One computer instead of three

[Stripe]

Hi,

 

I'm currently running 3 computers at my house (excluding laptops ): the first one is a desktop pc with Windows - used for every-day work, the second one is a HTPC connected to my tv - used for watching movies and listening to the music and the third one - an unRaid machine that I use as a NAS. My desktop machine (the one with Windows) is buit on Gigabyte p35-ds3r board (LGA 775), slightly modified to work with an LGA 771 processor - Intel Xeon E5450 with 4 GB RAM and Nvidia GeForce 8600GT. As I have read my motherboard supports virtualization, so does the CPU. I know that it's not the most powerful machine but I wonder if I could use my desktop pc combined with HDD from NAS instead of those three? I would need a VM with Windows and another one with OpenELEC. From what I've read I would need a second graphic card to run simultaneously both VM and... anything else?

 

regards

Stripe

[jonp]

4gb of RAM seems awfully tight for all this. Can you upgrade to 8gb to give yourself a little more breathing room?

[garycase]

Your CPU has enough "horsepower" to do this, but as JonP noted, your VM's would have a lot more "breathing room" if you upgrade the memory to 8GB (which your board supports).    If you've currently got a pair of 2GB modules, that's easily done by adding two more.    If you're using 1TB modules, at least replace two of them with 2TB modules (6TB total).   

[WeeboTech]

While certainly feasible CPU wise, RAM would need to be upgraded.

What OS is the HTPC?

 

I could see combining the NAS and HTPC.

YMMV on the everyday Windows desktop experience.

 

Personally, I like to keep my everyday machine separate from the others.

I would certainly combine the NAS and HTPC components.

[METDeath]

An OpenELEC VM can run with 512 RAM, more if you use addons frequently. I give mine 1.5GB of RAM because it is setup to auto update my library and I have plenty to spare in my server. If you're using Windows Media Center you will probably want 3GB for it.

[garycase]

Agree ... a Windows 7 VM runs fine with 2GB assigned to it, but if you're using WMC I'd give it 3GB.  OpenElec runs fine with 512MB, but again I'd give it a bit extra (perhaps 1GB) just to be sure it has a bit of headroom.

 

So that's 4GB you're going to assign to your VM's.    So you definitely need to bump up your RAM.    If you bump it to 6GB, you could assign 2.5GB to the Win7 VM and 768KB to the OpenElec and have plenty left for UnRAID.    If you bump it to 8GB, you could assign 3.5GB to Win7 and 1GB to OpenElec.

 

If you're currently using 1GB modules, I'd replace 2 of them with 2GB modules and see how things run with the 2.5GB/768MB allocations => if you're not happy with the performance, then replace your other 2 modules and bump the allocations up as I suggested above.

 

[WeeboTech]

I've never been happy with Win 7 performance on 2GB.  I'm a busy guy, so that could part of my problem.

I have an 8GB laptop and wish I could bump it up higher.

 

It all depends on the usage patterns. An SSD does help.

 

My suggestion would be to pull 2GB out of the everyday machine and see how you like it's performance.

 

Really, I would suggest just going with the 8GB.

If it's funding that's the issue get it used from eBay.

[Stripe]

HTPC runs on OpenElec. The problem with my motherboard is that it has 2 DDR2 slots and 2 DDR3 slots. I'm currently using DDR3 and 4 GB is the maximum amount that the board can handle - according to the manual, but I've found information that some people successfully use 2*4 GB modules, so I think I'll give it a try. Or I'll sell DDR3 and buy 2*4GB DDR2 that are surely supported.

[WeeboTech]

Further research may be required.  ie. check if the board and CPU support what's needed.

 

If you have read examples here on the forum, please advise.

 

From what I'm reading the CPU supports VT-X but not VT-D (for directed IO) which may be required to enable intel_iommu=on and pass through the video.

 

I really do not know what I'm talking about with this.

However I did a quick 3 minute look up and it seems to be raising red flags in my rapid view.

 

I would suggest a bit more research as to viability.

[METDeath]

VT-d/AMD-Vi is required, without it GPU pass through doesn't work.

[garycase]

According to Gigabyte that board only supports DDR2 -- up to 4 modules of 2GB each (total of 8GB)

http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=2746#sp

 

[garycase]

... I'm currently using DDR3

 

Are you CERTAIN about that?    Did you post the wrong board number in your original post?

