Linux Mint 19.2 *beta* (XFCE, Mate, Cinnamon) 64-bit is out! Also, how to get Mint working with Ryzen 3rd-Gen!

[VirtualLarry]

www.linuxmint.com

Anyways, I had to go into my UEFI on my Gigabyte B450 AORUS PRO WIFI ATX mobo, running BIOS F41b (AGESA 1.0.0.3AB), and DISABLE "IoMMU". Once I did that, Linux Mint LiveUSB started booting OK. (There were a few issues, but overall, it booted.) I'm using 4x8GB DDR4-3000 (XMP), and 2x RX 570 8GB cards (both MSI). UEFI booting, onto a separate SATA SSD just for Linux.

 

[mxnerd]

Unless you are running bare metal VM platform (ESXi, Hyper-V) and need to pass through hardware to client VM, you don't need to enable AMD's IOMMU (or AMD-V) (the equivalent of INTEL VT-x).

IOMMU, VT-x feature is useless in general OS (you can't pass through hardware to either VMware workstation or MS Hyper-V's VMs anyway), you can disable it and it won't affect anything.

 

[mxnerd]

https://www.pcworld.com/article/340...m-for-third-gen-ryzen-pcs-that-wont-boot.html

 

[PingSpike]

Unless you are running bare metal VM platform (ESXi, Hyper-V) and need to pass through hardware to client VM, you don't need to enable AMD's IOMMU (or AMD-V) (the equivalent of INTEL VT-x).

IOMMU, VT-x feature is useless in general OS (you can't pass through hardware to either VMware workstation or MS Hyper-V's VMs anyway), you can disable it and it won't affect anything.

Pretty sure VT-x and AMD-V are the same thing and IOMMU stuff is under VT-d and AMD-Vi. The naming is a mess. VT-x is used by generic stuff like VMware workstation to speed up VMs, Vt-d is for passing through devices.

You can pass through hardware on kvm linux hosts. I think Hyper-V VMs can do it at well but I've never tried as I can't understand why one would want to run Windows as a VM host.

 

[mxnerd]

@PingSpike I might be wrong. You probably are more familiar with this thing. The naming is really confusing.

I don't have any AMD platform so I probably were confused, and I don't have much experience with Linux, let alone Linux KVM. I did test ESXi and pass through hardware before, but currently I only run VMs in Windows VMware Workstation, which only need VT-x for Intel machines.

@VirtualLarry is more on the hardware side, so he probably never run VM environment before, or probably just use it once in a while, I don't know.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I've messed with VMs, a bit, and know somewhat the difference between VT-x and VT-d on the Intel side, but I'm mostly unfamiliar with AMD-V, AMD-Vi, and IOMMU. (Other than I know that you have to use IOMMU somehow, to "pass through" hardware to VMs, and allow them to use the native OS drivers for that hardware.)

All I know is, I couldn't boot current distros of Linux (Ubuntu Mate 19.04, and Linux Mint 19.2beta Cinnamon 64-bit), without disabling IOMMU in my Gigabyte B450's UEFI, with an R5 3600.

 

[mxnerd]

Haven't used Gigabyte motherboards for a while, never liked them since it seems they are always slow to update their firmwares and have compatibility issues with my Logitech keyboard/mouse, which constantly lost connection to Linux based OS during setup.

Once bought a Gigabyte mini-ITX MB and found that there is no beeper on it, not even a connector so I can hookup a beeper/speaker! How on earth you debug bootup problems then?

 

[VirtualLarry]

Once bought a Gigabyte mini-ITX MB and found that there is no beeper on it, not even a connector so I can hookup a beeper/speaker! How on earth you debug bootup problems then?

Now THAT's kind of weird. Almost negligent. No beeper???

 

[mxnerd]

Now THAT's kind of weird. Almost negligent. No beeper???

Yep. I had to return it.

 

[mxnerd]

Now THAT's kind of weird. Almost negligent. No beeper???

It's GA-B75N . No built-in beeper, no connector. A major flaw.

https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/GA-B75N-rev-10#ov

 

[EXCellR8]

beep boop beep, definitely peculiar

 

[Red Squirrel]

Now THAT's kind of weird. Almost negligent. No beeper???

That seems to be common now, kind of annoying. Most of the systems I've built don't have it, you can buy them separately (little speaker that plugs in), I just never think of buying them since they are only really needed if troubleshooting.

Though normally there's a connector at least... that is very annoying if there is none.

As for VT-D is that not for performance stuff too? I think most VM programs (hypervisors but even desktop ones like Virtualbox) nowdays won't even let you start a VM without it being enabled.