![]() ![]() Isolation of OSsįor security reasons, you may want to avoid a situation where you will be transferring files between your hard drive and VM. By using VirtualBox with a physical hard drive, you can create a VM that runs the old OS and access the data stored on the physical hard drive. This can be useful if you have an old computer with essential data that you want to keep but can no longer use due to hardware failures or other issues. You can retain an old OS and data by using VirtualBox with a physical hard drive, creating a VM that runs the previous OS and accessing the data stored on the physical hard drive. There are several reasons why you might want to use a physical hard drive with VirtualBox, such as retaining your old OS and data as you move to a new system, isolating two OS versions, or simply because it offers better flexibility and compatibility. Why You Might Want to Use a Physical Hard Drive with VirtualBox If you need additional help you can refer to the official VirtualBox documentation on this topic. You can now run the VM that will boot from the physical drive you defined when creating the VMDK file. To do so, open the VirtualBox GUI, select the desired VM, click Settings, click Storage, click the Add Hard Disk button, select Choose existing drive, and then select the VMDK file you just created. This VMDK will be a very small file that simply points to your physical drive. ![]() MacOS: VBoxManage internalcommands createrawvmdk -filename ".vmdk" -rawdisk /dev/disk# Linux: VBoxManage internalcommands createrawvmdk -filename ".vmdk" -rawdisk /dev/sda Windows: VBoxManage internalcommands createrawvmdk -filename "C:UsersVirtualBox VMs.vmdk" -rawdisk. For each of the following examples, ensure that you input the desired names between the arrows and replace the number or pound sign with your desired drive number. Now you can run the command to create the virtual hard drive file that points to your desired physical drive. If you’re using Windows as the host OS you will also need to go to the root directory of VirtualBox using the following command: cd C:Program FilesOracleVirtualBox Creating the VirtualBox Hard Drive Make note of the desired drive in the format of /dev/disk0, /dev/disk1, etc. In macOS, use the following command: diskutil list.Make note of the desired drive in the format of dev/sda0, dev/sda1, etc. In Linux, run the following command: sudo fdisk -l.You’ll see the associated drive numbers on the left and will identify them later as PhysicalDrive0, PhysicalDrive1, etc. Next, you’ll need to find the path and drive number of the physical drive you’d like to mount: Choose all options as normal, but when asked about the virtual hard drive, select Do not add a virtual hard drive. You’ll first want to create a VM within the VirtualBox GUI. And no matter which drive or partition you want to mount, it’s always a good idea to back up any existing data on it before continuing. Warning: Do not attempt to mount or boot the partition that runs the host OS with a VM, as that can lead to severe data corruption. We’ll show how to do this when running VirtualBox on a Windows, Linux, or macOS host machine. This method is called VirtualBox “ raw hard disk access.” This allows you to mount or boot additional storage such as a secondary hard drive or external USB. How to Enable VirtualBox Raw Hard Disk Access This tutorial will only discuss mounting entire VirtualBox physical hard disks. VirtualBox can mount entire physical hard disks as well as only selected partitions of a drive. Though it’s possible to create a virtual hard disk image from the existing contents of a physical drive, you might find it useful to directly mount or boot a physical drive on a VM.Īnd while this is fairly easy to do with the GUI of VMware and Hyper-V when configuring a VM, that isn’t the case with creating a VirtualBox physical disk, or a VirtualBox raw disk, in VirtualBox, as the process requires some command-line interface (CLI) usage. ![]() While virtual machines provide many benefits, such as increased security and flexibility, there are times when you may need to use a physical hard drive with your VM. VirtualBox is a popular open-source virtualization software that allows you to create and run virtual machines (VMs) on your computer.
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