Windows 10: System-wide freezing with VeraCrypt system drive encryption

I have this problem for a while now. I use VeraCrypt for the system Windows drive and other volumes. When memory usage is heavy usually because of Firefox Portable, eventually everything freezes, and the disk I/O LED at my notebook becomes unlit indefinitely. The only way out of this is doing a hard power off.

I have 6 GB of RAM an use a 12 GB swap file on the system volume.


Other users on the net are experiencing this as well. This seems related to a Windows upgrade, maybe version 1809.

https://sourceforge.net/p/veracrypt/discussion/general/thread/f6e7f623d0/

https://www.reddit.com/r/VeraCrypt/comments/gmy5eu/veracrypt_freezes_under_windows_10/

:)

 

How to encrypt a dual boot system with Veracrypt?

No wipe needed. OSes are always on their own partition. Veracrypt can only encrypt a Windows system and only if using BIOS vs UEFI. The dev has stated that there are no plans for *nix systems support. If you want your Linux system encrypted, look into dm-crypt and LUKS. Also, you seem to misunderstand Veracrypt's system encryption capability. It doesn't support full-disk encryption; only the Windows system partition itself. The restore and recovery partitions are not encrypted.

If you have multiple Windows partitions (normal or hidden and normal), the bootloader should only show a password input field. It's your responsibility to remember the password and know which OS it unlocks. Each bootable partition would use it's own password. No idea what happens if you choose to put the same password for different systems.

As long as you have Veracrypt installed on both, you will be able to access Veracrypt-encrypted partitions on any drive connected.

 

Best way to encrypt the system drive on Windows

BitLocker is the Windows equivalent of FileVault.

VeraCrypt supports FDE of the system disk, in other words, you can encrypt the disk Windows is installed on.

Backing up your recovery key is an optional step, BitLocker, can be used on a system without a TPM. So, unfortunately, it seems you have eliminated the only two methods, to accomplish Full Disk Encryption with Windows (BitLocker and VeraCrypt/TrueCrypt).

 

How to encrypt a dual boot system with Veracrypt?

I want to dual boot Windows 10 alongside Arch Linux on 1 SSD. The SSD is 465GB and I want to use Veracrypt to encrypt the hard drive and enable pre-boot authentication.

I haven't attempted to do this as of yet as I cannot find any information about this on the Veracrypt website.

Would I have to wipe the drive, split it in to two partitions then install the respective operating systems on to their partitions? What about after that? I can encrypt the system using Veracrypt when I'm logged in to my Windows OS for example but would this encrypt the Linux partition as well?

Would they use the same pre-boot password and would I be able to choose which operating system to boot in to from Veracrypt's boot loader?

Furthermore, if I encrypt a non-system partition that is part of a different hard drive than which the operating systems are installed on, would I be able to access the encrypted partition from both operating systems without any trouble?