Pros and cons of Kali as guest VM versus as standalone host with harddrive

[iLikeKali]

Hello Experts:

This is my first time looking into learning about computer security,
but to defend well, I have to learn about cyber offense first.

I like to know the pros and cons of using kali
as a guest Virtual Machine (VM) or
as a standalone OS with its own harddrive.

What is the limitation of using Kali as
a guest VM versus using it as a standalone host,
and vice versa.

Thank you.

[Tulpa]

Hi iLikeKali,

Welcome to the world of offensive security

I think we can have a lengthy conversation regarding the pros and cons of both setups, but it's important to consider your context and needs.

From my own experience, I have found that running it on it's own hard drive as a standalone OS, provides a easy platform for using USB adapters such as wireless cards. Of course you can use a VM for this purpose, but as a new user you might find it easier to configure from a driver standpoint. That being said, I cannot recommend running it as a VM any higher. When you start building your own lab environments, you'll find that the vast majority of those machines are VM images. Beyond that, being able to create snapshots to revert to when your experiments yield unstable results is a major time saver. Personally, I run kali primarily in a VM, but I have a couple of raspberry pi's floating around for wireless engagements.

I hope that helps.

Tulpa

[grid]

I'll second Tulpa's statement about Kali VM & wireless cards. A standalone install works better for me with any wireless work. Aside from that, if you're doing any CUDA-enabled password cracking, that also works better on a standalone install.

My primary Kali box dual boots with Windows 7. That configuration works well for me, but I periodically use a Kali VM for some tasks.

[Crash]

http://blog.dclabs.com.br/2016/05/ka...ed-or-usb.html