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Thread: Basic build for VM

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    Basic build for VM

    I'm building a basic low power Ivy Bridge setup to run a few virtual machines.

    Asus P8Z77-V PRO
    Core i7 3770K
    16GB (2x8) DDR3 Corsair Vengeance 1866Mhz (LN44568)
    256GB Corsair Performance Pro SSD

    I want the Asus because it's got lots of USB3 ports, but I'm not sure of three things:
    1. It's got two spare DIMM slots, but can I fit another pair of the Corsair 8GB DIMMs reliably?
    2. Will I have to overclock the motherboard to make it take the 1866 memory? What are the power implications of a motherboard only overclock? Is there another board that will take 1866 memory without the overlock?
    3. Can anyone recommend a power efficient power supply, that could if necessary run a GTX680 if I install one later?

    Thanks

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    Moosing about! CAT-THE-FIFTH's Avatar
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    Re: Basic build for VM

    The Core i7 3770K lacks IOMMU:

    http://ark.intel.com/products/65523/...to-3_90-GHz%29

    The Core i7 3770 does have it:

    http://ark.intel.com/products/65719/...to-3_90-GHz%29

    So do the other Core i7 and Xeon E3 V2 CPUs.

    Are you overclocking the CPU?? If not save money and get this CPU:

    http://www.scan.co.uk/products/intel...tio-80w-retail

    There is also an IB based Xeon E3 V2 coming out soon.

    I would also consider getting a low end discrete card,due to the Intel IGP drivers.

    The socket 2011,Core i7 3820 does support IOMMU:

    http://ark.intel.com/products/63698/...he-3_60-GHz%29

    However,you are paying much more for the graphics card.

    If you are looking at a cheap CPU for virtualisation then,a £120 to £130 AMD FX8120 is worth considering(if you are not gaming). Idle and low load power consumption is fine and load power consumption is not really any worse than some older CPUs.

    Edit!!

    Looking at this thread it seems some AMD desktop motherboards support ECC memory:

    http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...e-Workstation&

    However,there were quite a few suggestions of going with a dual socket G34 motherboard and using a pair of six core CPUs.
    Last edited by CAT-THE-FIFTH; 01-05-2012 at 02:18 PM.

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    Re: Basic build for VM

    Cat, that's an amazing post. Thanks for giving such a comprehensive answer. You've completely turned my plan on its head! I can't find a way to [thank] you automatically, so I'm hoping my thanks will get parsed out of this response.

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    Re: Basic build for VM

    Thanks!!

    BTW,IOMMU does also need motherboard support for both AMD and Intel based systems.

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    Re: Basic build for VM

    Based on Cat's comments about discrete GPU/IOMMU, I've gone a different direction on the build.

    Asus P9X79 WS (which support VT-d)
    http://www.scan.co.uk/products/asus-...e-30-(x16)-ceb

    Intel Core i7 3930K (C2 has VT-x and VT-d)
    http://www.scan.co.uk/products/intel...-cache-130w-re
    http://ark.intel.com/products/63697/...ache-3_20-GHz)

    Nvidia Quadro 600
    http://www.scan.co.uk/products/1gb-p...rofile-compati

    I haven't got the memory sorted. The scan configurator will do 32GB as 8x4GB. I only need 16GB but I'm keen to be able to upgrade to 64GB over the course of the next 3-5 years, so I'd like to get 2x8GB (maybe even at a higher clock speed 1866/2000/2200). I know it's not ECC, but I'm willing to live with the performance hit on error correction.

    I think it's a good compromise. The power profile should be reasonable and I can also use the machine for a bit of 3D/rendering and many even some games. Others have used it for VMs (http://www.servethehome.com/asus-p9x...rboard-review/) and even running ESXi upto 32GB limit (http://forums.servethehome.com/showt...-Asus-P9X79-WS).

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    Re: Basic build for VM

    A quick question - how many VMs are you running?? The Xeon E3 and FX8100 series are far cheaper alternatives as you can get motherboards which support IOMMU for less. Both support ECC RAM AFAIK.There is also the dual Opteron option(six and eight core processors) with a dual CPU motherboard which should cost less than a i7 3930K based setup.

