Disable Hyper-V under Windows 10

Image of the RAW mode error.
blog.johnminadeo.com Musings Operating Systems Technology
by JohnMinadeo : blog.johnminadeo.com, Musings, Operating Systems, Technology

Trying to disable Hyper-V under Windows 10 is a little trickier than simply uninstalling it; but not much!

tl;dr If you’re just interested in how to disable Hyper-V so VirtualBox can get RAW mode, skip down to the “Turning off Hyper-V” section below.

Some background

I am a fan of virtual machines but I don’t get to use them often at work. I do use them at home to evaluate operating systems like Linux from time to time for fun and staying aware.

Most of my computer use is with Microsoft platforms though I have had a few Macs and Linux desktops over the years.

The addition of the Hyper-V into the Windows 10 operating system is exciting because it reduces the number of software setups required after a new  setup – everybody has time for that!

I have  been digging into privacy and security lately; No doubt you’ve seen the data-breaches and customer privacy abuse headlines over the years.

I have used Tor browser by the Tor Project which led me to their Tails operating system, “a live operating system that you can start on almost any computer from a USB stick or a DVD.”

The plot thickens

While looking into Tails, two other security and privacy minded operating systems were found to be more recommended (high counts of recommendations not necessarily authoritative ones): Qubes and Whonix.

This post won’t go into the details of what these operating systems offer, but they were interesting enough to make it on to the list for evaluation.

And the Gotcha!

Qubes will not install on a Hyper-V virtual machine. There are many systems it can run, however Qubes is not one of them. The only choice is disabling Hyper-V.

More digging uncovered reports of being able to convert an existing Qubes VM to the Hyper-V format. My use case is to install the operating system manually to an empty VM.

There are third-party Qubes VMS out there but not being able to build it yourself stands against the fundamental privacy premise.

Starting a VirtualBox virtual machine with an active Hyper-V will cause the following error:

Image of the RAW mode error: "Raw-mode is unavailable courtesy of Hyper-V. (VERR_SUPDRV_NO_RAW_MODE_HYPER_V_ROOT)."
RAW mode error caused by Hyper-V being active. “Raw-mode is unavailable courtesy of Hyper-V. (VERR_SUPDRV_NO_RAW_MODE_HYPER_V_ROOT).”

Disable Hyper-V

Step 1: Disable Hyper-V Windows 10 features

  • Start the Turn Windows features on or off application
  • Ensure the following items’ checkbox icons are unchecked:
    • Hyper-V and it’s sub-items
      • Hyper-V Management Tools
        • Hyper-V GUI Manaement Tools
        • Hyper-V Module for Windows PowerShell
      • Hyper-V Platform
        • Hyper-V Hypervisor
        • Hyper-V Services
    • Windows Hypervisor Platform
    • Virtual Machine Platform (may be unrelated, needs additional testing. Not a feature I need or use normally.)

Step 2: Ensure Windows 10 boot does not automatically launch Hypervisor

Found this post at ErpNext.com by: Sirjames

  • Open the command prompt as an Administrator.
  • Run the command with no argument: bcdedit. Note the property hypervisorlaunchtype is set Auto by default.
  • Disable Hyper-V by running the command: bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype off
  • Restart the system.

Turning it back on

To re-enable Hyper-V back on, run the command: bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype auto
You will need to reboot the system to use Hyper-V.