Visualization and GPU Questions.

[SnipeYa]

Well I've recently come into ownership of two HP ProLiant DL360 Generation 5 servers, I've currently got a home made NAS (Modified Laptop with 3TB) running Linux that i'd like the HP to take over.

The plan is for the DL360 to run both my Linux distro and a copy of windows 7 (Or 10) that i will connect to with RDP. Here begins my visualization question... Whats the best way to go about running Linux and Windows? Would installing Virtualbox on Linux hosting the windows VM be fine? Or is UnRaid (or something like it) the way to go? I'd like whatever option to be free or as close to possible.

Next question... The DL360 is currently running an ATi ES1000 for graphics, I'd like to install a graphics card in the server for the Windows VM, BUT it only has room for a single slot card and no PCIe power cables. What's my best option for graphics with those constraints?

Thank's for any and all help.  

[tt2468]

9 minutes ago, SnipeYa said:

Well I've recently come into ownership of two HP ProLiant DL360 Generation 5 servers, I've currently got a home made NAS (Modified Laptop with 3TB) running Linux that i'd like the HP to take over.

The plan is for the DL360 to run both my Linux distro and a copy of windows 7 (Or 10) that i will connect to with RDP. Here begins my visualization question... Whats the best way to go about running Linux and Windows? Would installing Virtualbox on Linux hosting the windows VM be fine? Or is UnRaid (or something like it) the way to go? I'd like whatever option to be free or as close to possible.

Next question... The DL360 is currently running an ATi ES1000 for graphics, I'd like to install a graphics card in the server for the Windows VM, BUT it only has room for a single slot card and no PCIe power cables. What's my best option for graphics with those constraints?

Thank's for any and all help.  

For virtualization, you should use Proxmox. It's a hypervisor with a very nice web interface. It uses kvm virtualization, so pcie passthroughs are easy.

[SnipeYa]

Thanks, Is there a particular tutorial/instructions to setting everything up in proxmox that you would recommend over others?

Ohhhh, I've just noticed its Debian based. Is there an equivalent for Fedora? I'm using centos on my current NAS and need to stick to a Fedora based distro.

[leadeater]

3 hours ago, SnipeYa said:

Thanks, Is there a particular tutorial/instructions to setting everything up in proxmox that you would recommend over others?

Ohhhh, I've just noticed its Debian based. Is there an equivalent for Fedora? I'm using centos on my current NAS and need to stick to a Fedora based distro.

Proxmox is only the hypervisor, it only runs your VMs so the flavor of linux does not matter. You will still need to create a VM for your linux server and a VM for Windows.

 

A hypervisor is an extremely customized OS for running virtual computers, it has no other function than this. VirtualBox and a hypervisor are only equivalent in function, how they do it is completely different.

[SnipeYa]

1 hour ago, leadeater said:

Proxmox is only the hypervisor, it only runs your VMs so the flavor of linux does not matter. You will still need to create a VM for your linux server and a VM for Windows.

 

A hypervisor is an extremely customized OS for running virtual computers, it has no other function than this. VirtualBox and a hypervisor are only equivalent in function, how they do it is completely different.

Ahhh I see, I'm glad you picked up my misconception of how it worked, As I was thinking I could save some overhead by just running the Linux services I require along side Proxmox's. 

Would I be right in thinking it would be sensible to run CentOS in a container-based virtual machine and Windows with full machine visualization to save on some overhead? 

By the way thank you both for helping me with this, It's much better learning from people who know what they are talking about rather than Googling my way around through the situation.