    Also,in any case the low end Quadro cards are overpriced IMHO. I would look at this card TBH:

    http://www.scan.co.uk/products/1gb-a...efinity-retail

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    Re: Basic build for VM

    Probably just two or three. Each instance needs to run very fast when called upon, but there won't be that much interleaving of operations. Many applications don't make the most of all cores, so I quite want a high clock on a single core, hence Intel. I think the Intel hex cores offer the best priceerformance at the moment.

    I think the FireGL card looks good. I've veered towards Nvidia just for reliability issues. I want all my drivers to work well and not crash under load. I know these prejudices are rarely well founded, but bad experiences with a Radeon-based rig 5 years ago left their mark. Do you think the FireGL option will give better performance, reliably and without blowing my power consumption?

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    Re: Basic build for VM

    Single thread performance of the socket 1155 and socket 2011 CPUs is not hugely different,and the socket 1155 Xeon motherboards do cost less:

    http://www.scan.co.uk/shop/computer-...x-motherboards

    Memory bandwidth is more on socket 2011.

    The V4900 is very power efficient and the drives are quite solid AFAIK.

    The card can support three monitors:

    http://www.anandtech.com/show/5035/a...-firepro-v4900

    So,this might be useful if you are running multiple monitors.

    Here is a review under Linux:

    http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag...ro_v4900&num=1

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    Re: Basic build for VM

    If you just want stable drivers rather than Quadro drivers, then frankly any Nvidia card would do.

    I would probably go for a GT430/GT440, one with a big lazy fan so it lasts a long time.

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    Re: Basic build for VM

    At that price point, I would start to consider something like a cheap HP ML150 G6 with dual quad xeons.

    You get 12 DIMM slots, ECC support and each CPU gets it's own triple channel memory controller.
    Main PC: Asus Rampage IV Extreme / 3960X@4.5GHz / Antec H1200 Pro / 32GB DDR3-1866 Quad Channel / Sapphire Fury X / Areca 1680 / 850W EVGA SuperNOVA Gold 2 / Corsair 600T / 2x Dell 3007 / 4 x 250GB SSD + 2 x 80GB SSD / 4 x 1TB HDD (RAID 10) / Windows 10 Pro, Yosemite & Ubuntu
    HTPC: AsRock Z77 Pro 4 / 3770K@4.2GHz / 24GB / GTX 1080 / SST-LC20 / Antec TP-550 / Hisense 65k5510 4K TV / HTC Vive / 2 x 240GB SSD + 12TB HDD Space / Race Seat / Logitech G29 / Win 10 Pro
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    Re: Basic build for VM

    What are your VMs going to be doing? 256Gb might be a bit tight if any of them are File Servers...

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    Re: Basic build for VM

    You might want to look at getting an addon Network card if you are going to have multiple client machines connecting up or are usign a SAN such as FreeNAs as storage. That'll keep your main NIC free for everyday use. We've got HyperV Windows 7 virtual machines running Remotefx where each client is pulling over 80Mb when thrashing through Google Earth or editing HD video on dual monitors. Don't take many users doing that to thrash a NIC.

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    Re: Basic build for VM

    I'm concerned about the power consumption; the active consumption running 24-7 for the next 3 years and the latent environmental impact. All that sand takes a lot of processing to make quad cores! I'm leaning towards an Asus P8Z77 WS, Intel core i7 3770T. It cuts down the need for a separate graphics card and the chip's got a very low TDP, VT-d. The motherboard's got a server grade dual NiC which I think will help ensure there's headroom on the connection.

    Good point about storage. I've found in-VM disks are inefficient so I'm looking to use some kind of shared storage. Shared folders are only ok, because there's a fair bit of protocol overhead. I imagine iSCSI is the way to go but I've no experience setting that up on Windows (7).

    Thanks all for the feedback. You've really changed the way I think about the build.

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