GPU Drivers baked into unRaid


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On 1/30/2020 at 11:20 PM, BRiT said:

I am not confusing anything. I'd rather even just 5 minutes of LimeTech time be spent on genuine NAS functions and features than on any and all GPU-related work.

I don't think the user base would be 1/5 the size without VMs, docker, etc. LimeTech wouldn't have gotten my money if it wasn't for those features. So look at is as time well spent fundraising for the NAS functions :)

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2 hours ago, Skitals said:

I don't think the user base would be 1/5 the size without VMs, docker, etc. LimeTech wouldn't have gotten my money if it wasn't for those features. So look at is as time well spent fundraising for the NAS functions :)

Your point is not valid for the discussion in this topic.

The only use at the moment for needing GPU driver baked into Unraid is for hardware transcoding.

 

Even if one ignores the fact that pretty much all of the people requiring the feature are Nvidia users, the proportion of user base requiring hardware transcoding is certainly less than 80%.

So no, not having this feature will definitely not drop the user base to arbitrary 1/5 that you mentioned.

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1 minute ago, testdasi said:

Your point is not valid for the discussion in this topic.

The only use at the moment for needing GPU driver baked into Unraid is for hardware transcoding.

This is not true, proper driver support would mean that the GPU will be able to enter low power mode even when not assigned to a VM.

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31 minutes ago, testdasi said:

Your point is not valid for the discussion in this topic.

The only use at the moment for needing GPU driver baked into Unraid is for hardware transcoding.

 

Even if one ignores the fact that pretty much all of the people requiring the feature are Nvidia users, the proportion of user base requiring hardware transcoding is certainly less than 80%.

So no, not having this feature will definitely not drop the user base to arbitrary 1/5 that you mentioned.

You're missing the point. If LimeTech focused all their efforts on only "core" functions that 100% of users would use, they are never going to draw in more users and grow the userbase. Supporting hardware encoding natively, without being dependent on third-party builds, is user friendly for a very popular use case and would drive license sales.

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On 2/1/2020 at 10:20 PM, Skitals said:

I don't think the user base would be 1/5 the size without VMs, docker, etc. LimeTech wouldn't have gotten my money if it wasn't for those features. So look at is as time well spent fundraising for the NAS functions :)

 

I would agree with this as docker support and the ability for hardware transcoding was the main factor in switching my home system from FreeNAS to Unraid despite the concerns around reduced speeds, multi-array support, security and all the fantastic ZFS benefits. Native driver support would be great as it would remove the dependency of relying upon the LinuxServer team as lets face it they are volunteers and priorities can change or projects can fall to the side. (I do not mean any disrespect to LS.io and are extremely thankful for all the effort you've put in)

Edited by Trigonal
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On 2/1/2020 at 6:28 AM, Skitals said:

You're missing the point. If LimeTech focused all their efforts on only "core" functions that 100% of users would use, they are never going to draw in more users and grow the userbase. Supporting hardware encoding natively, without being dependent on third-party builds, is user friendly for a very popular use case and would drive license sales.

The main roadblock to adding Nvidia and AMD gpu drivers has been that Linux will grab those devices upon boot - which is what you want for them to be used by docker containers but makes it a real PITA for those wanting to passthrough the cards to VM's instead.  Traditionally you had to find out vendor id and stub the drivers via syslinux kernel command line.  To help with this we added vfio-pci.cfg method to select by PCI ID, but still no slick user interface for easily selecting the devices to stub - but lately I've seen a plugin called "VFIO-PCI Config" - maybe the author would help us integrate this natively into Unraid OS 😎

This would open door for us to add gpu drivers without adding a huge burden to VM users.....

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6 hours ago, limetech said:

This would open door for us to add gpu drivers without adding a huge burden to VM users.....

There are certainly more VM users than hardware-transcoding users.

So I would strongly urge LT to make the loading of Nvidia driver an optional setting (especially if it requires existing VM users to make config changes for a feature they didn't ask for or even worse a feature that may even break things).

 

Needless to say, expect a lot of upset users to inundate the forum with "6.x.0 broke my VM" posts. 😅

 

Last but not least, I can only wish you good luck with all the future "Nvidia new driver has already been out for one whole freaking day, why haven't Unraid had it yet?" demands. 🤣

 

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2 hours ago, Koshy said:

I hope LimeTech doesn't dismiss the needs of people who need GPU drivers because of a few naysayers who dismiss the needs of others. 

You can just call me out instead of making passive aggressive comments.

I wrote much stronger words originally before editing it back to something more conducive but if you want strong words then well:

 

FACT: there are more VM users than hardware transcoding users.

FACT: as even LT admitted, getting the driver embedded may cause issues with existing VM users.

So I hope LimeTech doesn't bow down to the pressure from the few vocal complainers who do nothing but demand stuff for their own needs while ignoring the implication to the larger user base who QUIETLY enjoy Unraid because it just works.

 

 

You prefer that instead of my conducive suggestion to make it an optional setting?

Edited by Squid
Remove Trump reference
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4 hours ago, testdasi said:

There are certainly more VM users than hardware-transcoding users.

 

Right which is the main reason we haven't "just added" the gpu drivers.

2 hours ago, Koshy said:

I hope LimeTech doesn't dismiss the needs of people who need GPU drivers

Right, don't want to do this either.

 

Hopefully we can get this done with minimal disruption.

