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> On Sat, May 22, 2021, 17:02 <thelma@×××××××××××.com> wrote: |
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> > Is anybody running Windows 10 Pro 64bit in Virtualbox? |
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> > Is it stable? |
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> > Is it easy to resize? |
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I forgot to mention stability and resizing ... |
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In one case after a major update the Win10 desktop became terribly unstable, |
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menus not showing up, everything on the desktop taking minutes to respond to a |
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mouse click or keyboard press. Eventually I realised the transparency had |
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been enabled by the update and this was cause any desktop graphics to render |
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partially and with a lot of latency. Disabling transparency restored the |
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previous normal desktop behaviour. This was on a host with an old AMD-Radeon |
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APU. Other video cards and drivers may not have such a problem, but I thought |
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it worth mentioning. |
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|
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Resizing the C:\ drive partition is straight forward, in most cases. You can |
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use 'VBoxManage modifyhd' in a terminal to increase the virtual disk size, or |
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the VBox GUI Virtual Media Manager tab. Then use the Windows Disk Management, |
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or boot the VM with GParted and resize the OS partition & filesystem. |
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However, Windows 10 tends to create additional partitions as part of |
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installation, or subsequent major updates. These are called System Reserve |
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Partitions (SRP). Initially one is created at the start of the disk to |
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contain bitlocker, boot and Windows Restore data. After certain major |
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updates, or if the Windows 10 installation was an in situ upgrade from an |
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older Windows 7 installation, such an SRP can be placed after the C:\ drive. |
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In one case, changing an installed system from MBR to GPT/UEFI also created an |
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ESP after the C:\ drive. It follows you won't be able to increase the size of |
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the C:\ partition without moving any partitions following it out of the way |
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first, increasing C:\, then restoring the moved partitions. Since an |
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otherwise 5 minute disk & partition resizing exercise can develop into a |
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prolonged and pre-planned effort, you'd be better off sizing up the virtual |
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disk before you start installing MSWindows. |
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|
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Big upgrade releases every six months may require more temporary storage space |
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to create a backup in case the upgrade fails. If enough space is not |
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available on the disk, the the OS will ask you to insert a USB drive to be |
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used during the upgrade. You can also create and attach a new virtual disk |
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for this purpose. |
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Finally, there's the Windows 10 'Storage Spaces' replacing Dynamic Disks, if |
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you want to create a RAID in software. I understand you use it to add more |
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disks/partitions, like you would with a RAID, but I have never used this to |
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know what it can achieve in terms of resizing. |