Windows 10 Virtualization 'Winception' Allows Windows In Windows Within Your Windows

In a case of Xzibit’s “Yo Dawg!” meets Inception, Microsoft is “going deeper” with virtualization in Windows 10. Although the company didn’t make note of the added functionality when it announced Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 10565, the operating system now supports nested virtualization.

Nested virtualization leverages hardware virtualization (i.e. AMD-V and Intel VT-x) with a twist. In a typical Hyper-V environment, hardware virtualization capabilities are kept hidden from guest virtual machines — therefore, its cannot take advantage of Hyper-V. However, nested virtualization allows guest virtual machines to “see” that hardware virtualization is supported, thus allowing a cascading level of Windows virtual machines running within the host.

Windows 10 Nested Virtualization

As Microsoft’s Theo Thompson explains, you can run Windows 10 as a host and have a virtualized copy of Windows 10 running within it as a guest, with yet another copy of Windows 10 running within that guest… as a guest. You still with me?

A word of warning though; this functionality is still in testing and is by no means ready for primetime. However, if you want to perform your best Leonardo DiCaprio impression in the digital world, the feature is there to explore in Build 10565.

“When I say it is an “early” preview, I mean it – there are plenty of known issues, and there is functionality which we still need to build,” said Thompson. “We wanted to share this feature with Insiders as soon as possible though, even if that meant things are still rough around the edges.”

If you do choose to test this feature, be sure to read over Microsoft’s “Known Issues” before proceeding.

Brandon Hill

Brandon Hill

Brandon received his first PC, an IBM Aptiva 310, in 1994 and hasn’t looked back since. He cut his teeth on computer building/repair working at a mom and pop computer shop as a plucky teen in the mid 90s and went on to join AnandTech as the Senior News Editor in 1999. Brandon would later help to form DailyTech where he served as Editor-in-Chief from 2008 until 2014. Brandon is a tech geek at heart, and family members always know where to turn when they need free tech support. When he isn’t writing about the tech hardware or studying up on the latest in mobile gadgets, you’ll find him browsing forums that cater to his long-running passion: automobiles.

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