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13 hours ago, limetech said:

The main roadblock to adding Nvidia and AMD gpu drivers has been that Linux will grab those devices upon boot - which is what you want for them to be used by docker containers but makes it a real PITA for those wanting to passthrough the cards to VM's instead.  Traditionally you had to find out vendor id and stub the drivers via syslinux kernel command line.  To help with this we added vfio-pci.cfg method to select by PCI ID, but still no slick user interface for easily selecting the devices to stub - but lately I've seen a plugin called "VFIO-PCI Config" - maybe the author would help us integrate this natively into Unraid OS 😎

This would open door for us to add gpu drivers without adding a huge burden to VM users.....

 

13 hours ago, Squid said:

giphy.gif

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1 hour ago, Joeri1594 said:

I would like to use my internal amd radeon 10 vega  gpu. Im running on an amd 2200g. Is it possible to use the gpu in some way? I tried to use in vm but the whole server crashed at that moment.

Your issue probably relates to the vega reset bug which is a completely separate issue to the discussion of this topic. You might want to start your own topic for more targeted advice.

Edited by testdasi
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1 hour ago, testdasi said:

Your issue probably relates to the vega reset bug which is a completely separate issue to the discussion of this topic. You might want to start your own topic for more targeted advice.

I just want to know if it is somehow possible to use the internal gpu of my proccesor.

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53 minutes ago, Joeri1594 said:

I just want to know if it is somehow possible to use the internal gpu of my proccesor.

With an AMD GPU, your best bet at the moment is to try to pass it through to a VM and do things in the VM, reset bugs and all.

Otherwise, it will just be a glorified VGA display for the Unraid CLI / GUI.

 

For Nvidia GPU, there is the alternative of the Unraid Nvida build which allows hardware transcoding e.g. Plex using the GPU.

That's another alternative of a GPU outside of a VM but obviously doesn't work with AMD.

 

Or you can set Unraid up in a way that would allow dual-boot, that is it allows you to pick, at boot, whether to boot into a Windows bare metal (e.g. to play game) or Unraid (for NAS and docker stuff). There's a SpaceInvader One tutorial on Youtube for that.

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I'm not sure I fully understand the issue here. You can pass GPUs to VMs (whether they're from nVidia or AMD). You can use your IGP to transcode inside a docker (I do it with Plex and my Intel IGP currently). What do nVidia users want to do exactly? Use hardware decoding directly in Unraid? 

 

Don't throw rocks at me, just trying to understand.

Edited by dnLL
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8 hours ago, dnLL said:

I'm not sure I fully understand the issue here. You can pass GPUs to VMs (whether they're from nVidia or AMD). You can use your IGP to transcode inside a docker (I do it with Plex and my Intel IGP currently). What do nVidia users want to do exactly? Use hardware decoding directly in Unraid? 

It's the same as your using of Intel IGP with Plex docker but it's for Nvidia GPU instead.

The problem is that Nvidia drivers are quite troublesome to compile with Unraid (just look at the Unraid Nvidia plugin topic + LT post above about VM pass through implication) while Intel IGP tends to sort of "just work" with kernel updates (with VM pass through implication not applicable / ignored).

 

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On 2/20/2020 at 3:55 AM, testdasi said:

There are certainly more VM users than hardware-transcoding users.

So I would strongly urge LT to make the loading of Nvidia driver an optional setting (especially if it requires existing VM users to make config changes for a feature they didn't ask for or even worse a feature that may even break things).

 

Needless to say, expect a lot of upset users to inundate the forum with "6.x.0 broke my VM" posts. 😅

 

Last but not least, I can only wish you good luck with all the future "Nvidia new driver has already been out for one whole freaking day, why haven't Unraid had it yet?" demands. 🤣

 

On the note of the bolded line - this is as easy as using /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf (or in some situations /etc/modules-load.d/blacklist.conf) to blacklist nouveau, nvidia, fglrx, amdgpu etc modules. And attaching that to a toggle in the WebUI. Have this toggle default to the "OFF" (blacklist) position so that no drivers are loaded by default. Allow granularity for users to enable which drivers should and should not load. But default to NONE loading out of the box. Makes it painless for VM users, and a single setting for docker and baremetal graphics acceleration users.

And on the note of the "new driver" issue - DKMS would  take the brunt of this. Have the officially packaged unraid version bundled up in a neat and ready to go, and community driven DKMS releases for the bleeding edge. There's literally zero reason to update your nvidia driver every single time it comes out. But people are going to argue over that, too.

Edited by Xaero
Correct moduleprobe.d to modprobe.d rip
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  • 2 months later...

Just to add another hand in the air for someone who would love not just baked in Nvidia GPU drivers, but also the ability to update said drivers if required.

 

I absolutely love unRAID now, I'm a bit of a convert, and love the support, have no expectation that people should support plugins etc, so will not be complaining that limetech haven't 'fixed' my issues yet or anything, I just wanted to say that this feature (and presuming some ability to upgrade nvidia drivers) would be very much appreciated., especially as it might well solve one of the last niggles I have (my 1660 super falling off the PCI bus randomly every day or so).

 

I like the talk in the thread about having it optional,  we all use our servers for our own reasons that are most important to us. I also think (as someone who has been developing all manner of software and dealing with OS issues for 30 years) that I can imagine opening up things like driver support for GPU's is a bit of a minefield (however, my experience of unRAID and HBA controllers has shown it's pretty good at this!).

 

Anyway this is just a +1 to the OP's request.. :)

Edited by Snubbers
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