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Windows 11 Enterprise VM

Date: March 4, 2026 Status: Complete

Objective

Deploy a Windows 11 Enterprise VM on Proxmox for use as a Windows administration and Active Directory lab environment.

Pre-Install: Getting the ISOs

Windows 11 Enterprise ISO

Downloaded from Microsoft’s Evaluation Center. Hit an immediate snag: Pi-hole blocked the Microsoft download page.

Fix: Added the Microsoft domain to Pi-hole’s allowlist, reloaded the page, and the form loaded. Downloaded the 64-bit English ISO.

Small reminder that Pi-hole affects all traffic on the network including your own downloads. Worth keeping the Web UI handy.

VirtIO Drivers ISO

Windows can’t see a VirtIO virtual disk during installation without drivers loaded first. Downloaded the VirtIO ISO separately:

Both ISOs uploaded to Proxmox local storage before creating the VM.

VM Configuration

Setting Value Reasoning
Name windows11-lab  
Chipset Q35 Modern PCIe-native chipset
BIOS OVMF (UEFI) Windows 11 requires UEFI will not install on legacy BIOS
EFI Storage local-lvm Stores UEFI boot settings so the VM remembers how to start
TPM Storage local-lvm Windows 11 requires TPM 2.0; Proxmox emulates it in software
SCSI Controller VirtIO SCSI Single  
QEMU Agent Enabled Lets Proxmox see the VM’s IP and shut it down cleanly
Disk 60GB, VirtIO Block, Write-back cache VirtIO Block is the fastest disk interface in Proxmox
Discard Enabled Keeps the virtual disk healthy; releases unused space to the host
CPU 2 cores, host type Passes full physical CPU features through for best performance
RAM 4096MB, ballooning enabled Dynamic allocation lets Proxmox share RAM with other VMs
Network VirtIO on vmbr0 Paravirtualized; VM-aware and faster than emulated hardware
Static IP 192.168.86.35  

Note on VirtIO Block vs SCSI: VirtIO Block was chosen for the disk interface because it bypasses hardware emulation entirely the VM talks directly to the Proxmox hypervisor. SSD Emulation is greyed out on VirtIO Block because it’s already handled natively.

Installation

Loading the Storage Driver

At the “Where do you want to install Windows?” screen, no drives appeared. This is expected Windows doesn’t ship with VirtIO drivers and can’t see the virtual disk without them.

Fix:

  1. Load Driver Browse VirtIO CD Drive amd64 w11
  2. Selected Red Hat VirtIO SCSI controller (viostor.inf)
  3. Clicked Install

The 60GB drive appeared immediately. Selected it and continued.

Post-Install: VirtIO Guest Tools

After Windows reached the desktop, opened the VirtIO CD in File Explorer and ran virtio-win-guest-tools.exe. This installed all remaining drivers in a single pass:

Network connected immediately. Rebooted.

Note: The VirtIO installer shows a Linux penguin icon. This is normal VirtIO drivers were originally developed by Red Hat for Linux but work perfectly in Windows.

Enabling & Connecting via RDP

Inside the VM: Settings System Remote Desktop Toggle On

From my main workstation: Win + R mstsc enter IP

Troubleshooting: RDP Kept Failing

RDP failed on the first several attempts. I went through the standard checklist:

None of it helped. Eventually I looked more carefully at what I was typing.

The actual problem: I had been entering 191.168.86.35 instead of 192.168.86.35. A single digit typo.

The firewall changes and network profile switch were almost certainly unnecessary. The lesson: before changing system configuration to fix a connection problem, verify the connection string itself first.

First successful connection showed a certificate warning about an unverifiable identity. This is expected for a local lab machine using a self-signed certificate. Checked “Don’t ask me again” and clicked Yes.

Re-enabling the Firewall

# Re-enable (run as administrator)
netsh advfirewall set allprofiles state on

# Verify all three profiles
netsh advfirewall show allprofiles state
# Domain: ON  |  Private: ON  |  Public: ON

RDP stayed connected with the firewall back on confirming it was never the issue.

Snapshots

Took two Proxmox snapshots as clean baselines before any lab work:

Result

Windows 11 Enterprise VM running and accessible via RDP at 192.168.86.35. The Pi-hole download block and the RDP typo were both small but real examples of how the lab components interact with each other in unexpected ways.

Next: macOS Ventura VM