Hello all, I have tried several Linux distros, I may refer to TAILS for example.
I am not a programmer at all, but I do believe the community has the right to learn and for transparency in the software they use. So, I think PureOS philosophy is more similar to my ideology. Although I still have some dependency on Windows as a user, and worst at this time I can not yet invest in open hardware. I am considering giving a try to PureOS and possibly making a symbolic donation, as I understand the way PureOS should be free. It happens that Live USB seems to work perfectly, but then after installation I might have some problems with proprietary drivers on my computer that I am not predicting in forehand. So I am trying to figure out if I should make my move now and I consider the following:
To Install PureOS in a virtual machine;
To try to install PureOS in a different partition on the drive, using Gparted to do that;
To try to install PureOS in a different partition and run Windows 11 in a virtual machine;
To install PureOS in the whole internal hard drive and run windows 11 on a Virtual Machine.
What are the security concerns of running Windows as a virtual machine?
Will it give me any kind of security to run PureOS in a virtual machine, is the PureOS system isolated from Windows? Will my files be safe this way from the Windows malware?
Will my system be inconsistent because I don`t own non-proprietary open hardware?
It is a risk, let`s face it, that my system will not work. Please give me some advice, as I just own this computer and need it working everyday.
I think in general it’s safe to assume that if all your hardware is working when the operating system is on a flash drive it’ll be working when it’s on some other bootable storage device. You can always get another hard drive and see.
I suppose that when you say “install PureOS in a different partition on the drive”, you mean having windows in another partition. I don’t think that’s a very good idea. You’ll need to make sure that all other partitions are encrypted and I’ve never had much luck getting multiple operating systems on the same hard drive to begin with.
Personally I recommend using PureOS as your host and run Windows in a virtual machine if at all. I only use it like that, and only for video games and only when something doesn’t work under WINE. There is a fair amount of setup involved especially if you want to pass through a graphics card, but it’s worth knowing how to do. When using windows like this it’s a good idea to just disconnect it from the network as much as is possible, but it’ll still try to send whatever telemetry it has saved up on you whenever you do give it network access, and blocking that with complete certainty is difficult.
But you should try anyway.
Microsoft is a social engineering company. Like all of them, Microsoft’s data collection is ultimately in service of a goal that makes people behave according to the desires of Microsoft’s customers. If you want to avoid being affected by that, you have to limit yourself and avoid any part of that system, or anything likely to become a part of that system, as much as possible.
I don’t actually know with 100% certainty if Windows as a guest operating system can’t access files on the host operating system (unless shared) but it’s not supposed to be able to do that. If you want to transfer files from host to guest, it is pretty easy to just redirect a USB flash drive back and forth from host to guest.
I’m not sure I can answer your last question. If by “inconsistent” you mean “ideologically inconsistent”, well, no one is going to get that mad at you. If anything you’re taking steps into what these social engineering companies would have people think is the “wrong direction” already, so they might have a bigger problem with you doing this than us. Any further elaboration would be a long philosophical rant/debate that no one is going to want to read.
Run PureOS on Live USB then install PureOS on another USB drive. I am using PureOS on usb 16gb drive. Whenever I want to run another system just turn off and boot with another OS.
I have a 480SSD with linux mint Installed, and other 420SSD with PopOS. All these are external USB
I’m fairly sure that it is not safe to assume this i.e. there are known cases where this has proven to be incorrect i.e. live boot runs well but once the Linux distro is installed, it does not work.
No.
The only safe VM option, of the two, is running PureOS on the computer and then Windows in a VM, which is reasonably solid. However for this to work, PureOS must be able to run and the only way to be sure is to try it, as suggested by @Tonyp, installing PureOS on an external drive.
You might. The WiFi is a prime problem area. It may help to enumerate your hardware here or mention the make and model or at least check out http://linux-hardware.org/.
I have found it to be true myself, with graphics drivers. I believe it’s because the live environment settles for software graphics rendering but the installed environment will try to use the hardware, which it can’t always do.
