[Discuss] Using raw host hard disk in virtual client

[richb at pioneer.ci.net (Rich Braun)]

What I do under Linux host/OS to access partitions or logical volumes using
VirtualBox guests is to prepare the resource with the following command:

 VBoxManage internalcommands createrawvmdk -filename $vmdk_file -rawdisk $device

where:
 vmdk_file looks like ~/.VirtualBox/HardDisks/foo.vmdk
 device looks like /dev/volgroup/logicalvol

The device could equally well look like a disk partition /dev/sda6.

Performance is equal to or possibly better than the bare-metal, setting it up
this way.  (How could it be "better"?  The big host OS cache, which should be
turned off if you're concerned about data integrity during a power outage.)

If VBoxManage command line comes with the PC version, it'd work the same way.

-rich