That would fix the partscan thing I'm guessing, but it introduces its own issues, and still doesn't give me the abilities that Linux on bare metal does.

What issues would it introduce that you're thinking of? (Perhaps i can test it and let you know.)

I've had tonnes of issues passing through USB devices to UTM. There are SBCs I'm working with which appear as one kind of USB device, then a flashing tool sends a command which makes the SBC disappear and re-appear as another kind of USB device, which the flashing tool then writes an image to. I have gotten it to work in UTM a few times, but it's very janky every time.

having written a usb driver myself while at apple, i wonder if it's the devices, but of course could be the utm wrapper. good to know though...i was wondering.