Installing / Setup Steps

This is a quick guide on how to install Windows 10 on your QEMU-KVM setup. Make sure you followed the previous guide QEMU-KVM on Arch Linux Guide.

Base Script

First I will provide you with a generic script. You can use this and most likely it will cover your needs.

#!/bin/bash

# QEMU name and PID
OPTS="-name windows-10-pro"
OPTS="$OPTS -pidfile /tmp/windows-10-pro.pid"

# Processor (4 cores with 2 threads)
OPTS="$OPTS -cpu host,topoext,host-cache-info=on,kvm=off,check,hv_relaxed,hv_spinlocks=0x1fff,hv_vapic,hv_time,hv_stimer,hv_synic,hv_vpindex,hv_vendor_id=whatever,-hypervisor"
OPTS="$OPTS -smp 8,sockets=1,cores=4,threads=2"

# Machine
OPTS="$OPTS -machine type=pc-q35-3.1,accel=kvm,kernel_irqchip=on"

# The following setting enables S3 (suspend to RAM). OVMF supports S3
# suspend/resume. Disable when using Q35
OPTS="$OPTS -global PIIX4_PM.disable_s3=0"

# Memory (assumes you use hugepages!)
OPTS="$OPTS -m 8G"
OPTS="$OPTS -mem-path /dev/hugepages"
OPTS="$OPTS -mem-prealloc"
OPTS="$OPTS -balloon none"

# Hardware clock
OPTS="$OPTS -rtc base=localtime"

# Sound hardware

# If you use Qemu 3.x.x
#QEMU_ALSA_DAC_BUFFER_SIZE=512
#QEMU_ALSA_DAC_PERIOD_SIZE=170
#QEMU_AUDIO_DRV=alsa
#OPTS="$OPTS -device ich9-intel-hda,bus=pcie.0,addr=1b.0,id=sound0 -device hda-duplex,id=sound0-codec0,bus=sound0.0,cad=0"

# If you use Qemu 4.x.x, 5.x.x
OPTS="$OPTS -device ich9-intel-hda,bus=pcie.0,addr=0x1b"
OPTS="$OPTS -device hda-micro,audiodev=hda"
OPTS="$OPTS -audiodev pa,id=hda,server=unix:/tmp/pulse-socket"

# Graphic card passthrough (Gigabyte GeForce GTX 980 G1 Gaming)
OPTS="$OPTS -device vfio-pci,host=02:00.0,multifunction=on"
OPTS="$OPTS -device vfio-pci,host=02:00.1"

# USB 3.0 passthrough (NEC/Renesas)
#OPTS="$OPTS -device vfio-pci,host=03:00.0"

# Keyboard layout
OPTS="$OPTS -k en-us"

# Boot priority
OPTS="$OPTS -boot order=c"

# OVMF
cp /usr/share/edk2.git/ovmf-x64/OVMF_VARS-pure-efi.fd /home/tanasaki/qemu/VMs/windows10/my_vars.fd
OPTS="$OPTS -drive if=pflash,format=raw,readonly,file=/usr/share/edk2.git/ovmf-x64/OVMF_CODE-pure-efi.fd"
OPTS="$OPTS -drive if=pflash,format=raw,file=/home/tanasaki/qemu/VMs/windows10/my_vars.fd"

# System drive
OPTS="$OPTS -drive id=disk0,if=none,cache=unsafe,format=raw,file=/home/tanasaki/qemu/VMs/windows10/windows10.img"
OPTS="$OPTS -device driver=virtio-scsi-pci,id=scsi0"
OPTS="$OPTS -device scsi-hd,drive=disk0"

# Other drive
#OPTS="$OPTS -drive id=disk1,if=none,cache=none,aio=native,format=raw,file=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-Hitachi_HDS721050CLA660_JP1570FR1ZWP7K"
#OPTS="$OPTS -device driver=virtio-scsi-pci,id=scsi1"
#OPTS="$OPTS -device scsi-hd,drive=disk1"

