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WSL vs. Dual Booting vs. virtualbox

I have a friend thats setting up linux (ubuntu) on his machine. He has a windows installation. I personally use mac as my primary OS, but I’ve had a linux partition on my machine as well, and I’m having a slightly hard time giving him good advice as to what solution he should choose when setting up linux (I don’t even know how I would partition a disk on a windows machine to prep it for dual booting).

My question is quite simple: What are the pros/cons of WSL vs. Dual Booting vs. Virtualbox, both with regards to setup and with regards to usage?

Guenther_Amanita , (edited )

Maybe, another consideration might be to not run Linux on Windows in some way, but the other way around.

Linux offers great virtualization, maybe you can use QEMU with KVM and GPU passthrough, and then run Windows inside this box.

I find Linux more powerful and less annoying to use day to day, and having those annoyances inside a small virtualized container I can just shut down is more peaceful.

WSL can be restricting, since Linux can’t access anything, and I think getting “the real and proper thing” might be better.

And dual booting, by having both Windows and Linux on the same drive, is something I would advise against. Windows doesn’t play nice with others and often “accidentally” breaks the bootloader and hard drive permissions, leading only to trouble. If you dual boot, install them on a separate drive and select the booting drive manually in the BIOS.

Also, why do you want to run Ubuntu specifically? Did you also look up for alternatives, like Fedora or Debian?

Bitrot ,
@Bitrot@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

Most people are running Windows OEM licenses that don’t transfer to VMs. A retail license you can move around.

lnxtx ,
@lnxtx@feddit.nl avatar

Are you sure?

Bitrot ,
@Bitrot@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

It has activation issues as the license is tied to hardware. If you have a retail license tied to your account it will prompt you to transfer from another machine, OEM does not. Nowadays people don’t even get a key, although it can be extracted from the firmware.

lightnsfw ,

I use WSL for cli stuff and I have Mint running in a VM for desktop stuff. I briefly tried dual booting but it was a pain in the ass and I ended up rarely switching to the Linux partition in practice.

kbal , (edited )
@kbal@fedia.io avatar

I still have a laptop with Windows on it. Dual boot works for me. I only need Windows once in a blue moon, don't want it using up any of my attention or the computer's resources the rest of the time.

Kangie ,

WSL2 is “fine”. It has some performance issues when accessing files on the windows side of things from sick

On a technical level it’s a Linux VM running containers for Distributions that get some mounts and for WSLg a directx video device.

WSLg also provides an X server, Wayland compositor and a Pulse server so most gui apps “just work”.

Good way to start learning or get a taste for things, and easier than a VM to get started.

atzanteol ,

You don’t get the immersion of a new OS when you use wsl though. Which is fine if you just want some Linux compatibility for things like docker, but if you want the whole “desktop experience” then a VM is a better option. Either Hyper-V or VirtualBox will give you that with reasonable performance.

tired_n_bored ,

WSLPros: easy to use and to install Cons: it still runs on top of Windows and some hardware functions are not available. Also, terminal-only

VirtualboxBasically the same as WSL but it could be slower being a layer2 hypervisor

Dual bootingPros: a full-fledged Linux OS Cons: Harder to install and to mantain.

clmbmb ,

Also, terminal-only

this is not the case anymore. You can run graphical applications.

tired_n_bored ,

I didn’t know, thank you

Guenther_Amanita ,

Dual booting Pros: a full-fledged Linux OS Cons: Harder to install and to mantain.

Also, sometimes Windows being an ass and “accidentally” breaking the bootloader.

I advice anyone to have just one OS per drive installed. Keep Windows and Linux separate if possible, or some Windows update may break GRUB.

mrvictory1 ,

WSL: If your friend is a dev and needs Linux cli utilities, use this. Dual Boot: If your friend wants to daily drive Linux, use this. Shrink Windows NTFS partition within Windows then install Linux to blank space. Virtualbox: Testing ground for dual boot, your friend can familiarise themselves with Linux safely using a VM.

TheDarkQuark , (edited )

For a person with not much familiarity with Linux, and just wants to check things out, I would recommend starting out with a VM. WSL is good, but that is not the “Linux experience”. Moreover, if they are not already familiar with the command line, it may be a bit intimidating. The same goes for dual booting. It’s more technical, and it’s more appealing to just jump back into Windows when things go wrong on Linux. VM approach though, gives you a sandboxed space (with DEs and all) where you can smoothly get familiar and comfortable with Linux before making the final switch. That’s my personal opinion for beginners.

7EP6vuI ,

can you define “machine”? if it’s a desktop: have you thought about an additional hdd/ssd? all the pros of dual booting, without the cons: you can simply unplug the windows drive if you install linux.

but still do a backup!

breadsmasher , (edited )
@breadsmasher@lemmy.world avatar

Windows as a daily driver, want to do some development / docker usage based on Linux - WSL. Also you can if I remember correctly only run windows containers on windows as well as linux containers. You cant run windows containers on a linux host

You want to daily drive Linux but sometimes swap back to windows for some specific purpose (like specific games or applications that proton doesnt work with), Dual Boot

Only reason I would use virtualbox over WSL is if I need to work with a fully fledged Linux OS. I havent needed to do this since WSL though

To prep for dual booting, simplest is to have windows installed first then use the graphical installer from Linux distro which lets you select a partition to split, resize and setup GRUB etc. Very easy to do. BACK YOUR SHIT UP THOUGH

aaaa , (edited )

WSL is pretty good these days. Dual boot with Windows is still a pretty risky move with how easily Windows will overwrite your boot loader. I usually recommend you pick one os or the other rather than dual boot, so I’m in favor of WSL or virtualbox. Personally, I have never cared for needing to reboot just to switch operating systems. I tend to stick with one and the second one does nothing but take up disk partition space.

WSL lets you run both simultaneously without rebooting. Virtualbox lets you do the same with extra setup. Virtualbox makes it easier to do GUI setups than WSL does, and the network configuration is a little more obvious.

The best option is to get a second machine so you can run both. If that’s not an option, virtualbox is the better choice for learning. If you just want a Linux environment on your existing setup (similar to using a Mac) then WSL is usually good enough

stuckgum ,

Dual boot

neidu2 ,

In my book WSL and VM share the same downside in that you’re only abstracting Linux functionality in relation to the hardware.

Linux really shines when it has full access to the actual hardware as opposed to asking it’s environment nicely if it’s allowed to do something.

For example, I routinely need to change my IP address to talk to specific networks and network hosts, but having to step over the virtualisation or interpretation layer to do so is just another step, thus removing the advantage of running linux in the first place.

Sure, VMs and dual booting have their uses, but the same uses can be serviced by an actual linux install while also being infinitely more powerful.

I played around with WSL for a while, but you notice really quickly that it is not the real thing. I’ve used virtual box for some use cases, but that too feels limiting ad all of the hardware you want to fully control is only abstracted.

I would say that unless he has a really good reason why he wouldn’t want to go for dual boot, then he should do just that.

Deckweiss , (edited )

Depends on their specific needs, so they should probably jump into some Linux community and ask for themselves.

My anecdotal evidence includes vastly different experiences.

I have a friend who hates Linux desktop and exclusively uses it for running dev related stuff via WSL.

Another who uses Linux desktop primarely, but dualboots Windows for certain games.

And I am on Linux single boot and rarely use KVM (without GPU) for running my CNC or other software.

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