Ditch Virtualbox, Get QEMU/Virt Manager

In this video I show you how to setup QEMU/virt-manager with KVM which is a better virtualization stack than virtualbox (faster, scales better, and supports more advanced options like GPU passthrough and CPU pinning.)

install these packages
qemu virt-manager virt-viewer dnsmasq vde2 bridge-utils openbsd-netcat

start the services

edit this file

drivers for Windows VM

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[kademan]

Props to Fabrice Bellard. He's responsible for QEMU, FFmpeg, TCC and he's working on a new compression algo called nncp.

[joshuafountain]

I setup a KVM with GPU passthrough for Windows gaming a couple weeks ago, and the performance is absolutely wild. Everything works perfectly, native performance, and games are incredibly smooth.

[Martin_Then]

I don't own a desktop. I've never run Linux or anything other than Windows. Basically 99.9% of your content goes over my head, but I can't stop watching your videos. Keep it up, man!

[yoyoyogames]

literally tried it out today for the first time, never using virtualbox again :D

[mukyumukyun]

also for anyone curious, the reason why the performance is so much better on qemu kvm than virtualbox, it's because virtualbox run virtualization on software level, while qemu kvm on kernel level, so it's like the reason why in programming language C is much faster than python, kinda like that

[mjbezuidenhout]

A very underrated featue of virt-manager is to access remote VM's. Setting up a headless hypervisor in your homelab is quite comfy, and was my reason for switching from VirtualBox.

[CandyCaneChris]

Protip: if your computer came pre-installed with windows, you can pull in that registration key and use a registered version of Windows in your VM.

[calva]

I've been learning more about virtualization lately. Interesting topic; looking forward to hearing more about it from you in this video.

[rightwingsafetysquad]

Heads up to people trying to do performance comparisons: just having KVM or HyperV installed will tank the performance of VirtualBox or VMware Workstation, even if you're not actively using them.

[ubermind-tim]

Thanks. This is the best set of instructions that I've seen to date. I finally got my Debian 12 with QEMU virtualizing Win10. As of 11/2023 there were a few holes which I was able to solve. My next step is to learn the setup needed so I can copy btwn Bookworm and Win10. I also need to test printing.

[fairlyfactual]

I have been using virtual machines for years now and never once did it occur to me that the awful performance in virtual box was NOT normal... I just assumed that virtualization was just rather intensive. Very excited to try out QEMU and transition some of my environments over!

[Neko-san]

You didn't post any video in a week already... is everything okay?

[usuallyclueless]

For most others (using systemd), the commands are:
sudo systemctl restart libvirtd
sudo systemctl enable libvirtd

[seanpaul]

One of your best tutorials and very well explained. Thank you Sir.

[jimmyjazz]

Keep in mind the instructions for starting the service and editing that config file don't apply if you use systemd (which is the default on basically every popular Linux OS). You need to do "systemctl enable --now libvirtd" (this both starts and enables the service). You don't need to edit the config file at all. Also you may need to change some bios settings to enable virtualization, on an AMD board all of these should be enabled:
SVM - Enabled
Iommu - Enabled
AES - Enabled
AER Cap - Enabled
That's required for GPU passthrough. Also note GPU passthrough is a huge pain-in-the-ass if you only have one GPU.

[FunkyDeleriousPriest]

Last week I made the switch from VirtualBox to KVM-based Proxmox and so far the experience has been great. 1st class support for ZFS is a huge advantage.

[ne]

Thanks M.O.! I was out of doing any Virtual Machine for years, its a good news update!

[jammyjellyfish]

Easy to follow along and detailed instructions! Liked and subscribed :D

[caleb]

I recently swapped to arch from windows, it rough for a bit but I’m learning more everyday got my qemu for some usb audio pass through to a windows vm. It’s been pretty great.

[tonnentonie]

Oh boy if GPU manufacturers would allow us to virtualize GPUs, we could have one desktop that serves more than one person at a time.