# Other drive 2
#OPTS="$OPTS -drive id=disk2,if=none,cache=none,aio=native,format=raw,file=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-Hitachi_HDS5C3020ALA632_ML0220F30NX2DD"
#OPTS="$OPTS -device driver=virtio-scsi-pci,id=scsi2"
#OPTS="$OPTS -device scsi-hd,drive=disk2"

# Windows 10 Pro installer
OPTS="$OPTS -drive id=cd0,if=none,format=raw,readonly,file=/home/tanasaki/qemu/OS_ISOs/Windows10/Windows10.iso"
OPTS="$OPTS -device driver=ide-cd,bus=ide.0,drive=cd0"

# Virtio driver
OPTS="$OPTS -drive id=virtiocd,if=none,format=raw,file=/home/tanasaki/qemu/OS_ISOs/virtio-win.iso"
OPTS="$OPTS -device driver=ide-cd,bus=ide.1,drive=virtiocd"

# OVMF emits a number of info / debug messages to the QEMU debug console, at
# ioport 0x402. We configure qemu so that the debug console is indeed
# available at that ioport. We redirect the host side of the debug console to
# a file.
#OPTS="$OPTS -global isa-debugcon.iobase=0x402 -debugcon file:/tmp/windows_10_pro.ovmf.log"

# QEMU accepts various commands and queries from the user on the monitor
# interface. Connect the monitor with the qemu process's standard input and
# output.
#OPTS="$OPTS -monitor stdio"

# A USB tablet device in the guest allows for accurate pointer tracking
# between the host and the guest.
#OPTS="$OPTS -device piix3-usb-uhci -device usb-tablet"

# Network
#OPTS="$OPTS -netdev tap,vhost=on,ifname=$VM,script=/usr/local/bin/vm_ifup_brlan,id=brlan"
#OPTS="$OPTS -device virtio-net-pci,mac=52:54:00:xx:xx:xx,netdev=brlan"

# Disable display. Use '-vga none' if you use GPU-passthrough 
OPTS="$OPTS -vga none"
#OPTS="$OPTS -vga qxl"
#OPTS="$OPTS -serial null"
#OPTS="$OPTS -parallel null"
#OPTS="$OPTS -monitor none"
#OPTS="$OPTS -display none"
#OPTS="$OPTS -daemonize"

# QEMU Guest Agent
#OPTS="$OPTS -chardev socket,path=/tmp/qga.sock,server,nowait,id=qga0"
#OPTS="$OPTS -device virtio-serial"
#OPTS="$OPTS -device virtserialport,chardev=qga0,name=org.qemu.guest_agent.0"

sudo taskset -c 0-7 qemu-system-x86_64 $OPTS

OVMF Download

If you have downloaded this already, you can skip this step.

We need the UEFI bios called OVMF from here. Look for the edk2.git-ovmf-x64-###.noarch.rpm file.

Download VirtIO drivers from Red Hat

Since we will be using the vfio-pci and in order for Windows to discover our (virtual) hard drive, we need to download the VirtIO drivers from Red Hat.

Choose the folder you want to download the files to and then, download stable virtio-win.iso:

wget https://fedorapeople.org/groups/virt/virtio-win/direct-downloads/stable-virtio/virtio-win.iso

and also the latest:

wget https://fedorapeople.org/groups/virt/virtio-win/direct-downloads/latest-virtio/virtio-win.iso -O virtio-win-latest.iso

The “Latest virtio-win iso” has drivers for Windows 10. We are also downloading the stable version, because it might happen that the “latest” version will give you errors during installation. You have to experiment with that.

Create a new container (disk)

qemu-img create -f qcow2 -o preallocation=metadata,compat=1.1,lazy_refcounts=on windows10.img 200G

Modify the script

Now modify the first script to match

• location of the Windows 10 install ISO
• location of your container
• location of the VirtIO drivers ISO
• Do you want to create a bridged network? Follow this guide!

