I am thinking about replacing my old i7-3820 on a DX79SR with a new System. I intend to keep my 1080 TI for now and want to replace only CPU + MOBO + RAM.
I was thinking about getting a new Ryzen 7000 maybe the 8 Core variant but was wondering how well GPU passthrough is supported and which chipset/motherboard I should get.
The following points are especially interesting for me:
Do I need the ACS override patch?
Does the system have a stable TSC?
Especially which specific motherboard model since I was very disappointed that on my motherboard it is unstable whereas other X79 based motherboards do not have this problem
Can I passthrough a M2 SSD?
Can I passthrough an onboard USB controller as I do now with some USB 3.0 ports which I find very partical?
Realistically the only way to tell is going to be specific about the motherboard you want to use since BIOS’s can differ from one MFG or even board tier to another.
Secondly We are still waiting on AMDs B650 series which should put real price presure on AM5 based motherboards.
Right now though, you can get a good deal on the whole platform at MicroCenter where they are “giving” away DDR5 memory with purchase of a AM5 motherboard and AM5 CPU greater than a 7700x.
Wendell covered some of the details like IMMOU groups on his most recent board coverage for AM5 so its worth watching those.
@TheHunt0r, my advice is if your current system is still working out for you, meaning your workflow isn’t impacted by the age of your current system, I will wait between 1 year and eighteen months before I would consider building an AMD 7000 system. Since the AMD’s 7000s is a brand-new technology, there will be teething issues with running such a system with Linux. You have to remember people who purchase brand-new technology chips are volunteering to be beta testers because the Linux community is a bunch of non-paid volunteers. It takes time to find and resolve any issues that will come up.
Do I need the ACS override patch?
It looks like @TheHunt0r would need to use the ACS override patch because, so far, most new motherboards have poor IMMOU group separation, and the few that don’t when you purchase it will have terrible IMMOU separation after the first BIOS update. At least That is what happened to a forum member, but he fixed the issue by downgrading his BIOS.
From what I’ve seen so far anything sitting on CPU lanes has been fine, chipset lanes have been “it depends”. So a board that splits the 16x into 8x-8x for the GPU will probably be fine, plus one CPU M.2 to passthrough. At least for USB Ryzen has both CPU and Chipset USB ports, which usually appear in separate IOMMU groups.
I’d recommend you wait for more info, Wendell is no doubt testing/playing with this at the moment.
One thing you will definitely need if you go B650 is a replacement Intel 1Gbe NIC. The Realtek 2.5Gbe NIC on ALL B650 mobos is garbage, and won’t ever get good Linux support.
I haven’t had any trouble with the realtek chip on my X570S board under linux - Realtek 8125B 2.5Gb A few of the B650 boards I’ve seen use the exact same chipset.
The only issue I could see is if you’re using a long-term stable distro like Debian or CentOS that doesn’t have a recent kernel. Support for 8125B was apparently added in kernel 5.9.x.
I’ve noticed issues around of going to a lower link speed with it though. And people are reporting better performance with the non-kernel firmware, so I’d much rather stick to what’s known good in the stock kernel rather than rely on external modules and firmware images.
Also TrueNAS Scale might be on older Debian so there is legit concern there.
What works:
Basically eveything i asked for:
TSC is detected as Stable
Passthrough of GPU works
Passthrough of nvme SSD works
Passthrough of USB Controller works
iGPU also works
IOMMU groups look perfect basically every device is in its own group
Problems I had:
Booting a BIOS Installation does not work I got a black Screen Dispite the os actually Booted just No GPU Output weather igpu Nor external
So i Had to reinstall
Ubuntu 22.04 Kernel 5.15 ist too old for the igpu using Hardware enablement Kernel 5.19 works
You have to enable acs Support manually in the BIOS it ist pretty well Hidden and only Shows Up when enabeling advanced Error reporting