Morning! W10 Question

[BarkingGhostar]

Not that I care much beyond the general curiosity but I was wondering ...

Does Windows 10 [Professional] know when it is being operated in a VM as opposed to natively? I run Virtualbox under Linux and had W10pro running as a guest.

Not that it matter, but my morning curiosity got the best of me this morning.

 

[Ketchup]

No. The reason virtual machines work is because they use software to emulate hardware. An OS can't tell the difference.

 

[quikah]

No. The reason virtual machines work is because they use software to emulate hardware. An OS can't tell the difference.

It is very easy to determine if you are running in a virtual machine. There are programtic way to do it and ways you can do it from powershell. For example, here is the output of one of my Win10 systems:

Get-WmiObject win32_bios


SMBIOSBIOSVersion : 6.00
Manufacturer : Phoenix Technologies LTD
Name : PhoenixBIOS 4.0 Release 6.0
SerialNumber : VMware-42 3c d6 bd 55 ab 81 a9-f5 4d ea a0 10 a6 1a 5a
Version : INTEL - 6040000

See the SerialNumber entry? This is a VM running on Vmware ESX.

Or you could look at Device Manager and see very obvious devices which would indicate a VM. For this machine there is a VMware VMCI Bus Device present.

A hypervisor can hide these facts, but there is really no legitimate reason to do it. Here is a VERY technical paper on such a scenario where malware could install a hypervisor, move the entire OS into a VM then hide this fact:

web.eecs.umich.edu/~pmchen/papers/king06.pdf

 

[Ketchup]

It is very easy to determine if you are running in a virtual machine. There are programtic way to do it and ways you can do it from powershell. For example, here is the output of one of my Win10 systems:

Get-WmiObject win32_bios


SMBIOSBIOSVersion : 6.00
Manufacturer : Phoenix Technologies LTD
Name : PhoenixBIOS 4.0 Release 6.0
SerialNumber : VMware-42 3c d6 bd 55 ab 81 a9-f5 4d ea a0 10 a6 1a 5a
Version : INTEL - 6040000

See the SerialNumber entry? This is a VM running on Vmware ESX.

Or you could look at Device Manager and see very obvious devices which would indicate a VM. For this machine there is a VMware VMCI Bus Device present.

A hypervisor can hide these facts, but there is really no legitimate reason to do it. Here is a VERY technical paper on such a scenario where malware could install a hypervisor, move the entire OS into a VM then hide this fact:

web.eecs.umich.edu/~pmchen/papers/king06.pdf

To me, that is not exactly what the OP was asking. You answered the question of whether a user could tell he is running a VM from within the OS. The answer is of course yes. A couple ways, that you mentioned, is by the harware IDs and serial numbers.

But does Windows know that this is a virtual machine? No. It is just reading the hardware IDs, and serial numbers that the VM program is giving its virtual hardware to the OS, in the same way that real hardware would. As long as Windows is provided this info, it doesn't care if it's virtual or not.

 

[quikah]

To me, that is not exactly what the OP was asking. You answered the question of whether a user could tell he is running a VM from within the OS. The answer is of course yes. A couple ways, that you mentioned, is by the harware IDs and serial numbers.

But does Windows know that this is a virtual machine? No. It is just reading the hardware IDs, and serial numbers that the VM program is giving its virtual hardware to the OS, in the same way that real hardware would. As long as Windows is provided this info, it doesn't care if it's virtual or not.

Fine if you want to be pedantic.

Yes, Windows 10 knows when it is running in a VM. Proof is the fact that Hyper-V Integration Services are built-in to Windows 10. When you install windows 10 on hyper-V you get all VM functionality without installing additional software.

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn792027.aspx

 

[Ketchup]

Fine if you want to be pedantic.

Yes, Windows 10 knows when it is running in a VM. Proof is the fact that Hyper-V Integration Services are built-in to Windows 10. When you install windows 10 on hyper-V you get all VM functionality without installing additional software.

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn792027.aspx

Not being pedantic. Telling the OP how it is. He is not going to run Hyper-V with Linux as a host. It does support Linux as a guest. So if the OP had the configuration in reverse, I could see your argument.

 

[JackMDS]

In contrast to the Current trend in SCI FI movies Computer are not People they do not Know anything. Their code is executed according to the Programmer commands.

The programer designed the code to work with VM.

I.e., the OP is sort of tautology - a statement that is true by the virtue of its logical form.

 

[BarkingGhostar]

In contrast to the Current trend in SCI FI movies Computer are not People they do not Know anything. Their code is executed according to the Programmer commands.

The programer designed the code to work with VM.

I.e., the OP is sort of tautology - a statement that is true by the virtue of its logical form.

Oh Jack, how could you! LOL

But with all the hubbub about W10 spying on people why couldn't these programming already be installed and running by design to look for and report such things? BTW, when I say, "Dow W10 know" of course I mean the inclusion of all of M$.