Windows 10: Activating Windows in a type 2 hypervisor Virtualbox

Hi all, I want to activate my Windows installation on Virtualbox, which is an open source type 2 hypervisor. I am currently running a Linux installation Ubuntu 18.04.4 LTS as my main OS. I have a windows 10 pro that I purchased through the Microsoft store, and Windows 10 home came with the PC. It says on both that they were activated by a digital license on my account. I was able to get windows 10 home activated Couldn't get pro to activate on QEMU/KVM Native Linux type 1 hypervisor but I can't seem to get it to work on Virtualbox.


My virtualbox version installed from the repos is 5.2.34-dfsg-0~ubuntu18.04.1 Patched, bug fixed linux version. Most of my research has led me to believe that on a type 2 I will need to purchase another license to be able to activate windows on this, but I was wanting to confirm this and see if there was any way to do this without purchasing another subscription.

:)

 

Hypervisor Type 1 and Type 2

Have you ever wondered what the difference between a type 1 and type 2 hypervisor is. This drawing shows the principle







Type 1 Hypervisors sit between the hardware and your virtual machines AND your Host OS.

In effect, your Host OS is turned into a virtual machine as well. Each Guest OS has direct access to the native hardware via interface built into the Hypervisor.


Type 2 Hypervisors sit between your virtual machines AND your Host OS.

The Guest OSs do not have direct access to Host hardware, and use emulated drivers.

There are pluses and minuses with each type:

In the domestic consumer market, the three main players are type 1 - Hyper-V (not for Home users), and type 2 (work with Home) - virtualbox (free version), VMware workstation (free version)

Hyper-V is really more geared to Windows virtual machines but will run alternative OSs but sound is typically not available. Biggest minus is it is not available to Home users.

VirtualBox and VMWare have more flexibility, but require more maintenance, particularly when a build upgrade = occasionally a build upgrade "breaks" the type 2 hypervisor.

Personally, I use Hyper-V as I use it for Insider builds, and my personal experience is it performs better than the type 2 alternatives, and less maintenance overhead. However, not so good for Linux etc.

Nobody can say one is better than the other - it really depends on what you are doing.


Note: Windows does not allow the two hypervisor types to coexist Fortunately, it is quite easy to create two boot entries - one which will start the type 1 Hyper-V hypervisor, and one which will suppress it starting so type 2 can be used instead.

I have no idea if you can run two type 1 hypervisors simultaneously but I suspect not?

 

Hypervisor Type 1 and Type 2

Hi there

Great simple explanation which clearly shows the difference between the two.

In theory I wouldn't imagine it's possible to run to type 1 Hypervisors on the same host unless like some IBM mainframes running a thing like PRISM /ESA or similar where you can split the host hardware up into separate smaller physical machines -- which is in fact a form of cheating.

The main point of a Type 1 Hypervisor (HYPER-V is a bit of a "middle solution" as as normally seen it runs within the Windows OS environment) is that it can be a tiny OS that can even run from a thing like a small micro sd card so that around 99% of the Host's hardware can be used for the VM's without the overhead of having an OS on top of it. So type 1 Hypervisors will use Native Guest drivers and pass through cards like GPU's, I/O RAID controllers etc etc.

Type 2 Hypevisors will use the HOST drivers and devices and the Guest will see these as sort of emulated devices (strictly speaking - virtual drivers rather than emulated ones but the end result is that the Guest sees these as valid drivers for the relevant devices) although in some cases it is possible to directly attach hardware USB devices to the GUEST and use the GUEST drivers -- this doesn't always work though if the Host's generic USB driver gives problems.

Typically say for Sound on a Linux Guest on a type 2 HYPERVISOR - say running VMware on windows the virtual sound driver is something generic like say Sound blaster which the Guest will think that it is and will work. If you want gaming etc it's better to try and use a TYPE 1 HYPERVISOR although performance of type 2 hypervisors have improved dramatically in the last few years.

Ideally HYPER-V would run much better as a minimal OS without the extra overhead of the Windows OS as well - however for domestic and small business users having a familiar Windows GUI makes setting up the whole thing easier.

Optimising I/O in a type 2 hypervisor (VMware etc) is tricky as you have to convert separate file systems / directory searches etc - this can though be minimised via the use of Physical disks in the Guests which use the Guests native file system and I/O mechanisms.

Virtual Hard disks on type 2 hypervisors can suffer a lot from fragmentation too which also reduces the efficiency of the I/O subsystem on the guest.

For Linux running things like XEN it's also best not to load up a GUI - needs a bit of understanding of the CLI but also can be a tiny OS like Esxi and can run a whole slew of guests including Windows.

Otherwise great stuff

@cereberus --tried to rep you but I have to give some to others --it wouldn't let me !!!

Agree about choice - choose what works best for you - there's no "generic" solution here - although if you want to run a whole slew of VM's concurrently a type 1 Hypervisor is likely to be your best bet.


Cheers

jimbo

 

Hypervisor Type 1 and Type 2

You can run HyperV in a version of windows that is not much more than a command line Our Finnish friends have more experience. I believe you can diwnload a trial version and do it free (unlimited tine I think).
@Kari, this would make a hell of a great live TF sesson sometime