Moving 6 VM's from 1 Intel too 2 AMD machine - Which AMD ?

[simtech76]

Morning, I am currently running 5/6 virtual machines on a single i7-27k @ 4.5ghz. When all VM's are running I tend to get 95-100 cpu usage. Each virtual machine runs 2-5% CPU when idle but once running DirectX applications each changes too between 20-25% per VM (on the host). The machine is still useable for web browsing or streaming films but not much else. I have all the components apart from motherboard / CPU to move the VM's to another PC(s). I need the VM's for work however I'm a big gamer and would like to have dedicated machine(s) for the VM's. Each VM machine runs windows 8.1 has access to 4 cores 2GB of RAM and 35gb of HD space. The VM's are split between 2 SSD's.

I would prefer to have to have 2 machines and as AMD's seem quite cheap would I be able to run 3 VM's on a £100 AMD CPU (such as A10 7700k 3.8ghz) It's been 10 years since I have used an AMD and although I have looked at different benchmarks I don't think this would translate directly to running multiple VM machines. The host will be Windows 8.1 64bit as will the guests.

Regards

Simtech

[Linjo · Accepted solution]

I think your problem is that you have overcommited the pCPU.

Try to reduce the vm:s to 1 vCPU each.

// Linjo

[simtech76]

Thanks for the quick response. Part of the issue is also wanting to run the VM's while also wanting to play games on the host (BF4, Titanfall) so moving the VM's to another system would allow me to do this. I was looking at getting the same build with the i7 and 16gb but you can tell once 6 are running it does affect the performance of all the guests. For a smaller cost as I already have most the parts I was thinking about building 2 PC's to run 3 VM's however for the price would need to be looking at a £100 ish AMD CPU which I am unsure would run the VM's as well as my i7.

Regards,

Simtech

[simtech76]

I have reduced the vCPU to 1. At present virtualization engine is set to automatic with none of the options below selected (dis accel for bin trans, Virtualize Intel VT-x/EPT, Virtualize CPU performance counters.) Would I benefit from enabling or changing any of these?.

Regards

Simtech

[Linjo]

No, it will automatically choose the best on for the guest OS configured.