How do you handle the missing drivers when it comes to running under the VM? Do you modify the backups, or do you opt for emulation with good old standard hardware instead?
Windows is.. Windows. Always pain with drivers there. Linux should be the easiest story, but since RHEL7 (and the derivatives from there), dracut has defaulted to "host-only" mode which leaves the initramfs so skinny and devoid of drivers not related to the host.
We have a process called Hardware Independent Restore (HIR), which injects drivers into Windows before booting it in the virtual environment. If you Google "datto HIR" you'll find some resources (e.g. https://help.datto.com/s/article/KB217259206), but it's obviously a lot of secret sauce, so I can't talk about the details.
Windows is.. Windows. Always pain with drivers there. Linux should be the easiest story, but since RHEL7 (and the derivatives from there), dracut has defaulted to "host-only" mode which leaves the initramfs so skinny and devoid of drivers not related to the host.