Installing Win10 guest in VirtualBox on a Linux host

Discussions about using Windows guests in VirtualBox.
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Kevin250
Posts: 2
Joined: 2. May 2021, 10:57

Installing Win10 guest in VirtualBox on a Linux host

Post by Kevin250 »

I haven’t been using Windows for more than ten years but lately I’ve felt I ought to know something about it, so I bought a Win10 license. It came in the form of a bootable USB stick.

My idea was to have it installed as a VirtualBox guest system. Trouble is, you cannot directly boot VirtualBox from USB (although it seems there are tricky ways to do that), and when I created an ISO image from the stick, installation failed almost right at the beginning because it couldn’t find storage drivers and demanded I should insert an optical disk or attach a USB stick with those drivers—but doesn’t even tell which drivers I should be looking for!

Next I thought maybe I could install it in a physical machine first and then convert that into a VirtualBox image. I actually once have accomplished that with Win7, although in the end Windows stopped functioning because it claimed to be illegal, but even that seems to have been made more difficult lately.

Have anyone actually accomplished installing Win10 VirtualBox guest on a Linux host? How? Any ideas would be welcome.
mpack
Site Moderator
Posts: 39156
Joined: 4. Sep 2008, 17:09
Primary OS: MS Windows 10
VBox Version: PUEL
Guest OSses: Mostly XP

Re: Installing Win10 guest in VirtualBox on a Linux host

Post by mpack »

Ahem. Windows guest on a Linux host and you posted the question in "Linux Guests"? I'll move the topic to "Windows Guests" since the host OS is not relevant to the question asked.

I created a bootable Win10 ISO a while back from a bootable USB stick. I didn't make any notes, I just made sure to create a valid bootable ISO (i.e. get the boot sector right), and replaced all of the visible files with stuff from the USB stick. It worked fine in a VM.

I'm taking your word for it that you really created an ISO based on the USB stick. Some people seem to be under the impression that "ISO" is a synonym for a "raw disk image", which is absolutely not true. ISO refers to the ISO-9660 filesystem used on an optical drive (data CD, data DVD, Blu-Ray), and it can only be created using a proper ISO build tool, such as ImgBurn on Windows (I have no idea what passes for capable ISO tools on Linux hosts).

Incidentally, another option for a VM is to use the USB contents to create a virtual ISO (VISO). To access that you go to VM settings, storage, the CD drive, and in the same menu where you can browse for a CD is a tool to designate a folder as a virtual CD. Your USB stick contents might work as that folder.
scottgus1
Site Moderator
Posts: 20965
Joined: 30. Dec 2009, 20:14
Primary OS: MS Windows 10
VBox Version: PUEL
Guest OSses: Windows, Linux

Re: Installing Win10 guest in VirtualBox on a Linux host

Post by scottgus1 »

Another alternative: Download a fresh ISO from Microsoft that contains the same license level of the Windows 10 you bought (Home, Pro, N, S, etc.), then use the ISO from Microsoft to install the VM and use the license code you bought to activate the OS. The USB stick can be set aside.
Kevin250
Posts: 2
Joined: 2. May 2021, 10:57

Re: Installing Win10 guest in VirtualBox on a Linux host

Post by Kevin250 »

Thank you for your reply and help.

<mod edit> Delete offsite link.
Last edited by mpack on 14. May 2021, 10:22, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Deleted apparantly irrelevant offsite link.
mpack
Site Moderator
Posts: 39156
Joined: 4. Sep 2008, 17:09
Primary OS: MS Windows 10
VBox Version: PUEL
Guest OSses: Mostly XP

Re: Installing Win10 guest in VirtualBox on a Linux host

Post by mpack »

Can you explain the purpose of the offsite link you added to your follow-up post? It was not relevant to the question asked - it was something about routers I think (I didn't read carefully). It certainly had nothing to do with installing Win10.

It looked like spam. Please explain why it wasn't.
mpack
Site Moderator
Posts: 39156
Joined: 4. Sep 2008, 17:09
Primary OS: MS Windows 10
VBox Version: PUEL
Guest OSses: Mostly XP

Re: Installing Win10 guest in VirtualBox on a Linux host

Post by mpack »

Ok, never mind, I did a little research. It turns out that the text of the question was lifted from a Reddit post from about a year ago. It was answered there as well, so there was no valid reason to ask the identical question again.

That makes Kevin250 a (newly banned) spammer. The question however is good and can remain.

Reddit post: https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxquestions ... n_a_linux/.

You know what the amusing thing is? The question was too good! It was interesting, which meant I was interested in reading the follow-up, so there was never a chance that I'd fail to notice the spam.
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