USE ABSOLUTE PATHS! NOT RELATIVE ONES! 🙂

Important Remark: Since we are using vfio-pci  the virtual system drive will not be visible during installation, which is normal. To make the drive visible, you need to install the VirtIO drivers from the virtio-win.iso you downloaded earlier.

Script location

Well, basically you can save this script wherever you want as long as all paths from the above section are correct. You need make it executable with chmod +x and later run it as root.

Setting up huge pages

Hugepages is a mechanism that allows the Linux kernel to utilize the multiple page size capabilities of modern hardware architectures. Linux uses pages as the basic unit of memory, where physical memory is partitioned and accessed using the basic page unit. The default page size is 4096 Bytes in the x86 architecture.

First you need to know how much memory you will assign to all guests in total. Lets suppose that you have 16GB of ram in you system and you are allocating up to 12GB to your guests, leaving 4GB for the host. The standard huge page size is 2048kB – 2MB, so for 12GB hugepages we calculate: 12 * 1024 / 2 = 6144

First we need to check if we have the directory /dev/hugepages . If not, create it. Now, we need the right permissions to use this directory.

Add to your /etc/fstab:

hugetlbfs /dev/hugepages hugetlbfs mode=1770,gid=78 0 0

Of course the gid  must match that of the kvm  group. The mode of 1770 allows anyone in the group to create files but not unlink or rename each other’s files. Make sure /dev/hugepages  is mounted properly:

sudo umount /dev/hugepages && sudo mount /dev/hugepages

and check result:

> mount | grep huge
hugetlbfs on /dev/hugepages type hugetlbfs (rw,relatime,mode=1770,gid=78)

Now we allocate the amount of needed huge pages:

sudo sysctl vm.nr_hugepages=6144

and to make it permanent:

echo 'vm.nr_hugepages=6144' | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.d/10-kvm.conf

Verify that the correct amount of huge pages has been allocated:

cat /proc/meminfo | grep HugePages_Total

If it shows less than the amount we have tried to allocate, the memory is allocated by other processes already and you need to reboot your system.

Troubleshooting

1. Your windows installation does hand at 2% and does not move on?
   – Try using a different version of the VirtIO drivers. In my case I used the stable version and installed drivers for Windows 8.1
2. Your windows installation gives an error at 36%?
   – It related to this. Just format the primary drive partition before installing the OS OR simply close the installation and re-run it!
3. Combinations of -cpu and -machine that worked for me:
   -cpu qemu64  && -machine type=pc-i440fx-2.1
   -cpu host  && -machine type=q35
4. Qemu 4.0.0 issues
5. Pulseaudio issue:

   pulseaudio: pa_context_connect() failed
   pulseaudio: Reason: Connection refused
   pulseaudio: Failed to initialize PA contextaudio: Could not init 'pa' audio driver

   Edit the /etc/pulse/default.pa and add the following two lines:

   load-module module-native-protocol-tcp auth-ip-acl=127.0.0.1
   load-module module-native-protocol-unix auth-anonymous=1 socket=/tmp/pulse-socket

   See also:
   – https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=201393
   – https://forum.level1techs.com/t/kvm-qemu-audio-not-working-with-pulseaudio/135350
   – https://www.reddit.com/r/VFIO/comments/63qroi/qemukvm_vm_has_no_audio_standard_fixes_dont_seem/
   – https://askubuntu.com/a/1187701/163353

Sources

• Thread: Windows 10 qemu/kvm guest win/fails… (Ubuntu forums)
• KVM virtualization with Arch Linux as host system (lifeisabug.com/)
• KVM (wiki.archlinux.org)
• Synergy
• KVM VGA-Passthrough using the new vfio-vga support in kernel =>3.9 (archlinux.org)
• Heiko blog