What CPUs to get full VM in FreeNAS 11

[StephenRadford]

Hi ALL,
I have read quite a few threads on which CPU's will not work, but I still can not find a definitive list or where it is.
I am using a Intel S5520HC Server Motherboard LGA1366, Intel 5520 Chipset motherboard and twin Xeon W5590 @3.33Ghz.
In order to use the full VM potential would these replacement CPUs be ok?
Xeon Six Core X5670 12M Cache 2.93GHz 6.40 GT/s QPI SLBV7
Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[danb35]

Check out ark.intel.com for that processor's capabilities. According to the manual,

This type of virtualization requires an Intel processor with Extended Page Tables (EPT) or an AMD processor with Rapid Virtualization Indexing (RVI) or Nested Page Tables (NPT).

The ark page indicates that this chip does have EPT support.

 

[StephenRadford]

Check out ark.intel.com for that processor's capabilities. According to the manual,

The ark page indicates that this chip does have EPT support.

Thank you danb35, my current processors do not have the 'UG' flag, so I thought the ones above would have the 'EPT and 'UG' flags.

 

[Stux]

Thank you danb35, my current processors do not have the 'UG' flag, so I thought the ones above would have the 'EPT and 'UG' flags.

The processors are "Products formerly Westmere EP", which is what you want.

Unfortunately ARK doesn't cover the difference, except that Nehalem processors are inadequate for VM usage, and Westmere fixed the bug/issue in Nehalem. Other than that fix Westmere was just a die shrink of Nehalem with up to 50% more cores.

A great upgrade for an LGA1366 board. If you still have one :)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulftown

 

[Daniel Cook]

My motherboard is also LGA1366-type (GA-EX58-UD3R rev. 1.0/1.1), and it currently runs FreeNAS Corral. But I'd like to enable virtualization on my FreeNAS machine, most likely Plex server and/or Unifi video NVR. From the compatibility list it appears that the most powerful CPU I could upgrade to is the Intel Core i7-980X or 990X (Gulftown 32nm).

Unless I do such an upgrade I can't go into the console and grep the dmesg.boot file for its virtualization features, and the Ark database doesn't indicate whether UG mode is supported. Does anybody know first-hand whether the 980X or 990X can be used for FreeNAS 11-era virtualization? I've searched the forums and seen people suggest that the answer is Yes, but I'm hoping to hear from somebody who has actually proven it in hardware.