[Discuss] Converting Windows to Linux

[Greg Rundlett (freephile)]

I bought a new HP Pavillion with Windows 10 pre-loaded.  I want to run
(Ubuntu) Linux full time, but have the ability to use Windows 10 in a VM
when necessary (rare).

The HP Pavillion has 12 GB of RAM; an SSD drive (128GB), plus a 1TB disk.
There is a "recovery" partition (Drive E:) on the second disk.

Specifically, this is what Windows 10 Disk Management reports:

*Disk0* 119.23 GB
-  260 MB EFI System Partition
-  118.01 GB NTFS Windows C: (Boot, Page File, Crash Dump, Primary
Partition)
-  980 MB Recovery Partition
*Disk1* 931.51 GB
-  920.01 GB NTFS Data Primary Partition
-  11.5 GB NTFS OEM Partition (Recovery)


I used Disk Management to shrink the 920.01 GB NTFS Primary Partition on
Disk1 down to ~50GB

I plan to install Linux to the SSD Drive, and then add a VM in VirtualBox
that runs Windows10 (installed to the 50 GB partition on the regular HDD).
I don't know whether I can use the recovery partition to install Windows
into the VM? I do know that using a Windows10 install media ISO, I can do
this [1], and I just made a Windows 10 DVD just for the heck of it (the
machine has a DVD-RW drive).  However, I find an interesting option to use
"raw disk access" to run the OS from an installation in it's own partition
[2].  Does anyone have experience with "raw disk access" and opinions on
whether it's advisable?

The Windows 10 Home Edition is already "activated" on the OEM equipment.
I'm assuming that I will need to call MIcrosoft to activate it once I
install it in it's new virtual environment.  The license states that I can
only use one instance of the software.

Of course the recovery partition is not an "installation" but rather a
weird 10GB folder that I might be able to use instead of an ISO.  On this
point, I'm not sure, since I have almost no experience using Windows or
recovering it.  I'd guess that it's "pre-configured" or limited in such a
way as to only be usable to install Windows 10 to the primary disk.  I plan
to blow away this recovery partition once everything is up and running
because I would rather have the Win 10 DVD in a jacket and use the 10 GB
partition for additional storage.

Plan

   1. Download Ubuntu 17.10.1 -> burn iso to CD/DVD disk
   2. insert Linux boot media
   3. reboot
   4. install Linux to SSD drive, choosing Ubuntu to manage the Boot Sector
   5. [DONE] partition 1TB regular disk drive to give Windows 50GB (NTFS)
   6. and format the rest as EXT4, ZFS
   <https://insights.ubuntu.com/2016/02/16/zfs-is-the-fs-for-containers-in-ubuntu-16-04/>
   or BTRFS
   7. install VirtualBox
   8. create Windows10 VM;
   9. install Windows10 into the VM using a) ISO or b) raw disk access
   10. add VB Guest Additions for all the VB bells and whistles
   11. Test drivers (Internet, Print, Host partition R/W access)
   12. Snapshot
   13. Reformat Recovery partition to ZFS
   14. Create nightly cron to sync "home" partition from SSD to "recovery"
   partition on HDD


Any suggestions or gotchas that I should know about?

[1] https://itsfoss.com/install-windows-10-virtualbox-linux/
[2]
http://greenash.net.au/thoughts/2016/02/running-a-real-windows-install-in-virtualbox-on-linux/


Thanks,

Greg Rundlett
https://eQuality-Tech.com
https://freephile.org