New to Unraid and have some questions


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Hello,

 

Greetings.

 

im not good at intros, so here is the thing. i have a lot of drama with my brother about PC. since we have one, i though i can split the OS to 2 seperate pcs using same hardware. can i do that basd onmy specs below. im mostly playing Rust and other AAA titles, my brother only using Nox simulator to use android games and light youtube usage. can this work? Please note that if im limited in graphics output i can upgrade to Ryzen 3600 so i canuse on board gpu

 

My specs:

CPU: Ryzen 1600 overclocked to 3.95 Ghz (water-cooled by deepcool castle 240)

MOBO: Asus ROG 450 gaming-F

GPU1: EVGA 1080TI FTW3

GPU2: MSI GTX1060 6GB

RAM: GSkill Trident Z RGB 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200

STORAGE 1:  Samsung 970 Evo plus NVMe PCIe M.2 (500gb)

STORAGE 2: WD GREEN 1TB 7200 RPM

 

 

Thanks

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31 minutes ago, Ali Mohsen said:

can anyone help and guide me please? it will help me a lot

Probably the reason why you haven't received a response is because nobody has the exact same config as yours.

 

With regards to GPU passthrough (and especially primary GPU passthrough), it's impossible to predict with absolute certainty in advance that a certain config will work without actually trying it out (hence without someone with an identical config to yours, there's no way to know for sure).

 

Just looking at your config, I don't see anything that screams it won't work.

Some tips in case you decide to try it out:

  • Boot Unraid in legacy mode (i.e. not in UEFI mode).
  • Put the 1060 in primary slot (GPU1) and 1080Ti in secondary slot (GPU2). I have seen more reports of people having problems with the 1080Ti so it's better to have it as secondary, which simplifies things.
  • Make sure Hyper-V is off in your VM template.
  • You are likely to need a 3rd disk to backup your current system, in case you need to go back. It's likely that Unraid will have to format your Samsung 970 and WD Green before they can be used for Unraid purposes.

 

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Hi @Ali Mohsen

 

If you link to the video you reference, it would be helpful. LTT has many videos about unRaid!

 

But in summary....

 

unRaid must boot from a USB drive (your licence is tied to the UUID of the drive). Therefore, you would indeed keep the USB plugged in to your unRaid system all the time (or as long as you want the system to be an Unraid machine - you could unplug it and boot another OS  from a different system drive).

 

It's unclear where the laptop fits into this. Maybe they just used this to prepare the USB dive (format it and load the unRaid system files?) If that's the case then, no, the laptop is not needed. You'd prepare the USB drive on a laptop (or any other system) and then transfer it to your unRaid server.

 

If you can link to the video, I might be able to provide a clearer answer.

 

 

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1 hour ago, Ali Mohsen said:

do i need to keep USB plugged all the time,

Yes, the boot flash drive must be plugged into the server at all times.  Otherwise, it can 'lose' its link to the OS.  While the flash drive is not accessed much during normal operation, there are occasions when it must be accessed and it is always written to during shutdown or reboot.

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52 minutes ago, Ali Mohsen said:

Thanks guys for the fast responds. the LTT video s the 2 gamers 1 PC. i saw he kept his laptop on so that's why i wonder.

 

 

 

So I see where your question arises.

 

In the video, they use the laptop to prepare the USB key. They then transfer it to the desktop PC and boot off it.

 

However, the continue to use the laptop to access the unRaid UI and configure the system. What they are doing here is connecting to the unRaid system over LAN. This is a standard way of going about things, as unRaid can be managed over the network and can run 'headless',  but there is another option.

 

They have a display connected to the old GPU in the top slot. This is the 'system' gpu and the one unRaid will use as it's own display. When unRaid boots, it will display all the boot steps here. Normal operation is to boot to a linux command line (just a prompt). However, there is an option at boot to choose GUI mode. In this mode, the full unRaid GUI will be loaded on that system GPU and the system can be administered that way.

 

(it's possible that this video was made before unRaid GUI boot mode existed, I'm not sure)

 

In any case, you have options. You can boot up unRaid in GUI mode and administer the system directly, or you can boot in CLI or GUI mode, and administer the system remotely.

 

If you really want to get fancy, and you have the right graphics card, you can even dispense with the cheap GPU and boot on one of your gaming GPUs, then pass that GPU through to one of your gaming VMs. This is a little more complex, doesn't work with some GPUs and you can't get back to your system GUI when you shut down your VM. YMMV.

 

Check out SpaceInvader1's you tube videos - he covers all of this stuff, and more!

 

 

 

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38 minutes ago, meep said:

 

So I see where your question arises.

 

In the video, they use the laptop to prepare the USB key. They then transfer it to the desktop PC and boot off it.

 

However, the continue to use the laptop to access the unRaid UI and configure the system. What they are doing here is connecting to the unRaid system over LAN. This is a standard way of going about things, as unRaid can be managed over the network and can run 'headless',  but there is another option.

 

They have a display connected to the old GPU in the top slot. This is the 'system' gpu and the one unRaid will use as it's own display. When unRaid boots, it will display all the boot steps here. Normal operation is to boot to a linux command line (just a prompt). However, there is an option at boot to choose GUI mode. In this mode, the full unRaid GUI will be loaded on that system GPU and the system can be administered that way.

 

(it's possible that this video was made before unRaid GUI boot mode existed, I'm not sure)

 

In any case, you have options. You can boot up unRaid in GUI mode and administer the system directly, or you can boot in CLI or GUI mode, and administer the system remotely.

 

If you really want to get fancy, and you have the right graphics card, you can even dispense with the cheap GPU and boot on one of your gaming GPUs, then pass that GPU through to one of your gaming VMs. This is a little more complex, doesn't work with some GPUs and you can't get back to your system GUI when you shut down your VM. YMMV.

 

Check out SpaceInvader1's you tube videos - he covers all of this stuff, and more!

 

 

 

so just to make sure i understood it clearly, i can use a laptop to configure the OS without needing 3rd GPU?

 

I will watch that guy videos for sure. Thanks a lot mate.

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