Virtualization Lab and Gaming PC

[mvhoward]

Looking to use this machine as a lab for virtual machines in VMware workstation. I work in IT so looking to learn with a home lab. Also, looking to replace my PS4 with this machine as my gaming platform. Any thoughts or suggestions on things I missed or should change?

 

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/GHPNK8

 

- I want to do 1440p and 60 fps. But honestly, anything that will be an upgrade over my PS4 is good. Not sure how much gaming I'll do as I don't play my PS4 too often but looking to play GTA V for sure. Depending on how into it I get I may consider upgrading to a 980 Ti in the future.

 

- Went with the Xeon-1231 as it's basically an i7 without the GPU and overclock abilities which is fine with me since I have a dedicated graphics card and I'm not looking to OC since it's my first build. Need an i7 or a Xeon for the hyper threading aspect for my VM lab.

 

- Corsair's PSU is a great deal on Newegg right now so going with that although it's overkill. A 7 year warranty provides a lot of future proofing for it.

 

- Still looking for a monitor, I'm kinda set on a widescreen as it eliminates the need for dual monitors and I can have multiple VMs up at once.

 

- Going with cheap keyboard and mouse for now, I plan to upgrade to a mechanical keyboard in the near future.

[Guest]

my questions are:

Have you considered an EVGA G2 PSU because you can get this ( http://pcpartpicker.com/part/evga-power-supply-220g20750xr ) for less, and it'll work just as good

Have you considered any other case? or is your heart set on that specific one?

Have you considered a R9-390, because you said you want to focus on 1440p, the 970 can barely max at 1080p 60FPS, where the 390 is a bit more fit to go onto 1440

Why such an expensive wireless adapter?

Everything else, other than those personal preferences, looks good

[TheRandomness]

Just saying @mvhoward, you need one GPU per VM. The Xeon doesn't have an iGPU therefore you're going to need a single card for the VMware and then however many GPUs for each user. Also, Z97 board with Xeon = Useless. Don't need the overclockability.
 
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
 
CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1231 V3 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($242.99 @ SuperBiiz) 
Motherboard: ASRock Fatal1ty H97 Killer ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  ($95.98 @ Newegg) 
Memory: Corsair Vengeance Pro 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  ($66.99 @ Newegg) 
Video Card: PowerColor Radeon R9 390 8GB PCS+ Video Card  ($279.99 @ Newegg) 
Case: Fractal Design Define R5 Blackout Edition ATX Mid Tower Case  ($109.99 @ NCIX US) 
Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($78.99 @ NCIX US) 
Wireless Network Adapter: Asus PCE-AC68 802.11a/b/g/n/ac PCI-Express x1 Wi-Fi Adapter  ($84.89 @ SuperBiiz) 
Monitor: LG 34UM94-P 60Hz 34.0" Monitor  ($714.99 @ Amazon) 
Keyboard: Logitech K120 Wired Standard Keyboard  ($6.99 @ NCIX US) 
Mouse: Logitech B120 Wired Optical Mouse  ($6.99 @ NCIX US) 
Total: $1688.79
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-01-17 18:36 EST-0500

[mvhoward]

my questions are:

Have you considered an EVGA G2 PSU because you can get this ( http://pcpartpicker.com/part/evga-power-supply-220g20750xr ) for less, and it'll work just as good

Have you considered any other case? or is your heart set on that specific one?

Have you considered a R9-390, because you said you want to focus on 1440p, the 970 can barely max at 1080p 60FPS, where the 390 is a bit more fit to go onto 1440

Why such an expensive wireless adapter?

Everything else, other than those personal preferences, looks good

I haven't Im just partial to Corsair PSUs because of their quality and warranty plus the ability to not have the fan run at low speeds.

My heart is set on the r5, love the design, love the sound proofing.

I haven't considered a Radeon, this sounds bad but just because my friends use Nvidia and I've read a lot about heat and noise of Radeons (trying to keep this cool and quiet).

I was kinda set on an Asus one and wanted the AC wifi.  Do you have a suggestion?

[mvhoward]

Just saying @mvhoward, you need one GPU per VM. The Xeon doesn't have an iGPU therefore you're going to need a single card for the VMware and then however many GPUs for each user. Also, Z97 board with Xeon = Useless. Don't need the overclockability.

