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My card (Quadro 4000) is detected during PCI enumeration and I can successfully do DirectPath with it. But from the few snippets I've been able to gather about vSGA it relys on an nVidia driver (delievered via the VIB) that basically allows xorg to run.  Right now if I try to start xorg it fails, period.

This is very frustrating given that VMware/nVidia announced this almost 2 months ago and there's basically nothing of any value out there about implementing it. I just want to see the KB and the VIB.

View 5.1, vSphere/vCenter 5.1 is avail in VMware site itself download and positively it will work.

MattGagliardi,

r u able to bypass quadro? how kindly share. When I am trying to bypass and restart the ESX its geiing hang when it comes to cnic_regiser loading.

I'd guess that you may have your host misconfigured.  The T3500 workstation may not even be a good candidate for this...I've gotten it to work on an HP Z800 and several models of HP DL servers (all with Quadro 3800/2000/4000) but haven't tried Dell.  The T3500 is EOL and may not have a BIOS that's compatible and/or processors that support VT-D (on the other hand that may not be an issue...I don't know Dell well enough to tell you).

That said...you *MUST* have more than one video card in the box.  The one you're trying to pass through is going to be claimed by and dedicated to the guest VM you're trying to tie it to.  But your host needs a video card too...I think that might be why you're seeing the error you're getting, you've taken away the host's video card by dedicating it to the VM.

You need to keep in mind that doing DirectPath with video cards isn't supported.  At this point it's 100% experimental and those of us who've gotten it to work have done so by taking our time, reading logs and trying different things.  No one is going to hand you a solution to this...that's not because people don't like you or don't want to be helpful, it's because there really aren't any definitive/straightforward answers.  I happened to see you were rather rude about this in another thread and I debated whether I was even going to answer your plea here.

I'd strongly suggest that you go back and read the requirements for DirectPath (for DirectPath of anything)...things like processor features, BIOS levels, RAM reservations, etc. etc. etc.  Search the DirectPath/ATI thread for posts I made regarding Quadro cards (yes, they do work despite what some of the folks there posted recently).  You should also remember that this is not suitable in any way for a production environment as it is NOT supported.

Does anyone know how this compares to RemoteFX?  This sounds very similar to RemoteFX since it appears to carve up the GPU in a similar way (software-based API intercept method of GPU virtualization).  After some research it appears to limit the VM's GPU vRAM to 128 MB, however there are some sources that hint this may be increased to 512 MB.  From this link http://www.virtuallygeeky.com/2012/10/virtualized-3d-gaming-on-vmware-view.html (in the last few Barcelona videos) it appears that the performance is better than RemoteFX even though it seems to use a similar "abstraction layer"  in between the VM and the physical GPU.  I have never been able to get this kind of performance using RemoteFX and a Fermi Quadro GPU so I'm curious if VMware is doing things better/different?  Any thoughts?

Also this doesnt appear, on the first pass at least, to be as capable as Citrix's "yet to be released" solution using nVidia's new Kepler based VGX boards => http://www.nvidia.com/object/vgx-partners.html.  It looks like nVidia's new GPUs are needed to fully utilize the latest tech that nVidia showcased back in May at GTC 2012.  Since VMware's vSGA will also work with the older Fermi Quadro cards its leading me to believe (which at this point I'm wanting to be wrong about this) that its not as capable even when using it with the VGX boards.  What do you guys think?

That said...you *MUST* have more than one video card in the box.  The  one you're trying to pass through is going to be claimed by and  dedicated to the guest VM you're trying to tie it to.  But your host  needs a video card too...I think that might be why you're seeing the  error you're getting, you've taken away the host's video card by  dedicating it to the VM.

Matt,

Are you saying that each VM must have its own dedicated video card?  i.e. multiple guests cannot share the GPU?

Its not yet possible to utilise a shared a GPU using released VMware/NVIDIA software.

If you have an interest in trying this I would advise to contact you local salesteam/SE:s and see if they can assist you.

// Linjo

Now that Horizon View 5.2 is out, is the vib available?

Correct, Horizon View 5.2 is GA, the VIB should you get from Nvidia as any other driver. Have not checked if its there yet, if its not please contact Nvidia and ask when they will publish it.

// Linjo

Has anyone of you guys been able to get hold of that VIB from nVIDIA or VMware?
I'm all up and running with VMware Horizon Suite 5.2 and now would like to set up vSGA.
Cheers ;-)

In this thread a user clamed that he got it from Nvidia support, you could try that:

http://communities.vmware.com/message/2210555#2210555

// Linjo

Hi guys,

I did too email nvidia asking for the VIB file. I did get it attached to their answer.

Now i installed the vib file on my ESXi host and installed nvidia grid. Im using a quadro 4000 and after rolling out a new pool using the "hardware" option in VMware view i sitll get the "host is not compatible"

Anyone of you have an idea how i can fix this?  google is not really helping me on this matter!

Thanks in advance.

Hi Guys,

Finally most awaited VIB file is realized and available for download.

Is the xorg service started?

// Linjo

how could i check that ?

thanks