[SOLVED] Virtual Machine Running Slow w/ Intel Core-i7 4770K & USB 3.0 HDD

[Appletax]

I ran a Windows Server 2008 R2 VM from my USB 2.0 external HDD and it ran pretty good. I had to make a new one for my new external USB 3.0 HDD because one of the files wouldn't copy over. I gave it access to 8 cores and 4 GB of RAM. It uses a lot of the CPU cycles and runs slow. I'm not sure what the issue is here.

I'd like to know how important the Intel VT-d feature is for running VMs. I would switch over to the 4771 CPU if it meant my VMs would be a lot faster. I'm not doing anything fancy with my VMs, just using them for learning how to use different OSs.

I installed the Enterprise edition and started it out with 4 cores because I didn't know it could do 8 logical cores. Maybe I should install a new VM w/ standard edition and give it 8 cores out the bat. I could also try running it from a RAMDISK once I get my 32 GB of RAM to see if the HDD is a bottleneck.

Edit: my problem was that I had the VM set to use all 8 logical cores. Scaled this back to 4 and everything runs fast!

 

[coffee]

I dont understand, Please clearly state:

1. What VM software you are using.
2. What are the specs of your computer.
3. What is the host O/S system.
4. How much memory / Video mem /cores you are allowing the virtual system to use.
5. How much hard drive space you are donating to virtual o/s.

thanks

 

[Appletax]

I dont understand, Please clearly state:

1. What VM software you are using.
2. What are the specs of your computer.
3. What is the host O/S system.
4. How much memory / Video mem /cores you are allowing the virtual system to use.
5. How much hard drive space you are donating to virtual o/s.

thanks

1. The latest free edition of VMware player
2. Very high specs - just dropped 2k on a gaming PC and it works beautifully
3. Win 8.1
4. 4 GB (uses < 1) and 8 cores
5. 50 GB

 

[BrentfromZulu]

I'm curious as to why you are running off an external HDD. For me, my Windows VM's are very slow running off of a 5900prm drive. If it was more important I would go 7200rpm, but it's just for testing and goofing around. I would think that running off of USB would be very slow, even if it is USB3.

 

[Appletax]

I'm curious as to why you are running off an external HDD. For me, my Windows VM's are very slow running off of a 5900prm drive. If it was more important I would go 7200rpm, but it's just for testing and goofing around. I would think that running off of USB would be very slow, even if it is USB3.

They need to be portable because I have to use them in my Windows Networking class. Your suggestion doesn't explain why the CPU % used goes up pretty high.

I need to figure out if Intel's VT-d will make a significant performance difference. Does anyone else have a K series CPU that runs VMs fast?

 

[coffee]

1. The latest free edition of VMware player
2. Very high specs - just dropped 2k on a gaming PC and it works beautifully
3. Win 8.1
4. 4 GB (uses < 1) and 8 cores
5. 50 GB

Appletax,

I want to give you some advice and I dont want you take it in a wrong way. Iam posting it in the open here as to possibly help others too. So, Lets look at things here ok?

I asked you the specs of your computer and the answer I got was:

Very high specs - just dropped 2k on a gaming PC and it works beautifully

I expect this from a customer not a tech. You have told me very little about your computer. You see, I have a very high end computer too. Im sure alot of people do here. Mine cost about 700 bucks to build. "Very high specs" is really nothing.

I really get very little useful information to help you. Your second post did mention some other things like what VM software you are using but that could all be coverd in your first post.

Its just you need to work on being more discriptive of your problem, Your hardware you are dealing with including software and what you have tried to correct it.

Now, Im not bashing you. Im just saying that I have very little information on your system to work with. Therefore, I cannot help you.

Best wishes,

coffee

 

[creapure]

Don't know if this helps you but I have i5 2500k 8gb corsair vengeance ram, I run all virtual machines using VMware workstation from xp to 8 and server 2003 to 2012 and only hit an issue trying to use 2008r2 with severe lag and performance issues. I never did resolve the problem and after a lot of googling and no resolution just put up with it as was only for study. It was running from my desktop hdd not portable.

 

[Appletax]

Appletax,

I want to give you some advice and I dont want you take it in a wrong way. Iam posting it in the open here as to possibly help others too. So, Lets look at things here ok?

I asked you the specs of your computer and the answer I got was:

Very high specs - just dropped 2k on a gaming PC and it works beautifully

I expect this from a customer not a tech. You have told me very little about your computer. You see, I have a very high end computer too. Im sure alot of people do here. Mine cost about 700 bucks to build. "Very high specs" is really nothing.

I really get very little useful information to help you. Your second post did mention some other things like what VM software you are using but that could all be coverd in your first post.

Its just you need to work on being more discriptive of your problem, Your hardware you are dealing with including software and what you have tried to correct it.

Now, Im not bashing you. Im just saying that I have very little information on your system to work with. Therefore, I cannot help you.

Best wishes,

coffee

Please accept my appologies, good sir, lol

I didn't think the specs mattered much given how much I spent on the system. The only parts that made sense that would be the issue is the CPU and the external HDD. Also, I thought you posted on my other threads that included my system specs, so I thought you already knew them.

Also, I meant to originally post which VM software I was using.

Here's what's in my system at the moment:

- CPU: Intel Core-i7 4770K
- CPU Cooler: Stock
- GPU: EVGA GTX 770 SuperClocked ACX 2 GB
- Mobo: Asus Maximus VI Hero
- RAM: G.SKILL Trident X 16 GB 1866 MHz
- SSD: Samsung 840 Pro 256 GB

 

[Appletax]

Don't know if this helps you but I have i5 2500k 8gb corsair vengeance ram, I run all virtual machines using VMware workstation from xp to 8 and server 2003 to 2012 and only hit an issue trying to use 2008r2 with severe lag and performance issues. I never did resolve the problem and after a lot of googling and no resolution just put up with it as was only for study. It was running from my desktop hdd not portable.

I figured that the stripped out virtualization features in the K series were not important for regular VMs used at home for basic study, but I have not found much useful info on Google. I think it's very interesting that you're having a problem with the same OS I'm having issues with. I will create a Windows 7 VM and see how it performs.

Did you notice the CPU use being unreasonable for Win Server 08 R2? The RAM and the disk use are relatively low.

 

[Vicenarian]

Dude...the problem is that your computer is so overpowered, that the VMs are running faster than the speed of light, and because human vision can only see things at the rate of 5 Gigatrons per second, the virtualized machines appear to be running only half as fast

 

[Appletax]

Dude...the problem is that your computer is so overpowered, that the VMs are running faster than the speed of light, and because human vision can only see things at the rate of 5 Gigatrons per second, the virtualized machines appear to be running only half as fast

It's not that fast. It doesn't have a 6 core CPU or SLI jay kay JK lol

 

[coffee]

I didn't think the specs mattered much given how much I spent on the system.

Really????

Money spent is not quality bought.

Although VMware is very good software, I would recommend you try out VirtualBox. Other than that if you are tied into VMware then hit up the many forums dedicated to it. You will get more help there then here.

Unfortunately, It sound like a bad version from the other replies I have read here.

What I would suggest is you do an audit on your host system with the guest system running. See where your bottleneck is coming from. I would also just donate 2 cores to the guest with about 2/4 gigs ram of your total 16. If its having issues its probably not that but possibly drive issues with the SSD.

Personally, My first stop would be the VMware forums and downloadable docs.

coffee

 

[Appletax]

Really????

Money spent is not quality bought.

Although VMware is very good software, I would recommend you try out VirtualBox. Other than that if you are tied into VMware then hit up the many forums dedicated to it. You will get more help there then here.

Unfortunately, It sound like a bad version from the other replies I have read here.

What I would suggest is you do an audit on your host system with the guest system running. See where your bottleneck is coming from. I would also just donate 2 cores to the guest with about 2/4 gigs ram of your total 16. If its having issues its probably not that but possibly drive issues with the SSD.

Personally, My first stop would be the VMware forums and downloadable docs.

coffee

Very good advice. What is mostly important to me right now is figuring out if the K series of Intel CPUs are going to be a major hindrance to the performance of my VMs.

 

[creapure]

I never give my vm's much more memory or cores than they need to run and have never had issues other than server 2008 r2. I deleted it some time ago so do not recall the CPU usage tho at the time had it been high I would have allocated more cores to help. I can set it up again tomoz and check it out.

 

[Appletax]

I never give my vm's much more memory or cores than they need to run and have never had issues other than server 2008 r2. I deleted it some time ago so do not recall the CPU usage tho at the time had it been high I would have allocated more cores to help. I can set it up again tomoz and check it out.

Very interesting. Some guy wrote this, regarding the VT-d: "...it's not a big deal unless your VM's are doing a lot of I/O."

 

[KompuKare]

Very interesting. Some guy wrote this, regarding the VT-d: "...it's not a big deal unless your VM's are doing a lot of I/O."

more like "... are doing a lot of I/O and the controller being used for that I/O has appropriate virtualised drivers". Point being, vt-d allows the virtualising OS to grant the virtualised OS direct access to the hardare using an MMU. In fact I am not even sure if this even applies to consumer VM software like VMWare Workstation/Player or Virtualbox; IOMMU is more for proper Hypervisor OS's like ESXi, XEN etc.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_VT-d#Intel-VT-d

Anyhow, that's doesn't mean that USB3 might not be your bottleneck. And assuming your Windows Server thing is only a few GB in size, you should be easily able to copy the VM to your SSD and try it there; if all is well there you have eliminated one factor at least.

 

[Appletax]

My gaming PC is under construction, so I'm back to using my HP dm1z laptop w/ an AMD E-350 APU (relatively slow). I created a new VM for Win Server 2008 R2 and it runs better than it did on my system or my college's lab computer that have Core-i7s (Non K version) with 16 GB of RAM. I'm using USB 2.0. It runs great.

 

[Appletax]

I've got my rig running now along with Win Server 08 R2 and Win 7 Pro running simultaneously. The VMs are running silky smooth

 

[Appletax]

Update: my problem was that I had the VM set to use all 8 logical cores. Scaled this back to 4 and everything runs fast!

 

[MDD1963]

Alas, hyperthreading sometimes helps in some applications, but, quad core is still quad core. (and still plenty of most folks!)