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My absolute wish is to run Proxmox on a laptop and have a VM drive the laptop display. Currently this is not possible. There are many guides on passing throug

My absolute wish is to run Proxmox on a laptop and have a VM drive the laptop display. Currently this is not possible. There are many guides on passing through the integrated or dedicated GPU, but NOT using the laptop display in a guest VM. The host/Proxmox doesn't need the display. I want the guest to own it. No looking glass no spice no gl window no virt-gpu. The VM should directly own and exclusively operate the gpu and laptop display. My dream setup is Proxmox being very minorly configured - a stable base that's easy to restore. Within it 5 VMs: firewall, primary-linux, rescue-linux, linux-for-containers, and Windows 10. I recognize most folks are running Proxmox on a desktop but I have a very nice laptop. I want to isolate my firewall into a guest VM (opnsense). I want to run my primary Linux in another guest VM - with the Intel iGPU passed through and using the laptop display. I want to run Windows - when I need it - for games that intentionally disallow VMs. I want to run a separate Linux (Rancher) for containers/development. Finally I want a rescue-linux so if the primary fails for whatever reason, Proxmox would fail over by starting the rescue VM - just something with enough for me to remote into the host/proxmox and fix things. Windows would be viewable from RDP or looking glass. The container Linux would be ssh-administered. Same as firewall or web admin. I LOVE the idea of Proxmox making it easy to backup/transfer/experiment with different OS's. Because I can't get Proxmox to drive the laptop display - something not possible on AMD or Intel afaik - I settled on NixOS as the host with explicitly configured everything. Windows in a VM. Docker available on the host. It's the best I can do :( Someday I hope hypervisors-against-metal on laptops is commonplace. Seriously: If someone can get the laptop display to work from a guest VM on any laptop I would be so happy. I hope AMD gets this because I am so done paying for baby steps with Intel. EDIT: Looks like I'm trying this again tonight: https://github.com/patmagauran/i915ovmfPkg https://github.com/patmagauran/i915ovmfPkg (purportedly a romfile for the igpu that _will_ drive the laptop display) I've tried it before about a month ago but it looks like I was using the "2.1" release from last year. A few things have been updated in June/July.

HumblyTossed 5y ago
Oh you're not alone here. I've often wanted to do that too. It would make certain things easier toast up.
jchw 5y ago
This sounds pretty cool, but for now the closest thing I’ve tried is Qubes :( being able to actually pass the GPU to a VM would be great. Certainly it is technically possible? Maybe not…
AbraKdabra 5y ago
You're not alone my friend, I also have my old but powerful gaming notebook as a Proxmox host, and I'd very much like to be able to bring it to LAN parties and just boot a Windows 10 and play Age of Empires II while maintaining all my VMs intact.
- mikevm 5y ago
  Can you expand on your use case a bit? Why do you need multiple VMs?
  - AbraKdabra 5y ago
    I work in security and I test a lot of things in virtual machines.
amanzi 5y ago
I think this is how Qube OS works, but I haven't tried it personally so can't be sure. Perhaps check it out - it might be what you're after? https://www.qubes-os.org/ https://www.qubes-os.org/
umbcorp 5y ago
People install debian and then setup the proxmox on top of that with an install script to achieve what you want.
- the_third_wave 5y ago
  I assume the intention is to run only a bare-bones OS + Proxmox directly on the laptop with all the other functionality virtualised or compartmentalised through KVM and LXC, managed by Proxmox. Running the desktop directly on the hardware does not fit this profile. I'd say this - having nearly everything compartmentalised with access to the laptop display - might be possible by using containers instead of virtual machines. This would not work for Windows but it could probably be made to work for those mentioned Linux installs.
mikevm 5y ago
> I want to run Windows - when I need it - for games that intentionally disallow VMs I don't understand this.. You want to run Windows in a VM for games that disallow VMs? I dunno, this seems like such a complicated setup... what do you gain from all this? Might as well just run Windows + WSL2.
- thrwawy283 5y ago
  I did contradict myself there. Running some games in a VM within VMware or Virtualbox is detected as such. Running a game in a qemu VM there are some options available to hide that the hardware is within a VM - like how the CPU identifies itself. I'm aiming for the setup where the GPU is passed through from the host for exclusive control by the VM. I honestly don't need this RTX2060 except for games - the Intel iGPU is excellent for webdev.
  - mikevm 5y ago
    I have an Intel iGPU and a GTX 1070 myself, and currently just dual boot to separate SSDs (the larger SSD for Windows, the smaller for Linux). When you switch to the Windows VM, do you intend to suspend the Linux VM, or you just want to let it run in the bg? Also, couldn't you just run the VM in Linux and get the same benefits? Some people are passing through their graphics cards and reporting good performance IIRC.

HumblyTossed 5y ago

Oh you're not alone here. I've often wanted to do that too. It would make certain things easier toast up.

jchw 5y ago

This sounds pretty cool, but for now the closest thing I’ve tried is Qubes :( being able to actually pass the GPU to a VM would be great. Certainly it is technically possible? Maybe not…

AbraKdabra 5y ago

You're not alone my friend, I also have my old but powerful gaming notebook as a Proxmox host, and I'd very much like to be able to bring it to LAN parties and just boot a Windows 10 and play Age of Empires II while maintaining all my VMs intact.

mikevm 5y ago
Can you expand on your use case a bit? Why do you need multiple VMs?
- AbraKdabra 5y ago
  I work in security and I test a lot of things in virtual machines.

amanzi 5y ago

I think this is how Qube OS works, but I haven't tried it personally so can't be sure. Perhaps check it out - it might be what you're after? https://www.qubes-os.org/ https://www.qubes-os.org/

umbcorp 5y ago

People install debian and then setup the proxmox on top of that with an install script to achieve what you want.

the_third_wave 5y ago
I assume the intention is to run only a bare-bones OS + Proxmox directly on the laptop with all the other functionality virtualised or compartmentalised through KVM and LXC, managed by Proxmox. Running the desktop directly on the hardware does not fit this profile. I'd say this - having nearly everything compartmentalised with access to the laptop display - might be possible by using containers instead of virtual machines. This would not work for Windows but it could probably be made to work for those mentioned Linux installs.

mikevm 5y ago

> I want to run Windows - when I need it - for games that intentionally disallow VMs I don't understand this.. You want to run Windows in a VM for games that disallow VMs? I dunno, this seems like such a complicated setup... what do you gain from all this? Might as well just run Windows + WSL2.

thrwawy283 5y ago
I did contradict myself there. Running some games in a VM within VMware or Virtualbox is detected as such. Running a game in a qemu VM there are some options available to hide that the hardware is within a VM - like how the CPU identifies itself. I'm aiming for the setup where the GPU is passed through from the host for exclusive control by the VM. I honestly don't need this RTX2060 except for games - the Intel iGPU is excellent for webdev.
- mikevm 5y ago
  I have an Intel iGPU and a GTX 1070 myself, and currently just dual boot to separate SSDs (the larger SSD for Windows, the smaller for Linux). When you switch to the Windows VM, do you intend to suspend the Linux VM, or you just want to let it run in the bg? Also, couldn't you just run the VM in Linux and get the same benefits? Some people are passing through their graphics cards and reporting good performance IIRC.