v/programming: I have a laptop I want to install linux on the whole hd and run the existing windows environment in a vm

I have a laptop I want to install linux on the whole hd and run the existing windows environment in a vm

1 05 Jan 2017 19:43 by u/MrKequc

I think this is the right place to put it.

I have a Windows 10 laptop. I want to run Linux on the whole thing, but I still want to be able to use the existing Windows environment I struggled to setup (against all of Microsoft's better judgements on settings and configuration) in a virtual machine.

Is there a way to capture the existing state of the laptop, save it as a virtual machine, install linux, then import the windows environment I had as a virtual machine?

2 comments

3 u/kek_777 05 Jan 2017 20:06

You'll want to create a vhd of your existing windows install (disk2vhd). I would stick this on an external (usb or the like) and test this image (virtualbox, etc.) before continuing. Then go through the standard process of installing Linux. You could also dual boot if you don't want to just blow away a machine and use virtualbox to boot the Win 10 image (raw disk access) from the Linux side.