Launch Windows 11 development environment on Apple M1

[mahnunchik]

Describe the issue

Is it possible to launch already packed Windows 11 development environment? Downloaded from this page: https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/downloads/virtual-machines/

It seems it should be possible by using converted Hyper-V image.

$ qemu-img convert -p -O vhdx WinDev2112Eval.vhd WinDev2112Eval.vhdx

But I got stuck on UEFI Interactive shell

Configuration

• UTM Version: 3.0.4
• OS Version: macOS 12.1
• Intel or Apple Silicon? Apple Silicon

[ty-yqs]

Did you open this option ? It seems that you need to turn it off.

[ty-yqs]

Did you open this option ? It seems that you need to turn it off.

I mean that there is also a option in UTM on M1 Mac.

[mahnunchik]

Yep, I've tried to turn it off. The same result.

[conath]

On M1, we can't run VMs that depend on x86_64 hardware virtualization like Hyper-V VMs. You may have better luck with the VirtualBox version of that download, as that one will at least include an EFI bootloader in the VM. Still it is created to run with hardware virtualization, which is unavailable for non-ARM guests in UTM on Apple Silicon.

[conath]

I am able to boot the VirtualBox image "Windows 11 Enterprise" from the "[Get a Windows 11 development environment]" website in UTM on my Intel Mac. I have attached the config plist for my VM here.
Windows 11 Dev Env (VirtualBox).utm.zip

To get the hard disk image from the downloaded .ova file, you need to rename it to .tar, then double click to decompress. After it's decompressed, you end up with a folder with a couple of files inside. You want the WinDev2112Eval-disk001.vmdk file. The others are not needed for UTM. Next step takes anywhere from minutes to hours depending on your Mac's storage speed: import the VM I linked above, or create a new emulated Windows VM in UTM and import the drive (click New Drive, then Import and choose the file). On my MacBook Air 11" (2015), the import took over half an hour.

Finally, to get it to boot, I had to disable EFI boot and enable hypervisor.
.

[mahnunchik]

@conath Thank you for the research. How to enable hypervisor?

[conath]

@mahnunchik In the VM configuration “QEMU” section, check the “Use Hypervisor” box (if the checkbox is not there, make sure you are using an Intel Mac and update UTM).

[conath]

It's worth noting that UTM can't offer nested virtualization due to limitations of Apple's hypervisor on Intel Macs, so the feature "Windows Subsystem for Linux enabled with Ubuntu installed" advertised for this VM will not work and can't be configured to work in UTM, unfortunately.

[pipiche38]

Thanks it works well!

[erikmartinessanches]

It's worth noting that UTM can't offer nested virtualization due to limitations of Apple's hypervisor on Intel Macs, so the feature "Windows Subsystem for Linux enabled with Ubuntu installed" advertised for this VM will not work and can't be configured to work in UTM, unfortunately.

What about on M1 macs, can UTM offer nested virtualization for an arm Win 11 guest?

[oshan35]

I am also having somewhat similer problem. Trying to load the VM from VHDX file. I directly downloaded it from windows official site.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windowsinsiderpreviewARM64

can anyone tell me how to fix this.

[ansidev]

In the previous step, you have to press any key to boot into the Windows installation wizard.