VM Workstation, do i need intel vPro on my MB?

[sgudelj]

Hi,

I an building office / small lab - PC witch will have s.1151 i5 and 16-32GB of DDR4 RAM.

OS will be win 10 pro x64. (or maybe windows server if I have budget)

On that i will instal WmWare Workstation Pro. I attend to run 3-6 hosts, nothing fancy.

I know my MB and CPU need Intel® Virtualization Technology for Directed I/O (VT-d).

My question is, do I need vPro tech or not?

Witch chipset do you recomnd? Z270, H110 or something in the middle?

Intel® Product Specification Comparison

Thank you !

[bluefirestorm]

What you should be concerned about is

VT-x - this is required for VMware Workstation, ESXi

VT-d - I don't think this is required for VMware Workstation, but required for ESXi if you want device passthrough, such as presenting a qualified network card as a device for the VM. I think some of the earlier generation unlocked i7 (K desktop processors) doesn't have VT-d

EPT - this isn't required but required if you want nested virtualisation, (e.g. VMware Workstation running an ESXi VM or Hyper-V VM, or using ESXi running a Hyper-V VM)

ESXi is a lot more complicated than VMware Workstation.

[sgudelj]

I was aiming at intel  i5 7500 witch has all of them: VT-x, VT-d an EPT.

My concern is the right motherboard for the PC.

[bluefirestorm]

I don't think you need vPro. What you should be concerned about are the VT-x, VT-d, and EPT in the processor.

Intel is notorious for this kind of marketing. vPro is a marketing terminology; just like Centrino was a marketing terminology more than 10 years ago.

[wila]

Hi,

Bluefirestorm is right, vPro is not required at all for VMware Workstation.

The intel i5 7500 sounds fine.

What you want is cores from your CPU, the model mentioned has 4 of them.

Another thing you would want is RAM (the more the merrier) and fast disk.

For a new machine I would say NVMe SSD support highly preferred.

If you are having doubts about the motherboard or system to use, you can always ask here if anybody sees a problem with it.

But be specific about the setup you plan (amount of RAM/disks and what you are going to use it for - the usage scenario)

--
Wil