Got any hardware recomendations for a new virtual, gaming and other stuff too PC?

[OrbitaLinx]

Hi I am looking to build a virtual machine running beast. I am primarily looking for suggestions choosing the CPU and motherboard. From the things I have seen and read about what I am trying to do I might run into compatibility and or performance issues. I am looking to know what CPU and motherboard will definitely work for sure. Work arounds are fine but I don’t want to build this PC and find out it just won’t work.

I would like to run 5 - 20 VM’s at a time. I also want to play games on a windows VM. The machine will need to be VFIO capable and allow hardware pass-through. I will be using multiple GPU’s for gaming, rendering and compute. This PC will go threw a lot of experimentation. I could always add different VM’s and hardware for any porpoise. I have been interested in streaming, rendering and encoding lately. I also have an interest in deep learning. I may also want to stream since I will at least be able to play games again. I bought a large 4K monitor 2 years ago and my old keplers wont do it but new cards aren’t happy in PCIE 2.0 slots either.

In any case I want to balance my performance with gaming performance. I will spend a good amount of time gaming but I only want 1 PC instead of like 5 PC’s not including my pfsense box and data storage of course. I know Threadripper and Epyc aren’t for gaming but I haven’t seen any one do a deep dive into gaming performance in VM’s on these platforms yet and I am wondering if any one has some experience with this?

I am on a budget and I have limited space. I have several other PC’s I want to consolidate into VM’s to save space and power and they are all very old. I will use this PC for a very long time. I have been using my last build since 2011 on the same OS, upgraded of course. I was waiting for early to mid 2020 to see what AMD would release but due to the lack of PCIE slots and the PCIE slots I have being 2.0… I do not know how much longer I can wait…

I am thinking that I will probably go AMD for this build due to cost constraints, security and general capability but I am open to a low cost Xeon or ebay Xeon if its not one of the exploited ones and supports the features I need if that exist… I have heard rumor of an Epyc 3rd gen p series CPU that will be overclockable and TRX4 compatible could this be true? I am considering a Threadripper 39xxX series CPU how ever the boards I have seen do not have enough PCIE slots. I would really like to experiment with some compute cards and stuff. I know Epyc boards have lots of PCIE slots but I am concerned about the clock speeds in task that are not that multi-threaded.

I have herd of IOMMU problems on Threadripper boards and I am wondering if those ever got fixed on the TRX4 boards? Is any one aware if AMD will release overclockable hardware more suited to my needs in early 2020??? I do not mind running the board on a open bench or customizing a case so any suggestion goes.

Thank you.

[RyzenSapphire]

Those seem to be some fairly tough constraints - particularly the budget thing.

If you’re not going Threadripper as it sounds like, then it could seem that a 3900X or 3950X should be your minimum when it comes to CPU. The 3950X already performs better than the previous generation of threadrippers, if that’s any consolation and it doubles as a capable gaming CPU.

Pair with at least 32GB, but ideally 64GB of RAM and you’ll already be able to run many VMs.

The AMD CPU will also put you on an AM4 board, in which case you might as well go for the latest chipset, X570, as it has PCIe 4.0. Intel doesn’t offer this yet, so it looks pretty straightforward as far as this technology goes. Apparently, they won’t even support it on their 10nm parts either and therefore playing the waiting game might not be the best choice at the moment.

With any luck, the AM4 socket will also last into 2020 and then you might still have an upgrade path that is of some interest, while still getting a lot of your needs met now.

I suppose it comes down to how much you prioritise those different aspects. If you’re on a really tight budget, then to me the Threadrippers and similar are probably quite expensive. Which is where the 3950X is meant to provide a balance of workstation/gaming. As it sounds like you’re mainly into dabbling in various things, that CPU looks attractive from where I’m standing, since you get the flexibility of having many cores and threads, while not so many that your budget is destroyed - which then again allows you to invest in faster RAM, storage and other things. Of course, if PCIe lanes really are critical, then I suppose you’ve already answered your own question and probably will look beyond 3950X and its Intel counterparts .

[OrbitaLinx]

Thank you for the reply. I just went to micro center and bought $500 worth of stuff retail just to test the CPU I have. I agree if i am going to buy a CPU I should have 3rd gen Threadripper. I am assuming I have a 1st or 2nd gen. I would be pleased if it’s 3rd gen.

[OrbitaLinx]

So I just threw everything in a x399. It light up but no post. Doesn’t even turn on and fail to post. Its an Asrock x399 Taichi. The gear turns green when I plug in the PSU then pulses blue and that’s it… I am attempting to power it from the button on the board it self. Its a mystery CPU ES I got off of eBay. I hear even if the CPU is bad the board should try to post…