I have an Asus laptop with Windows 10 on it and I want to put Debian on it. Is it possible to save my copy of Windows 10 (it came with the laptop) and make it a virtual machine on the same machine just with Debian installed as the host or am I doomed to pick 1 or the other (or dual boot)?
1 Answer
If your Windows 10 license came with the laptop then it is tied to the motherboard in it's UEFI and cannot be used by a virtual machine.
A virtual machine is separate from the host machine and purposely isolated for many reasons including security. Windows will not detect the license and demand for a license key during installation on the virtual machine. Licenses cannot be extracted from UEFI, it was designed that way.
Your scenario requires you to have a separate license of Windows 10 for the virtual machine.
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If you are a student in a participating college or university, you will have access to Dreamspark which offers a free Windows 10 license among many other Microsoft software.– Alex G.Sep 26, 2015 at 2:53
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"Your scenario requires you to have a separate license of Windows 10 for the virtual machine." - This is 100% false. With Windows 10 came slightly different licensing with virtual machines. Provide the Virtual Machine is ran on the same hard, one can run the installation, within a virtual machine. This has to do with the fact the hardware hash would be identical.– RamhoundSep 26, 2015 at 3:09