow
also windows will be angry at you for booting it in a VM
wdym?
hardware change, windows doesnt like drastic hardware change and can invalidate your license
never really had that prob. worse thats happend is sometimes I broke the boot loader
i might just convert my windows install to a fully virtual machine image instead of being a disk i can also dualboot.
I had it like that so when I want to play a windows game I would just dualboot into windows but I almost never do that
tried single GPU passtrough once and it wasn't a great experince
was the gpu passthrough with 1 gpu on the system only?
yeah don't have a second GPU
yeah that experience will be shit
its why we have the hard requirement of 2 gpus for the vfio stuff
if you got only 1 or a laptop youre on your own
thats why I had the dualboot setup ,but I can't rember the last time I needed windows for playing a game. Usually only use it for controller update tools and maybe photshop and things like that
well either way virt-manager is the best route unless you need a super simple VM
well looks like boxes can't install windows 11? :BSOD:
pretty much what i use it for
probably lacks tpm support?
yeah probaly I know I had to pass my board tpm module on virt-manager
i emulate it with swtpm because my hw doesnt support win11
https://www.ctrl.blog/entry/how-to-win11-in-gnome-boxes.html
lol looks like i need the
edk2-ovmf package which means I would have to overlay it prob. screw that going with virt manHow to run Windows 11 in GNOME Boxes (with UEFI and TPM2 emulation)
Windows 11 needs some extra config to run as a virtual machine in GNOME Boxes. Get it setup with UEFI secure boot, TPM 2.0 emulation, and accelerated drivers.
although my vms are win10 for now
yeah we overlay that with the ujust
by defualt?
or after I run the virtualization setup?
if i have to overlay more things onto the system anyway. It would just be better to just use the virt-manager setup in ujust
after running it
i make a custom deck image to just include it on my image
since i actually need it constantly
Solution
welp
You cannot use the Flatpak/Flathub version as it doesn’t currently support emulating a TPM. so your limted to windows 10 it seems with boxes also suposidly usb pass trough doesn't work because flatpakso virt-manger it is
so even if I wanted to use windows 10 in boxes I would still need to overlay the rpm version of that if I want usb passtrough and
edk2-ovmf for windows 11 supportyep think so
and you still need to have qemu installed too i believe
yup so my whole "i don't want virt-manager because its going to bloat the system and slow the upgrade procsses" is moot have to overlay stuff anyway unless I want a SUPER basic vm with absoutly no passtrough abillity
or make a custom image
super easy
that to lol
im dead serious its super easy
BlueBuild
The easiest way to build your own desktop Linux images.
The BlueBuild project creates accessible tools for you to create, configure & build custom images of atomic Fedora distributions.
easiest way if you dont want to mess with a containerfile
okay looks intresting ill check it out if not just to learn how all this works. really new to the fedora atomic model
blue-build has their own discord as they are separate from ublue
but its a nice way if you want it kind of declarative through yaml
"i want to base my image on X and i want to remove Y but install Z and run these scripts to modify the files on the system before shipping"
i use it to enable the sddm login screen on my deck image as an example
there is also the ublue method using a containerfile listed here
https://discord.com/channels/1072614816579063828/1087140957096517672/1268596952640000043
with my example of what to do after the FROM line in the containerfile if you wanted to enable SDDM on deck images