vDGA, drivers on ESXi host needed?

Virtual GPU Forums More vGPU Forums XenApp
1

Hi,

Quick question; NVIDIA drivers on the ESXi host, are they needed to be installed if we are using vDGA (passthrough) and the NVIDIA drivers are installed in Windows on the VM?

Dell R720
GRID K2
ESXi 5.5
XenApp 6.5
Windows 2008 R2

Regards
P-H

2

For passthrough / vDGA you don’t require any drivers in the host.

3

Thank you for the answer.

Can the NVIDIA drivers on the ESXi host cause problems for VM’s with vDGA? I read somewhere that you can’t use vSGA and vDGA at the same time on the same host.

Our ESXi host have the NVIDIA drivers installed.
We have a few standard VM’s without vDGA (non-XenApp), and two VM’s with vDGA (XenApp) on all ESX hosts. Isn’t it so that the standard VM’s use vSGA by default if the NVIDIA drivers are installed on the host?

We have some strange issues with BSOD on the VM’s with vDGA.

Regards
P-H

4

Setting the devices for PCI passthrough on the ESX host prevents them from being used with vSGA, so they can co-exist on the same host. It’s vGPU and vSGA that can’t be deployed together.

If you’re experiencing BSOD issues, please log a bug with VMware, then send me the reference details via PM.

Thanks

5

How do I log a bug with VMware?

I created this post on their forum: BSOD on one VM with DirectPath I/O enabled (vDGA -... - VMware Technology Network VMTN

Thanks in advance.

6

PHGustavsson
Did you ever find a fix for this? I’m having a similar issue to what you posted in the VMWare forum. I’m not getting the BSOD but I’m getting nvlddmkm.sys errors in my Event Viewer.