 

[garycase]

The manual also indicates ONLY DDR2 (4 modules)

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CDUQFjADahUKEwipzeztyffHAhXHlYAKHR9ECNU&url=http%3A%2F%2Fdownload1.gigabyte.eu%2FFiles%2FManual%2Fmotherboard_manual_ga-p35-ds3r(ds3)(s3)_2.0_e.pdf&usg=AFQjCNETjd2fVM2bZo6AAQOCmh50_n1rEA&sig2=byy_6h26_2ObEIUq0-lxCg

 

In fact, I HAD one of these boards until it died last year -- and had 8GB of DDR2 installed in it.

 

[WeeboTech]

VT-d/AMD-Vi is required, without it GPU pass through doesn't work.

 

Unless someone can find more information about the CPU, it looks to be a bust.

 

As far as running a windows VM and accessing it via Remote Desktop or vnc, that's still a possibility for the 'every day computing task' as long as you can deal with the slower video update speed.

 

I do this on my HP Microserver with a 2.2ghz amd and Windows XP (4GB VM).

It runs my uTorrent client as a dedicated OS to the unRAID server running on the same machine.

It can be slow and laggy at times, but so what. It's basic operation is to receive torrents and that protocol is highly resilient.

I do plan to move this to a XEON based micro server. That should run so much better with the larger internal CPU cache.

 

With the XEON per original post and 12MB cache, it should run really nice, albeit slower to deliver the graphics over the network.

 

While I'm using ESX, you may be able to do this with a Windows 7 VM and KVM.

I'm not sure enough so don't quote me.

You'll need to follow through with extra research.

[jonp]

VT-d/AMD-Vi is required, without it GPU pass through doesn't work.

 

Unless someone can find more information about the CPU, it looks to be a bust.

 

As far as running a windows VM and accessing it via Remote Desktop or vnc, that's still a possibility for the 'every day computing task' as long as you can deal with the slower video update speed.

 

I do this on my HP Microserver with a 2.2ghz amd and Windows XP (4GB VM).

It runs my uTorrent client as a dedicated OS to the unRAID server running on the same machine.

It can be slow and laggy at times, but so what. It's basic operation is to receive torrents and that protocol is highly resilient.

I do plan to move this to a XEON based micro server. That should run so much better with the larger internal CPU cache.

 

With the XEON per original post and 12MB cache, it should run really nice, albeit slower to deliver the graphics over the network.

 

While I'm using ESX, you may be able to do this with a Windows 7 VM and KVM.

I'm not sure enough so don't quote me.

You'll need to follow through with extra research.

 

Gary explained the other day that a certain generation of Intel processors had VT-d implemented on the motherboard chipset, not the CPU itself.  This looks to be one of those possibly (maybe gary can confirm?).  That said, from looking at the motherboard manual, it doesn't look like it supports vt-d.  I see a specification for virtualization tech, but nothing explicitly about vt-d or IOMMU.

 

source:  http://download1.gigabyte.us/Files/Manual/motherboard_manual_ga-p35-(d)s3r_e.pdf

[garycase]

This is indeed a Xeon that doesn't have vt-d embedded in the chip, but will work fine with I/O pass-through on supporting motherboards.  HOWEVER ... this is not a server class motherboard -- indeed it's only able to use the Xeon due to some modifications -- and I strongly suspect it does NOT have the requisite I/O pass-through support.

 

 

[Stripe]

The board number is P35C-ds3r. Sorry guys for the confusion. The only thing that differs it from P35-ds3r is that it does support the DDR3 memory. From what you have said it won't work as  I had thought it would, so instead of upgrading my current computers I'll think about building a new rig that will be able to replace those 3 that I have now. Thank you for all replies.

[garycase]

A new rig is a good idea => a Haswell-based system will use far less power than your current board; support a LOT more memory; and have a good bit more CPU "horsepower".  I'd use a server-class board (with a Cxxx chipset), ECC memory, and a Xeon E3 series CPU ... very power-efficient and likely to nearly double your system's "horsepower".  [e.g. an E3-1240v3 has 2.27 times the performance of your current CPU]