I do the same thing, it works well. Do you use Windows 7 or 8 as your parent OS?
I use VirtualBox and have found it reliable for years.
The Windows host OS can then be kept very clean and it remains fast and relatively secure.
Then in those rare instances when you need to download something insecure or that you don't want cluttering your Windows install you can put it in a virtual machine that acts as a sandbox.
If you organize your files right you can even wipe your windows partition and reinstall with very little downtime and setup (other than the several gigs of updates that will be needed during the first few boots).
I ran into some odd problems with the DisplayLink drivers after a couple years of success in Win 7 so I recently made the jump to Win 8.1. Most of my real work happens in my VM's so I don't mind it. My laptop has two 500 GB SSD's and has room for two more drives via mSATA cards. When I run out of room for VMs I'll go ahead and start populating the mSATA slots. I recently picked up a USB 3.0 256GB thumb drive and use it for VM portability between machines so I can leave my big laptop docked at work & take a lighter one on business trips.
And yeah - you are right about very little downtime when reinstalling stuff. While my peers will be out for a week because of an OS or hardware failure I can be up and running again in no time at all.
I use VirtualBox and have found it reliable for years.
The Windows host OS can then be kept very clean and it remains fast and relatively secure.
Then in those rare instances when you need to download something insecure or that you don't want cluttering your Windows install you can put it in a virtual machine that acts as a sandbox.
If you organize your files right you can even wipe your windows partition and reinstall with very little downtime and setup (other than the several gigs of updates that will be needed during the first few boots).