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 

CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1231 V3 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($242.99 @ SuperBiiz) 

Motherboard: ASRock Fatal1ty H97 Killer ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  ($95.98 @ Newegg) 

Memory: Corsair Vengeance Pro 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  ($66.99 @ Newegg) 

Video Card: PowerColor Radeon R9 390 8GB PCS+ Video Card  ($279.99 @ Newegg) 

Case: Fractal Design Define R5 Blackout Edition ATX Mid Tower Case  ($109.99 @ NCIX US) 

Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($78.99 @ NCIX US) 

Wireless Network Adapter: Asus PCE-AC68 802.11a/b/g/n/ac PCI-Express x1 Wi-Fi Adapter  ($84.89 @ SuperBiiz) 

Monitor: LG 34UM94-P 60Hz 34.0" Monitor  ($714.99 @ Amazon) 

Keyboard: Logitech K120 Wired Standard Keyboard  ($6.99 @ NCIX US) 

Mouse: Logitech B120 Wired Optical Mouse  ($6.99 @ NCIX US) 

Total: $1688.79

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-01-17 18:36 EST-0500

Thanks for the head's up.  I cannot just share the GTX's virtual memory with different VMs? I was unaware of that so thanks for the insight.

Should I just go with an H97 or is there another mobo you suggest?

[TheRandomness]

Thanks for the head's up.  I cannot just share the GTX's virtual memory with different VMs? I was unaware of that so thanks for the insight.

Should I just go with an H97 or is there another mobo you suggest?

Ive already changed the build and posted it in that post. The 390 has superior performance to the 970. As I said you need one GPU per VM (including the OS running one). So if you had 3 users, you'd need 3 good GPUs to run the VMs and one crappy one to run VMware.

[mvhoward]

As I said you need one GPU per VM (including the OS running one). So if you had 3 users, you'd need 3 good GPUs to run the VMs and one crappy one to run VMware.

 

Thanks a lot for the head's up, I hadn't realized/thought of this.  So would I be better off getting an i7 with hyper threading and the integrated GPU so I can use the integrated graphics for multiple VMs at once? Since I won't be able to share my dedicated card with the host machine and my VMs?

[Streetguru]

Looking to use this machine as a lab for virtual machines in VMware workstation. I work in IT so looking to learn with a home lab. Also, looking to replace my PS4 with this machine as my

Well here, a 4k display gives you more pixels for less money compared to a 21:9 1440p display, this 4k display also has free-sync for gaming

 

and a 390 is a fair bit better choice than a 970 especially for 1440p, and it gives you adaptive sync for a lower price

 

this display is usually like 600, though a 40" 4k display is a lot better

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&sku=1164749&gclid=CMDWnP7bssoCFUhcfgod4XwGMA&is=REG&ap=y&m=Y&A=details&Q=

also that wireless adapter isn't worth it, this one has a movable antenna and wireless AC support for a 3rd of the price

 

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/vcdYMp

Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/vcdYMp/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1231 V3 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($242.99 @ SuperBiiz)

Motherboard: ASRock H97M PRO4 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  ($62.98 @ Newegg)

Memory: Corsair 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  ($81.95 @ Amazon)

Storage: Sandisk Ultra II 480GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($133.99 @ Amazon)

Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($49.98 @ OutletPC)

Video Card: PowerColor Radeon R9 390 8GB PCS+ Video Card  ($299.99 @ Amazon)

Case: Fractal Design Core 1000 USB 3.0 MicroATX Mid Tower Case  ($34.99 @ Micro Center)

Power Supply: SeaSonic S12II 620W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply  ($64.99 @ SuperBiiz)

Wireless Network Adapter: Gigabyte GC-WB867D-I 802.11a/b/g/n/ac PCI-Express x1 Wi-Fi Adapter  ($29.89 @ OutletPC)

Monitor: LG 27MU67 60Hz 27.0" Monitor

Total: $1001.75

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-01-18 01:16 EST-0500

 

 

Thanks a lot for the head's up, I hadn't realized/thought of this.  So would I be better off getting an i7 with hyper threading and the integrated GPU so I can use the integrated graphics for multiple VMs at once? Since I won't be able to share my dedicated card with the host machine and my VMs?

and what do you guys all mean you need one GPU for virtual machines, you can run as many virtual machines as you have RAM basically and can dedicated a display to each so long as it's connected to your main GPU

 

unless you mean you need GPU acceleration or something, also nvidia cards are something of a pain to do a kvm passthrough on

also what are you using the virtual machines for?

As far as silent cases though this one is about the best bang for your buck I'd think

[dabeast]

Does VMWare have issues with NVIDIA gpus not being recognized by the VM?

 

I know that unraid seems to have a workaround but everything I have read is that GPU passthrough (which is what you will need for games) doesn't work with NVIDIA cards very well so you may want to think about the 390.

[Streetguru]

Does VMWare have issues with NVIDIA gpus not being recognized by the VM?

I believe the error is "Code 43", they try to prevent people from virtualizing the non GRID cards I guess, but ya there's a fix