Best (consumer) CPU for Virtualbox?

[Ferzerp]

People know, but it is difficult to give you the real answer without getting jumped on.


What you're looking to do is similar to what a huge majority of servers in the mid-sized space do. Just look at the market share there. There is a reason it is what it is.

 

[Arkaign]

I think an 8320 is a great value for this task personally. Throw a Cooler Master 212 on it, run it at 4.2, won't take a crazy mobo or tons of power either. i7 4770 or 1150 Xeon is better still, but that's a LOT more money, and the 8320 will still be pretty good for the job. It's just a question of how much money you want to throw at it, and how much performance you definitely need.

 

[Cerb]

Why would you use virtualbox? I'm just asking as that is the really really bad option if you have work VM's. Please use XEN or Hyper-v, something that is at least supported in the Enterprise space and provides you with many more options.

Xen requires an ongoing license, and is all but unusable for GUIs. It works headless, too. If Xen worked indefinitely, I'd have a much more favorable opinion of it. Virtualbox is great for setting up and using virtual desktops.

Hyper-V is pretty good as an option, since it now has a standalone free version, not unlike ESXi.

 

[Headfoot]

I think it was safe to guess that I already that more hardware = better for VMs.. anyone who needs multiple VMs is likely already way ahead of that suggestion. That said, to their credit no one realy suggested such a basic thing besides you. 🙂 The only hard evidence for VM performance is the link that I posted, which seems to favor AMD's stuff.

Ah okay, you're one of those. Comes "asking for help" when you already know what you want. Just buy the AMD system but don't expect the rest of us to justify your purchase. It's okay to buy what you want man, just don't play a game around it

/trollthread

 

[Headfoot]

Nevermind

 

[Ferzerp]

Anyhow, it looks like virtualization is one of the few areas where AMD punches above their normal weight.

No, and the sub 5% market share in the server space is massive evidence of this.

 

[Obsoleet]

I know a couple of people who run VMs on FX-8350s. At less than $200 a pop they are a pretty good value proposition. Seeing as you're interested in DDR4 though you probably won't ever be considering an FX cpu, or at least an FX as we know it now (large die many cores no igpu).

That was my thought, the FX is a good option on the CPU side, I know a lot of peers that use those and love them. But the reports it's being delayed or no updates makes me think it's not an option anymore since I want to move to DDR4. If Intel's extensions are as popular or supported as AMD's, that's a big factor. Otherwise a Kaveri may do the job, but something with more cores would make more sense. Depends who gets to DDR4 first as well I suppose. A high end i7 with Crystalwell and DDR4 would be ideal, but a Kaveri with DDR4 and more cores would also. FX is pretty much out of the question though for the next few years until they get a good refresh.

 

[Zstream]

Xen requires an ongoing license, and is all but unusable for GUIs. It works headless, too. If Xen worked indefinitely, I'd have a much more favorable opinion of it. Virtualbox is great for setting up and using virtual desktops.

Hyper-V is pretty good as an option, since it now has a standalone free version, not unlike ESXi.

Xen is free and so is vsphere.... Either way, get a cheap 6300 or 8150 and you're set.

 

[Torn Mind]

VMs don't benefit from graphics processing, despite the OP's odd obsession with it. Intels have superior speed due to better IPC at a certain clockspeed. Hence, they are superior-performance chips when all relevant variables are equal(core count, clockspeed, hardware VM support), though not necessarily cost-effective.

 

[Cerb]

Xen is free

...per yearly activation period. It can be frustrating if you happen to forget when that ends, which is easy to do.

 

[Madpacket]

Grab an Intel 3770 before they're gone. Unlike the 4770 they can actually overlock up to 4.2Ghz and support VT-D which is important if you are making a Windows gaming VM (Google VT-D + Windows gaming).

Just make sure you get a motherboard that also supply VT-D properly, AsRock boards are generally good at supporting it.

Once you have a board and CPU toss in a Radeon 7950/7970 which fully support PCI passthrough and dedicate it to your gaming VM. Finally use the onboard CPU GPU for the rest of your VM's.

The other option if you want cheap is to go with Kaveri APU and run native Windows and then run your VM's in VMWare or Virtual Box. APU's support VT-D so you could pass through extra S-ATA controller cards or USB 3.0 to your VM'S depending on your goals. Like if you need to develop in Linux and are compiling a lot you would want to pass through a sata controller to that VM.

Good luck.

 

[cytg111]

Only when you wish to add certain devices directly into your VM. Most hypervisors dont even support VT-D either.

I wonder how many thinks about VT-C, and if they need it 😉

- If by "certain devices" you mean, for example, your discrete GPU, then yes, "certain devices".