Hi @irvinewade, thanks. Sorry for this late reply. I am considering installing PureOS on my laptop (Asus Vivobook S14 S410U). I have an ethernet connection, but if wi-fi were also available it would be good. At this time, I am considering using an external USB device, the fastest USB ports I have are USB 3.0 and USB-c, and I need to see the best option to run the system, considering the capacity and reading and writing speeds more convenient for a nice user experience with PureOS. At a later stage maybe I will be interested in open hardware and other devices, but for now it is kind of expensive for me. So now my priority is to try to predict that PureOS will work fine on my new external storage device, possibly a new flash drive. Any suggestions?
I have read on other threads that running PureOS and other Linux systems from a USB device is not a good solution, especially long term. Although it can be a temporary solution to see how PureOS works, and it can be safe since you do your regular backups until you really decide to install it in the internal SSD, am I wrong? How far can I go, predicting I won`t have problems running PureOS installed in the original SSD HD if I try to run it from an USB?
I have read on other threads that running PureOS and other Linux systems from a USB device is not a good solution, especially long term. Although it can be a temporary solution to see how PureOS works, and it can be safe since you do your regular backups until you really decide to install it in the internal SSD, am I wrong? How far can I go, predicting I won`t have problems running PureOS installed in the original SSD HD if I try to run it from an USB?
I wouldn’t run it from a flash drive, I use an external SSD myself. If you go that route, make sure you install the bootloader to the proper device, it’ll make your life easier.
performance won’t be the best - but I wouldn’t worry about that
USB flash drives aren’t really rated for a high level of writes over a long period of time - but it’s only temporary
You do your regular backups no matter what you have installed on, right? Any disk can fail.
Another aspect of this is to mitigate your risk by storing your actual files somewhere else. Then there isn’t much on the boot drive to lose. (This is what TAILS gives you, but taken to the extreme.) Hence, for example, with a regular distro, you could boot from an external drive but store documents and stuff on the internal drive, until you are ready to make the move to a permanent Linux install on the internal drive.
Interesting the option of storing files on the internal drive until the permanent move to it. Perhaps Gparted software might help here.
Would it be risky or possible to set up a shared partition between the system installed on the internal drive? If the system on the main internal drive is Windows, the better is to not allow a shared drive at all, right? But if not, perhaps it is still possible.
My problems with TAILS were also related to my ignorance as well, but also with the fact many websites require logins, only certain email providers work with TOR, and that would make me switch a lot to other systems. Also if you don`t update TAILS regularly then it might be difficult sometimes to proceed with the manual upgrade, especially if there is some error. TAILS is not totally compliant with strictly and only free software, but for the sake of security, anonymity and privacy I believe it is worth it.
It’s entirely possible. Not particularly difficult. You can share with windows if it’s formatted to NTFS, but “risky” depends on your definition of “risky.”
My definition of risky has more to do with Windows continuing spying on my files![quote=“Gavaudan, post:16, topic:17516”]
It’s entirely possible. Not particularly difficult. You can share with windows if it’s formatted to NTFS, but “risky” depends on your definition of “risky.”
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My definition of risky has more to do with Windows continuing spying on my files!
Windows will only see what you give it access to, which would be the shared drive.
If by “shared” you mean just the physical drive split into partitions, that’s different. You could also encrypt your Linux partitions with luks in that case and it wouldn’t be an issue. It all depends on what setup you’re looking for.
Thanks for the help @Gavaudan! Actually, I am looking for both solutions, as by imposition of some other less aware users and by some activities I need to use Windows sporadically (when there isn’t really another option in more extreme situations).
Thus, a “shared” partition with Windows might be useful, knowing in advance that if permissions are given to Windows to access the files, these files are compromised. This partition would be smaller since it can handle what I need.
The second option you explain is also useful and wiser than sharing files with a proprietary software system. Since I could share a split partition in the same hard drive of Windows, just to read and write to and from and to my PureOS external drive, yes it would be “handy” to be encrypted, and most probably with LUCKS.
Actually, I am looking for both solutions, as by imposition of some other less aware users and by some activities I need to use Windows sporadically (when there isn’t really another option in more extreme situations).