Purpose of a high end video card

[scottw]

Sorry for such a stupid question but I do not fully get it....yet

 

Is the purpose of having a high end video card just to connect directly to a monitor from the unraid server or is their an advantage when you are "streaming" a VM desktop as well?

 

I plan to create a few VMs but do not plan on hooking anything up directly to the unraid server, I will be connecting remotely to the VMs via RDP or something like that, Will adding a high end card enhance what I am doing for game play or movie streaming?

 

For some reason I have it stuck in my head that this will only help if you connect directly to the unraid server, please tell me I am wrong

 

Thanks,

Scott

[Greygoose]

You pass the hardware to the VM. Therfore that VM utilises what it's been given, if you pass through a more powerful GPU then that VM when remotely connected too has that hardware at its disposal. Same as the cpu etc 

 

 

 

 

[scottw]

And I guess as long as you have enough bandwidth then you would see a significant improvement, right?

Sorry, just trying to understand how it works.

Thanks for your help!

[burtjr]

Think of a VM like a regular computer that your building. If you want to play newer games at the highest frame rates then you buy a top of the line graphics card. In a VM you have a virtual computer using the same hardware as a bare metal box only it's in 1 box and you pass through the card so the VM can use it.

[scottw]

Thanks for the help, I think my only hang up was how it would transfer "streaming" but I guess that depends on your bandwidth. It all makes sense to me now, thanks to both of you!

[tdallen]

You are unlikely to enjoy much in the way of benefits of a high end video card being passed through to a VM if you are going to access the VM by RDP.

[scottw]

Thanks for the reply! What would help me benefit from it more, a direct connection or a different method of connecting to the vms?

[tdallen]

If I were building an unRAID server with the plan to run a NAS, some Dockers, and a VM or two that I was going to RDP into, I would not put a high end video card into it.  I would only put a high end video card into an IOMMU/VT-d compatible server where I planned pass the video card into a VM and directly connect a keyboard keyboard and monitor for the VM.

 

That could change at some point, we're seeing applications of a video card as a powerful co-processor for, say, encoding.  But you'd know if you are trying to accomplish that... 

[scottw]

Thanks!