VT-d would enable you running linux and windows side by side with full access to system resources. Wanna game? Switch to windoze. Want to do anything else? Stay in nix .. swap swap 🙂. Im sorry to say that I havent had time to throw Xen around yet .. just been really really busy.

edit : Oh, and btw, - reason for going the non-K version haswell.

 

[Headfoot]

VMs don't benefit from graphics processing, despite the OP's odd obsession with it. Intels have superior speed due to better IPC at a certain clockspeed. Hence, they are superior-performance chips when all relevant variables are equal(core count, clockspeed, hardware VM support), though not necessarily cost-effective.

^ Exactly this. This is the answer. Any more flip flopping around means that you're buying AMD because you want to buy AMD, not because its quantifiably better in any measurable way.

Suggestion to get 3770s as they go out was a good one if you are on a tighter budget

 

[Obsoleet]

This is the answer.

Didn't you already say your piece little troll? You were ignored the first time but begging for attention. Your help is no longer welcome nor required, please see your way out of the thread.

- If by "certain devices" you mean, for example, your discrete GPU, then yes, "certain devices".

VT-d would enable you running linux and windows side by side with full access to system resources. Wanna game? Switch to windoze. Want to do anything else? Stay in nix .. swap swap 🙂. Im sorry to say that I havent had time to throw Xen around yet .. just been really really busy.

edit : Oh, and btw, - reason for going the non-K version haswell.

Exactly, if VT-d is supported by VB or similar then it's a no brainer. Or if AMD-V does the same thing. Also, I don't need a discrete GPU if I can get Crystalwell or faster integrated- as you noted, it simply adds complication on device passthrough. It all lines up with the way the industry is going and the way I'm personally looking to head (AMD/Intel's way of the APU/iGPU). I'll have to find more material on AMD-V and VT-d and if they are similarly capable, but the fastest integrated GPU does matter to me quite a bit.

 

[ShintaiDK]

Exactly, if VT-d is supported by VB or similar then it's a no brainer. Or if AMD-V does the same thing. Also, I don't need a discrete GPU if I can get Crystalwell or faster integrated- as you noted, it simply adds complication on device passthrough. It all lines up with the way the industry is going and the way I'm personally looking to head (AMD/Intel's way of the APU/iGPU). I'll have to find more material on AMD-V and VT-d and if they are similarly capable, but the fastest integrated GPU does matter to me quite a bit.

AMDs equal to VT-D is called AMD-Vi, not AMD-V. Also you need to make sure the BIOS also supports it.

Intel CPUs also got a lower virtualization overhead than AMD. And Haswell is without doubt the fastest, even compared to IB.

 

[Arkaign]

Haha, I just realized something funny. I just built a cheap virtualization box for someone on the cheap. 2X Xeon 5560 and a Dual 1366 board, both CPUs and the board set me back about $300. 8C/16T, 8 DDR3 slots, yadda yadda. The results were really good for the $. Not very power efficient probably, even though the 5560 is a 95W CPU. $ for perf though, you can get truly nutty deals if you're willing to deal with used stuff. We added a PCIe USB 3.0 card and a PCIe SSD to the system (needed to run a ton of VMs, but all of them were fairly small in drive usage). The heaps of memory slots also made it pretty cheap to put 64GB on there with older 8gb sticks.

 

[theevilsharpie]

Exactly, if VT-d is supported by VB or similar then it's a no brainer. Or if AMD-V does the same thing. Also, I don't need a discrete GPU if I can get Crystalwell or faster integrated- as you noted, it simply adds complication on device passthrough. It all lines up with the way the industry is going and the way I'm personally looking to head (AMD/Intel's way of the APU/iGPU). I'll have to find more material on AMD-V and VT-d and if they are similarly capable, but the fastest integrated GPU does matter to me quite a bit.

Keep in mind that PCI passthrough works by giving the VM exclusive control over a piece of hardware. Stated another way, while the VM controls hardware passed to it, the host OS can't use it. In the case of a GPU, you'd either need to have two GPUs (one exclusively for the host, one exclusively for the VM), or you'd need to set up some alternate method of interacting with the host OS while the VM is active (e.g., command line over serial). You'd also be restricted to bare-metal hypervisors, as host-based hypervisors like VMware Workstation and Virtualbox aren't going to have the low-level access needed to control how hardware is assigned.

As for other comparisons between Intel and AMD on virtualization tech, AMD supports hardware-accelerated virtualization across their full product line, whereas Intel doesn't. I'm not sure how Intel's APU's fare against AMD's as far as virtualization tech goes, but if the only difference is that Intel lacks VT-d, I wouldn't consider that a big deal, since PCI passthrough isn't going to be practical on a host that you're also using as a desktop.

 

[Headfoot]

People know, but it is difficult to give you the real answer without getting jumped on.


What you're looking to do is similar to what a huge majority of servers in the mid-sized space do. Just look at the market share there. There is a reason it is what it is.

^ Ferzerp called it