Despite its performance limitations, this virtualized environment is extremely useful for several key tasks:
Open a terminal and run:
qemu-system-aarch64 \ -M virt,highmem=off \ -accel hvf (or kvm) \ -cpu host \ -smp 6 \ -m 8192 \ -drive file=win10-arm64.qcow2,if=virtio,aio=native,cache=none,discard=unmap \ -netdev user,id=net0 \ -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=net0 \ -device virtio-gpu-pci \ -display gtk,gl=on \ -machine vmport=off
: VirtIO drivers compiled for Windows ARM64 to handle storage and network virtualization. Step-by-Step Deployment Guide 1. Obtain the Windows 10 ARM64 ISO
file (common for Windows ARM Insider Previews), you must convert it to for better compatibility and snapshot features in QEMU: Conversion Command windows 10 arm qcow2
(Command Prompt, PowerShell, or bash) in the directory where you downloaded the VHDX file.
Windows lacks native drivers for QEMU’s high-performance storage and network interfaces. Download the latest stable . Ensure the ISO contains the ARM64 driver subdirectories (specifically for viostor , viorng , and NetKVM ). 4. Initialize the QEMU Virtual Machine
Microsoft does not always provide direct public ISO downloads for Windows 10 on ARM. You can obtain an official image through:
Open in Windows 10, locate the missing devices with yellow exclamation marks, and update their drivers by pointing the search to the CD-ROM drive. 2. Enable Graphics Acceleration and NetKVM ).
Follow these steps to set up your Windows 10 on ARM virtual machine.
: The format natively supports snapshots, allowing users to save VM states and roll back changes easily.
: QCOW2 images only allocate space on the host as the guest writes data, saving physical disk space compared to raw formats. 2. Launching the VM with QEMU
Replace the input filename with your own. This process may take several minutes and results in your new qcow2 disk image. Despite its performance limitations
To boot the image, you need specific UEFI firmware and drivers: UEFI Firmware : Download QEMU_EFI.img QEMU_VARS.img
: Linaro UEFI or QEMU AAVMF (ARM Architecture Virtual Machine Firmware) binaries.
While pre-built QCOW2 images exist on various file-sharing platforms (often of questionable legality or safety), the recommended route is creating your own.
Download the latest stable from the official Fedora Peer Review project.