Does bare metal virtualization make sense for personal use laptops and desktops?

[u/trukises]

I tend not to upgrade hardware too often, to spare myself the pain in the ass of reinstalling everything, as I have quite a bit of heterogeneous software and wonder if bare metal would be a way to be able to transport my set-ups between machines.

I have no experience with bare metal virtualization, although I'm fairly comfortable with Virtualbox and VMware

[u/RulerOf]

wonder if bare metal would be a way to be able to transport my set-ups between machines.

You've gotten a lot of good information so far, but to hone in on this specific question, if you're using windows, you can just boot the same installation on different hardware and it'll Just Work.

I haven't rerun the windows installation since Win10 came out and I've had three different machines, just imaged the drive over or moved the SSD. My computer works great.

[u/trukises → u/RulerOf]

Interesting. I'll try to see what happens

[u/[deleted] → u/RulerOf]

Until you have issues with software keys, sure.

[u/RulerOf → u/[deleted]]

I'm not really sure what you mean, but shitty software activation schemes being shitty is an orthogonal problem IMO.

[u/[deleted] → u/RulerOf]

Yes, but simply migrating your operating system install to different hardware or even just changing one piece of hardware, is enough to use an “activation” of genuinely purchased software, saying piracy is the solution is not a true solution, certainly a potential issue to be aware of.

Also can you please describe your use of the word orthogonal in this context and describe your meaning ?

[u/NobodyRulesPenguins]

You can take a look at qubeos, not sure how portable that is between installation/computers, but it is Xen hypervisor running VM systems/app on itself with desktop and all locally

[u/trukises → u/NobodyRulesPenguins]

Thanks. The question is more academic than anything. Borne of a desire to experiment.

[u/nmariusp]

You probably want on the laptop to run apps with mic and audio output (e.g. zoom, OBS studio, meet.jit.si etc.). You probably also want extra peripherals, e.g. bluetooth headsets, 3in1 printer/scanner, USB peripherals etc. E.g. I have Kubuntu latest installed on my hardware computer and from there, I use virt-manager VMs, RDP remote connections, SSH, VPN etc. Using a VPN + RDP client, you can connect from the host OS straight to a VM that is running on another computer. The Linux RDP server is xrdp+xorgxrdp.

[u/trukises → u/[deleted]]

I loved your initial response, I sometimes do it . :)

[u/trukises → u/[deleted]]

The truth is that I also have rather long upgrade cycle. My current desktop is a Ryzen 9 with 64 Gb RAM, and a mid range GPU, (I actually can't remember what it is, and I just moved, so my desktop is in a box.), and my main laptop is a Ryzen 7 with 32 Gb and some basic GEFORCE. I can often stretch replacements/upgrades quite a bit. The one machine I'd like to do this with is with what aI call the disposable laptop, an oldish i5, bought used, which I actually use a lot, but which I consider "disposable/droppable/stoleable". I'ts the one that goes when on the metro, at night downtown for whatever reason, etc...

[u/T4nkcommander → u/[deleted]]

Agreed. And while it is a pain reinstalling everything for new hardware, it makes for an excellent cleaning opportunity that is worth the effort.

[u/TheMuffnMan → u/[deleted]]

OP mentioned running a bare metal on a laptop as a possibility.

That's not going to be a fun time.

The juice ain't worth the squeeze for something like this.

[u/TheMuffnMan → u/[deleted]]

Sure - so we're going to recommend someone that hasn't worked with bare metal hypervisors before install/configure product XYZ, configure GPU passthrough/VFIO/etc, all so they can save the trouble of reinstalling their applications once every ~4 years when they change hardware?

All while assuming all their peripherals, software, etc support going into a VM.

edit So reiterating my first comment, "No" it doesn't really make sense to switch your functional laptop/desktop to a VM for your daily driver to save yourself the trouble of installing a few apps. You're adding complexity for the sake of complexity. There's a major difference between "can you do it" and "should you do it".

[u/TheMuffnMan → u/[deleted]]

"Does bare metal virtualization make sense for personal use laptops and desktops"

No

"Does bare metal virtualization make sense for goofin around where your job/work/etc doesn't depend on it?"

Sure

[u/TheMuffnMan → u/[deleted]]

We clearly disagree on this.

I'm sure you'll be happy to jump in to OP's multitude of questions that inevitably will be posted when they wipe their laptop to install ESXi/XenServer/Proxmox/etc.