Microsoft designs Windows with the assumption that it will be the only operating system on the computer’s disk. Therefore, it does not work well when you have to share that drive with another operating system. Anyone who has tried dual booting Windows and Linux will tell you that it rarely works smoothly.
Even if you don’t have any problems during the setup process, you can be almost certain that you will encounter some conflict with the operating system in the future. I say this as someone who maintained a dual boot workstation for years. Clock, bootloader, or BitLocker synchronization errors are practically inevitable. But there is a better way.
Get to know Proxmox
An operating system for operating systems.
Proxmox is a special operating system because it is exclusively intended for running virtual machines (VMs) and lightweight containers with minimal overhead. Think of it as an operating system for operating systems – “OS boot”, if you will.
Instead of keeping both operating systems installed on the same drive, Proxmox allows you to install them as isolated virtual machines, which you can run in parallel, simultaneously. They never conflict with each other and you don’t need to start back and forth between them. Proxmox even supports hardware pass-through, so your virtual machines can use your computer’s hardware components, like the GPU, directly.
You can run as many of these virtual machines as possible at the same time, depending on the power of your computer. I even have an Android phone virtual machine set up on my Proxmox.
Proxmox is not intended to replace a traditional operating system, so you won’t install it on your main PC. It is designed to run in a headless environment. Basically you are supposed to access it through the web UI in other devices. Any device that can open a web browser will allow you to interact with your Proxmox machine and the virtual machines running on it.
In addition to virtual machines, you can also use your Proxmox server to self-host services like your own media server, your own Google Photos clone, your home assistant, your password manager, and much, much more.
Set up a Windows machine in Proxmox
Create and run a Windows virtual machine
You will need two things for this to work.
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An image of the Windows installer in .iso format
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A virtual machine to install Windows
In your Proxmox web interface, go to the local storage tab and select ISO Images > Download URL. Grab the Microsoft website download link and paste it in the URL box. Give the ISO a simple name and start the download.
Next, let’s create a Windows virtual machine using this installer image. We will click the “Create VM” button in the upper right corner and select the ISO we downloaded. Leave the rest of the settings as default.
The setup window will jump from operating system to system. Here, select your SSD drive and allocate as much storage as you need.
Next comes the CPU section. Choose the number of cores you want to assign to this VM. Leave the rest of the settings as is.
Allocate at least 4 GB of RAM in Memory. And click “Start” to start the VM.
An active virtual machine will have a small green icon next to its name in the left pane. Click the “Console” button to open a screen with the graphics window. Within this screen, you can interact with the virtual machine directly on any device.
Then you just have to click on Windows installation setup and your Windows virtual machine will be ready to use. If you find the default “noVNC” web interface too complicated, you can also use the classic Windows Remote Desktop (RDP) remotely to your virtual machine.
- Brand
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Zettlab
- UPC
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RK3588
- Memory
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16GB LPDDR4x
- Drive bays
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4x 3.5 inch, 1x M.2 NVMe
Get a Linux desktop on your Proxmox
Easy to set up and run
If you just need a simple TTY environment for your Linux virtual machine, it’s incredibly simple to create. Simply paste a community script for your target OS into the Proxmox shell and it will do all the work for you.
However, if you need a full GUI desktop, it’s best to get an installer image in .iso format, just like we did for Windows.
Setting up a virtual machine is much easier for a Linux system. Simply configure the CPU cores, storage and RAM to your liking and leave the rest of the settings as default.
Unless you choose an advanced distribution like Arch, you will be placed in a live Linux environment where you can use a point-and-click installer. After configuration, the operating system should reboot into the entire virtual machine.
If you want to avoid the web console, consider connecting your Proxmox with virt-manager, if you access it through a Linux machine. It will allow you better clipboard sharing and smoother performance.
Run both operating systems at the same time
You can leave virtual machines running in the background and simply load them into the viewport of your choice to use at any time. It will save you the hassle of rebooting. Furthermore, there will be no conflict because the Virtual machines exist in their own sandbox..
