My plan to build a computer than can do virtualization - critiques welcome!

[cmyden]

For my next PC build, I want to try experimenting with OS virtualization.

The primary goals for this build are...

• one computer with 4 operating systems installed. One OS that can act as the gaming & media center, one for a private workstation, one for adult guests, and a locked down OS for kids to use.
• a computer that has a lot of horsepower when needed, but draws as little power as possible when sitting idle (will be on 24/7)
• a computer that is quiet. Doesn't need to be dead silent, just silent enough that it can't really be heard from 10 feet away.

The plan for virtualization

Initially I wanted to try running Windows on top of KVM or VMware. But after looking into it, it really doesn't look too feasible to get full VGA passthrough with NVIDIA drivers. I did find a few threads where people have somehow managed to do it, but it looks really hardware specific, and seems like it can turn into a real nightmare quickly.

So instead, the plan is to go with Windows Server 2012 R2 (update: now going with Windows 8.1 Pro or Enterprise) and use the Hyper-V hypervisor. The operating systems would be structured like this...



The hardware

CPU - $240
Intel Xeon E3-1230 V2 Ivy Bridge 3.3GHz (3.7GHz Turbo)
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16819117286
4 x 256KB L2 Cache 8MB L3 Cache
LGA 1155
Quad-Core Server Processor BX80637E31230V2
draws 69W of power
supports virtualization

- There's also the E3-1230 V3 with Sandy Bridge for not much more money. Both seem to get great reviews. The V2 seems to draw less power than the V3 though?

Motherboard - $165
ASRock Z77 Extreme4 LGA 1155 Intel Z77
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16813157293
HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard 4×240pin memory slots
2 - PCI Express 3.0 slots
4 x SATA 6GB/s

- Have always had ASUS motherboards. Have read great things about ASRock though. Seems to have the best BIOS at the moment?

SSD Drive (for all 4 OSes) - $300

SAMSUNG 840 EVO MZ-7TE500BW
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16820147249
2.5" 500GB SATA III TLC
Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)


- Sounds like it's best to get whichever one is cheaper at the time (Pro vs EVO), as the real world speed is similar?
- Updated: Going for the 500GB now ($0.60/GB).

Memory - $330
G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 32GB (4 x 8GB)
240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16820231569

1866 is available for $30 more. May not make a difference in real world speed?

Power Supply - $70

Rosewill CAPSTONE-450
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16817182066
450W Continuous @ 50°C, Intel Haswell Ready, 80 PLUS GOLD, ATX12V v2.31 & EPS12V v2.92, SLI/CrossFire Ready, Active PFC Power Supply
^^ Gold Certified, 92% efficient.

- Or is it worth paying $50 to $80 more for a 'Platinum Certified' power supply that is 94% efficient? Such as Rosewill Fortress or Seasonic SS-520FL. Not sure how much you'd save per year running Platinum vs Gold.

Hard Drive - $233 (Amazon)

HGST Deskstar NAS
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16822145912
H3IKNAS40003272SN(0S03664)
4TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s

Even though WD now owns HGST, I have read that the 4TB Hitachi Desktstars have a higher reliability rate than WD or Seagates. source: http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/1...le-hard-drives


Computer Case - $60 (Memory Express)

Cooler Master HAF 912
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16811119233

The other good one for the money seems to be the Rosewill Challenger ($55).

Case Fans - $20

Noctua NF-P12-1300 120mm Fan
http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX34320

- Seemed to be hard to find quiet cheap case fans *without* annoying blue lights!

CPU Cooling Fan / Heatsink - $60 (NCIX)

Noctua NH-D14 120mm & 140mm SSO CPU Cooler
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835608018
http://www.ncix.com/detail/noctua-nh...47090-1070.htm

Gigabit network card - $30

Intel EXPI9301CTBLK Network Adapter
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16833106033
10/ 100/ 1000Mbps PCI-Express 1 x RJ45


Total Cost: Just under $1500 at the moment. Used Newegg.ca for price estimates. Will try to source out cheaper prices once I've settled on components.

Thoughts?

Anywhere that I'm overspending or underspending? Anyone out there experimented with OS virtualization?

Thanks for any critiques or suggestions that anyone can provide.

[TorqueDog]

Why not just run Windows 8.1 Professional and use the built-in Hyper-V? It'll do all the stuff you already want with the benefit of not having to fight with compatibility issues because some games and drivers won't properly support a Server OS.

Then, get a Core i7 instead of a Xeon. And do not, under any circumstances, put a 5,400 RPM drive in that PC. 7,200 RPM minimum. It doesn't matter that you're going to put the OS partitions and OS VHDs on the SSD. You will notice it. I speak from experience.

[photon]

Yeah just configure the drive to power down after inactivity rather than a 5400RPM drive, they're painfully slow

I've read some about using Xeons on the desktop, but what's your reasoning vs. just getting an i7? About the only reason personally I'd consider is to use ECC memory (which actually is kind of attractive).

Good choice with the SSD, I like the Samsungs, just got a 512GB 840 Pro, and the EVO is just as good. 128GB is VERY limiting.

[Rathji]

Going to agree with almost everything that has been posted.

Use Windows 8, will have less driver issues as Server OS products do not support video cards. HyperV is the same between them, since any desktop processor in the last 3-4 years certain has SLAT support.

Also, SSD is ideal, but for your uses likely overkill as the sole drive. Put a SSD in, and have the 5400 as a data drive, but since your VMs will be running off it, you should consider a 7200 for sure, even if you need to go smaller to afford it. Putting a 5400 desktop drive would be insanely bad idea, although there are some laptop 5400 drives which match 7200 drive access speeds, you would have to do some heavy research to figure out which ones though.

[cmyden]

Thanks TorqueDog!

Originally Posted by TorqueDog

Why not just run Windows 8.1 Professional and use the built-in Hyper-V? It'll do all the stuff you already want with the benefit of not having to fight with compatibility issues because some games and drivers won't properly support a Server OS.

Then, get a Core i7 instead of a Xeon. And do not, under any circumstances, put a 5,400 RPM drive in that PC. 7,200 RPM minimum. It doesn't matter that you're going to put the OS partitions and OS VHDs on the SSD. You will notice it. I speak from experience.

I think for some reason I had dismissed Windows 8 right off the bat, not being a fan of what I saw of the new interface and hearing all the criticism. But taking a look at 8.1 Pro, it sounds like it's much better so I will definitely be considering this, thanks.

I'll definitely go 7,200 RPM for the hard drive. A friend just told me the same thing, that 5,400 will be noticeable, even used as storage.

Regarding Core i7 vs Xeon... from what I've heard the Xeons have a slightly lower power draw (energy savings) with similar performance to the i7 ? Just wondering what the benefit of going with i7 would be?

[cmyden]

Thanks Torquedog, Photo, and Rathji! I appreciate your input and have updated my plan thanks to your suggestions.

Photon: I hadn't really looked too far into Xeon vs I7, but the little searching I did suggested that besides ECC, the Xeons drew less power than the I7s with the same performance (I think this is due to the Xeons not having a built in GPU which I don't really need since I plan to use a video card). Basically, I have yet to figure out why I7 would be the more attractive option. I'll have to look into this some more.

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by cmyden

Thanks TorqueDog!



I think for some reason I had dismissed Windows 8 right off the bat, not being a fan of what I saw of the new interface and hearing all the criticism. But taking a look at 8.1 Pro, it sounds like it's much better so I will definitely be considering this, thanks.

Server 2012 has the same interface

[Vulcan]

If you're going to use it for gaming, I'd get a bigger power supply. Maybe something like this corsair 600w.

http://www.ncix.com/detail/corsair-c...78577-1070.htm

[photon]

If all else is equal then yeah a lower power draw is nice, though usually the Xeons come with a bit of a price premium, so it might be a wash (depending on how much less power it is, and the amount that a computer spends at full CPU usage is very low).

[cmyden]

Originally Posted by Vulcan

If you're going to use it for gaming, I'd get a bigger power supply. Maybe something like this corsair 600w.

http://www.ncix.com/detail/corsair-c...78577-1070.htm

Thanks Vulcan, it did cross my mind that 450W might not be enough. Although I really don't do that much gaming. I always think I will get into gaming on a new build, but realistically the hardest the graphics card will likely work is likely when playing large movie files.

[cmyden]

Originally Posted by photon

If all else is equal then yeah a lower power draw is nice, though usually the Xeons come with a bit of a price premium, so it might be a wash (depending on how much less power it is, and the amount that a computer spends at full CPU usage is very low).

Looking into it a little more, it looks it comes down to...

I7: if you want built in GPU, and the ability to overclock
Xeon: if you want Memory Error Correction

Of course this is assuming the price vs performance is equal. These seem to be the top 3 Intel contenders in the 'best performance for your dollar' category as of right now.



I don't really care about integrated graphics, and reading about Memory Error Correction it doesn't seem to be all that useful unless you're doing something very research-like where data integrity is critical. And I never really bother with overclocking.

So I guess for me, it's probably just a matter of the performance vs price. The E3-1230 V2 did intrigue me with it's sub-70W power draw, but it is also the slowest of the three. Overall, a difference of 11W draw probably means a difference of less than $10/year in the power bill, I just thought I'd try to help out the planet if I could.

[photon]

Power draw difference for me isn't about cost, it's about heat and noise. I.e. for a power supply a very efficient one means it generates the least amount of waste heat possible.

[Hack&Lube]

My VM machine uses a Xeon X5660 with Intel 120GB SSD and 2x 15,000 RPM Cheetah's in RAID-0. Backups run to slow disk.

What graphics card are you intending on using?

[cmyden]

Originally Posted by photon

Power draw difference for me isn't about cost, it's about heat and noise. I.e. for a power supply a very efficient one means it generates the least amount of waste heat possible.

Good point! It seems like one might be able to get a bit more CPU for the money by going with AMD over Intel, but they seem to draw a lot more power. I did a little more searching yesterday, and AMD seems to draw about 3X as much power at a similar speed to Intel.

Updated Intel CPU chart...



The Xeon E3-1230V3 seems like a pretty good price/performance buy at $260.

[cmyden]

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

My VM machine uses a Xeon X5660 with Intel 120GB SSD and 2x 15,000 RPM Cheetah's in RAID-0. Backups run to slow disk.

What graphics card are you intending on using?

Nice!

I'm thinking of going with a Radeon HD 7790 or 7770 (or possibly a 7850). Should be around $100-$150. From what I understand this should be enough to render video with madVR at Level 5. At least according to the guys in this thread over at AVSforum...

"How to get the ultimate picture and sound quality from your HTPC"
http://www.avsforum.com/t/1477339/so...browser-jriver

That should be about as powerful as I need, as I'm more into home theater and watching movies than playing games.

[cmyden]

The plan at the top has been updated to reflect the advice given in this thread.

SSD: Going with 512GB now

Hard Drive: Now a 7200rpm Hitachi Deskstar

CPU: Thinking the Xeon E3-1230V3 unless I run across something unusually priced.

[photon]

I love Hitachi drives!

[photon]

One cool thing I did recently is when I rebuilt my computer to Windows 8.1 from Windows 7, I used a VMWare tool to export my Windows 7 computer to a virtual machine and can run it under VirtualBox! I did a bunch of prep work (i.e. uninstall anything not needed, remove drivers, etc), and it worked quite well.

Works well since I do my work on my computer, and sometimes getting a dev environment setup again can be painful so I always have a working fallback that I can look at to figure out how the heck I got it to work.

For the CPU cooler, xbitlabs is a good site to go to to compare coolers, those circular ones don't do very well if memory serves, you could probably get a Scythe or Arctic Cooling tower type that is better and quieter.

[cmyden]

Originally Posted by photon

One cool thing I did recently is when I rebuilt my computer to Windows 8.1 from Windows 7, I used a VMWare tool to export my Windows 7 computer to a virtual machine and can run it under VirtualBox! I did a bunch of prep work (i.e. uninstall anything not needed, remove drivers, etc), and it worked quite well.

Works well since I do my work on my computer, and sometimes getting a dev environment setup again can be painful so I always have a working fallback that I can look at to figure out how the heck I got it to work.

For the CPU cooler, xbitlabs is a good site to go to to compare coolers, those circular ones don't do very well if memory serves, you could probably get a Scythe or Arctic Cooling tower type that is better and quieter.

Nice! That's pretty cool. I usually just make notes whenever I build a new computer, of everything I did, and update it during the lifetime of the build if necessary. I find it helps make the next build go a lot faster, because there can be so much involved in getting things set up just right the first time.

I'll take a look at xbitlabs, thanks!

[Jacks]

You might want to look at these fans.
http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX34320

Ugly as hell and a bit more expensive but they keep the case cool and are super quiet. I replaced the stock fans with 2 of these and I can't even hear it most of the time.