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Gaming PXE Server for multiple users

RoyceIrving
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While watching the video "What the heck is a GAMING SEVER??", Linus briefly mentioned how there are no drives within the server because all of that would be designated to storage servers where they boot everything over the network using something like PXE. This is honestly something I would like to try with at two computers in my house. There's a lot of questions I have about a solution like this, especially because I don't really have the money yet to test a bunch of things. I will list my questions below:

  • Can this be achieved with Windows 10 on the clients? I know you would need the server to be on a Linux machine
  • How well does this work in terms of multiple users. If my roommate and I would like to use this server, and say both play a game like Rocket League from the server, will there be some file system locks that would prevent us sharing the same file?
  • Closely related to the last question, could it work like having a single Windows machine where I could sign into my account, and without restarting, have another user log into their account without having to switch drives.
  • What kind of hardware would I need? (How fast of drives, NIC for server and clients, Processor)
  • Can I set up the PXE server on just 1 linux machine
  • How bad would the latency be?

 

Thanks in advance!

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https://linustechtips.com/topic/1228261-gaming-pxe-server-for-multiple-users/
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31 minutes ago, RoyceIrving said:

How well does this work in terms of multiple users? If my roommate and I would like to use this server, and say both play a game like Rocket League from the server, will there be some file system locks that would prevent us sharing the same file?

You still need to have individual installations of [OS] for each user.

 

Unless you have identical hardware on each machine and have the server processor and RAM availability to have deduplication on, there's not really any space or performance advantage to PXE in a home environment. Running another machine just to boot your main one is just another point of failure.

 

33 minutes ago, RoyceIrving said:

Closely related to the last question, could it work like having a single Windows machine where I could sign into my account, and without restarting, have another user log into their account without having to switch drives.

No, PXE basically just moves the boot drive to a network location and tell the motherboard to start from there instead of a local disk. AFAIK you can't boot from the same image twice.

 

What you're imagining sounds more like Windows in a VM on the server and then remoting in via RDP or VNC or Steam, in which case this is possible (not really for gaming though). You'd (probably?) need a Server build to support multiple RDP connections at once (I've never tried...).

 

38 minutes ago, RoyceIrving said:

What kind of hardware would I need? (How fast of drives, NIC for server and clients, Processor)

SSD RAID array, 10G NIC preferable (though I suppose 1G would be workable), decent processor

 

39 minutes ago, RoyceIrving said:

Can I set up the PXE server on just 1 linux machine

Yes.

 

40 minutes ago, RoyceIrving said:

How bad would the latency be?

Worse than a local boot drive.

Main System (Byarlant): Ryzen 9 5950X | Asus B550-Creator ProArt | EK 240mm Basic AIO | 32GB G.Skill DDR4 3600MT/s CL16 | XFX Speedster SWFT 210 RX 6600 | Samsung 990 PRO 2TB / Samsung 990 EVO Plus 4TB | Corsair RM750X | StarTech 4× USB 3.0 Card | Realtek RTL8127 10G NIC | Hyte Y60 Case | Dell U3415W Monitor | Keychron K12 Blue (RGB backlight)

 

Laptop (Narrative): Lenovo Flex 5 81X20005US | Ryzen 5 4500U | 16GB DDR4 3200MT/s (soldered) | Vega II 384SP Graphics | SKHynix P31 1TB NVMe SSD | Intel AX200 Wifi | Asus 2.5G USB NIC | Asus ProArt PA278QV | Keychron K4 Brown (white backlight)

 

Proxmox Server (Veda): Ryzen 7 3800XT | ASRock Rack X470D4U | Corsair H80i v2 | 128GB Micron DDR4 ECC 3200MT/s | 2× Samsung PM963a 960GB SSD / 4× WD 10TB / 4× Seagate 14TB Exos / 4× Micron MX500 2TB / 8× WD 12TB (custom external SAS enclosure) | Seasonic Prime Fanless 500W | Intel X550-T2 10G NIC | LSI 9300-8i HBA | Adaptec 82885T SAS Expander | Fractal Design Node 804 Case

 

Proxmox Server (La Vie en Rose): GMKtec Mini PC | Ryzen 7 5700U | 32GB Lexar DDR4 (SODIMM) | Vega II 512SP Graphics | Lexar 1TB 610 Pro SSD | 2× Realtek 8125 2.5G NICs


Media Center/Video Capture (Jesta Cannon): Ryzen 5 1600X | ASRock B450M Pro4 R2.0 | Noctua NH-L12S | 16GB Crucial DDR4 3200MT/s | EVGA GTX750Ti SC | UMIS NVMe SSD 256GB / TEAMGROUP MS30 1TB | Corsair CX450M | Viewcast Osprey 260e Video Capture | TrendNet (AQC107) 10G NIC | LG WH14NS40 BD-ROM | Silverstone Sugo SG-11 Case | Sony XR65A80K

 

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Network:

Spoiler 
                       ┌─────────────── Office/Rack ───────────────────────────────────────────────┐
Google Fiber Webpass ── Cloud Gateway Max ══╦═ Pro XG 8 ══╦═ Flex 2.5-8 ══╦═ Doven Wolf
                      La Vie en Rose (DNS) ═╬═ Narrative  ╠═ Veda-NAS     ╠═ La Vie en Rose (vmbr)
                                Veda (DNS) ─┘             ╠═ Veda (vmbr)  ├─ Ptolemy (vmbr)
╔═════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╩═ Ptolemy-NAS  ├─ Veda (Mgmt)
║   ┌ Closet ┐      ┌───────── Bedroom ─────────┐                         └─ Veda (IPMI)
╚═══ Flex XG ══╦╤═══ Flex XG ══╤╦═ Byarlant
       (PoE)   ║│              │╠═ Narrative 
Kitchen Jack ══╣└─ Dual PoE ┐  │╚═ Jesta Cannon*
   (Testing)   ║┌─ Injector ┘  └── Work Laptop
     Bedroom ══╝│        ┌─────── Media Center ────────────────────────────┐
     Jack #2    └──────── Switch 8 ────────────┬─ nanoHD Access Point (PoE)
Notes:                                         ├─ Sony PlayStation 4 
─── is Gigabit / ═══ is Multi-Gigabit          ├─ Pioneer VSX-S520
* = cable passed from Bedroom to Media Center  └─ Sony XR65A80K (Google TV)
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47 minutes ago, RoyceIrving said:

I know you would need the server to be on a Linux machine

nope, windows server cn host pxe clients aswell.

 

48 minutes ago, RoyceIrving said:

Can this be achieved with Windows 10 on the clients?

yup, lots of software lets you configure it so that a system will boot to a network disk

 

48 minutes ago, RoyceIrving said:

How well does this work in terms of multiple users. If my roommate and I would like to use this server, and say both play a game like Rocket League from the server, will there be some file system locks that would prevent us sharing the same file?

normally give a user a virtual disk. Or make a generic disk and do something like redirected users. Depends on your goals

 

49 minutes ago, RoyceIrving said:

Closely related to the last question, could it work like having a single Windows machine where I could sign into my account, and without restarting, have another user log into their account without having to switch drives.

Yea, you cn do this without network boot with domains in windows, but its a lot of hassle for a home enviroment

 

49 minutes ago, RoyceIrving said:

What kind of hardware would I need? (How fast of drives, NIC for server and clients, Processor)

Really depends on the requirements, and how many users, and how much performance you want. But its almost alwasy cheaper and faster to just have a local disk on the system

 

 

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