How to create a "Gaming VM in Windows 10"

[KlassischerFeldsalat]

Hey, 

 

a friend wants to come over but he doesnt have a own computer so I thought why shouldnt I create a VM running Windows 10? 

Turns out that it isnt really as straight forward as I thought since Oracle's Virtual Box supports only 256 mb VRAM for the VM...which is not enough for games.

 

I have a GTX 1080 and a Ryzen 7 2700x, 16GB 3200mhz RAM.. so performance wise it shouldnt be a problem to run minecraft twice..right? 

[GoodBytes]

So a few problems:

• You need to use a Type 1 hypervisor. Virtual Box isn't one. It is a Type 2. Meaning, at a basic level, you are too far away from the hardware due to the additional layers between the Guest OS and hardware. Type 1 VM is closer which will lead you with much greater performance. I'll let you read more into Type 1 and 2 Hypervisor
   
• You need a VM with vGPU support. VirtualBox isn't one. Hyper-V is, but only under Windows Server, and even then, Microsoft discontinued RemoteFX.
   
• You need a compatible GPU. You don't have one. Only select Nvidia Quadro's (RTX 6000 andd RTX 8000 in displayless mode) and Tesla's support vGPU, to my knowledge.

Supported products and VMs: https://docs.nvidia.com/grid/8.0/product-support-matrix/index.html

 

[KlassischerFeldsalat]

4 hours ago, GoodBytes said:

So a few problems:

• You need to use a Type 1 hypervisor. Virtual Box isn't one. It is a Type 2. Meaning, at a basic level, you are too far away from the hardware due to the additional layers between the Guest OS and hardware. Type 1 VM is closer which will lead you with much greater performance. I'll let you read more into Type 1 and 2 Hypervisor
   
• You need a VM with vGPU support. VirtualBox isn't one. Hyper-V is, but only under Windows Server, and even then, Microsoft discontinued RemoteFX.
   
• You need a compatible GPU. You don't have one. Only select Nvidia Quadro's (RTX 6000 andd RTX 8000 in displayless mode) and Tesla's support vGPU, to my knowledge.

Supported products and VMs: https://docs.nvidia.com/grid/8.0/product-support-matrix/index.html

 

Thanks for that explanation :) 

 

So you're telling me there's no way in earth right now, to have a somewhat capable vm running windows 10 with my GTX 1080? :( 

.

[GoodBytes]

5 hours ago, KlassischerFeldsalat said:

Thanks for that explanation

 

So you're telling me there's no way in earth right now, to have a somewhat capable vm running windows 10 with my GTX 1080?

.

You can install any OS you want that is compatible with the VM software. But you won't be gaming on it.

For "somewhat" support on GPU side, VirtualBox is your best option, and as you can see, it is very limited. Beside memory, it only has partial OpenGL, Direct 8 (yes), and a bit of DirectX9 support. The feature is just there for rendering desktops that are hardware accelerated for "modern" OSs, than anything else. Your other option is Hyper-V, with the use of remote desktop which you use to connect to your running Hyper-V VM session, and even then, it only work well under modern version of Windows... you still won't be able to game. Maybe old school games will run. You'll have latency issues, but yea. You get what you get.