Has anyone gotten PCIE GPU passthough to Containers for Plex yet

[oumpa31]

I am super interested in moving to this version from core because I have seen the other NAS software with PCIE pass though to docker containers possible. But I have way too many drives for that one. I know FreeBSD doesn't have that capability but most Linux distros have built in drivers for Nvidia Cards now. So this would make my move happen even sooner if it is capable.

 

[peter.m]

Containers aren't a VM, it's a process in a different namespace. You don't need PCIE passthrough, but you will need a kubernetes/docker plugin that exposes the nvidia gpu to the container

 

[inman.turbo]

So this would make my move happen even sooner if it is capable.

Whoa!! LOL we are all just holding our horses. Can't really move any sooner than it's ready. And you can't rush a perfect pie either. That being said, I did see some mention in another thread somewhere earlier about support coming for precisely what you are looking for, via plugin. It's just a matter of time at this point till SCALE is capable of all this stuff. They seem to have at least passed beyond the point of inertia to where things like important additional features can begin to be worked out.

 

[morganL]

Its doable via CLI now https://kubernetes.io/docs/tasks/manage-gpus/scheduling-gpus/

It planned for the Web UI soon....

See this thred for more discussion. https://www.truenas.com/community/t...encoding-in-plex-kubernetes-deployment.89747/

 

[oumpa31]

Thanks guys I had been looking around and just hadn't seen anything about it yet. So I wanted to ask. I know they are still in Alpha I think but its very exciting.

I share my plex with a bunch of friends and we stream it a lot in my house so my threadripper has been working hard. I know a GPU does a better job at encoding so being able to do this is a game changer

 

[tgyk]

It can be done via docker, on cli, though it is not the best of solutions. Due to conflicts between kernel 5.9.0 and Nvidia's drivers that ship with the current version of Anglefish, you will need to manually change APT's sources.list to include Debian's experimental and testing repos.. Then install 455+ drivers. You then have to install the nvidia docker container runtime.. Modify a file to make the container runtime work correctly.. And finally build the container. There is a writeup over on reddit. Look down in the comments for updated instruction on getting this to work.

Until a kernel update is released, or SCALE ships with a newer Nvidia driver set, this process is fairly involved.. But it does work. I have my plex server running in a docker container, utilizing a Nvidia quadro p400 for transcoding, and have taken the workload off of my CPU. Do also keep in mind that you MUST have plexpass to enable hardware transcoding. No way around that one.

 

[oumpa31]

@tgyk Thanks for all that info. I was looking at a p2200 or P4000. I've had the Plexpass Lifetime for like 3 years now and it works fairly well with my antenna. Only problem I have is transcoding the antenna to watch live on my tv's so I definitely want the ability to transcode faster.

I'll probably wait for it to go to RC so its a little more refined. I will have to put together a test system Cause I've heard of some problems importing pools from TrueNAS Core and I don't want to loose all my data. Only problem I'll have with that is I have to wait till I can get the bigger hard drives. Come on tax season. lol

 

[tgyk]

I imported my pool from TrueNAS Core with no issues.. But only did so after having backed up all of my data on an external 10TB HDD. That being said, I would definitely wait for the RC, as this method isn't exactly sustainable. I went through the trouble of making it work as a project to do over the holidays (Spent away from every living thing due to 'rona) and to ensure the GPU I bought specifically for my NAS build would stop being dead weight within the system.

 

[oumpa31]

@tgyk I'm sorry to hear about the rona. Hope your doing better. Had a few friends that have had it but nothing serious.

At least it gave you time to do this. That's good to hear that you were able to import all your pools without issues. Unfortunately I have about 20 TB of data right now. I'm gonna be getting a couple externals to shuck to make sure my NetApp DS4246 3.5 24bay Disk Shelf will read them. A WD 12TB and 8TB Elements Desktop USB 3.0 External Hard Drive fingers crossed that the 12TB drives work. then I can use some of the 2TB ssd's for caching for read and writes.