Category: Desktop
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Windows VM with GPU Passthrough, Part 3: Setting up Looking Glass
(Read more...)Last time, we discussed how we might add a real GPU to our Windows virtual machine. Today, we’ll discuss how to view this virtual machine without using a dedicated monitor or switching inputs, but instead integrating it into the Linux desktop like a normal application.
There are three steps:
- Configuring the virtual machine.
- Installing the Looking Glass client on the host machine.
- Setting up Looking Glass host application on the virtual machine.
Without further ado, let’s begin.
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Windows VM with GPU Passthrough, Part 2: Passing through PCIe Devices
(Read more...)Last time, we discussed how we might create a Windows virtual machine as part of a series on running a Windows VM with native-level graphics performance via GPU passthrough and integrating it seamlessly into your Linux desktop via Looking Glass. Today, we shall turn that normal Windows virtual machine into something far more interesting by giving it a real GPU.
As far as Windows is concerned, the GPU is real hardware and can be treated as normal, so we will not go into too much depth. Most of the work lies on the Linux side, where we must do some work to make sure the GPU is free for the VM to use, and then instruct the hypervisor to use it. Again, we will be using the standard QEMU/KVM setup, managing our virtual machines with
libvirt.Naturally, the same procedure here can be used for any other PCIe device, such as NVMe SSDs. Let’s begin!
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Windows VM with GPU Passthrough, Part 1: Creating a basic Windows VM
(Read more...)Last time, we introduced a series on running a Windows VM with native-level graphics performance via GPU passthrough and integrating it seamlessly into your Linux desktop via Looking Glass. We start this journey by creating a basic Windows virtual machine, which will form the foundation of all future work.
For this example, I decided to use Windows 11 for fun, since I did it quite a few times with Windows 10 already. However, given that Windows 11 is basically a renamed Windows 10 with some additional hardware requirements, there is not much of a difference anyway.
On the Linux side, we will be using the standard QEMU/KVM setup, managing our virtual machines with
libvirt. Let’s begin! -
Windows VM with GPU Passthrough, Part 0: Introduction
(Read more...)As you may know, I contributed quite a bit to the Looking Glass project — an ultra-low-latency viewer for virtual machines with GPU passthrough. To those who understand the use case, this is amazing technology; but to most people, these words hold little meaning. I had plenty of difficulty explaining what this is all about, so I thought I’d write about it.
What is GPU passthrough? It is essentially giving a dedicated GPU to a virtual machine, just as if you plugged it into a PCIe slot if it were a real machine. This is commonly called “VFIO” (Virtual Function I/O). Originally, this is intended for server applications, for example, giving a network card to a virtual machine. These days, however, it’s also commonly used by Linux users to run a Windows virtual machine to play games at native speeds without dual-booting — just as if you had a separate Windows computer.
Annoyingly, this requires you to plug a monitor into the Windows GPU to get a display output, requiring you to either have a new monitor, switch inputs, or buy a KVM switch. Looking Glass is meant to address this problem — by capturing the output of the Windows display and presenting it to you in a window that is integrated into your favourite Linux desktop environment. This eliminates all annoyances with monitors — simply move your mouse into the window to start using Windows, and move it out to use Linux.
In this series, I will slowly walk you through the process of creating such a virtual machine and installing Looking Glass, explaining the technical details along the way. Expect updates over the next little while:
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Desktop Audio Visualizer with i3 and Cava on WSL
(Read more...)After seeing pictures of people running desktop audio visualizers on Reddit, I started to think if it is possible to replicate the effect on my i3-gaps setup running on Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL).