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  • 1.  Any experience with Nvidia cards with ESXi 5 ?

    Posted Oct 29, 2013 11:21 PM

    VMware newbie here....

    I have ESXi 5.1 running on a DL360 server and recently purchased a NVIDIA GeForce 210 card in order to play with 3D graphics on a VM.

    The card was installed on the host and we worked out how to get the passthrough working.  We created a new Windows 7 VM, added a PCI device for the card, and then installed Nvidia drivers

    on the VM.

    The Nvidia Display Adapter initially showed up correctly within Device Manager.   Also, an entry for Video Controller (VGA Compatible), categorized under "Unspecified", showed up within "Devices and Printers".   This adapter did not appear as available to associate to my Display/Monitor.

    Installing VMware Tools afterwards somehow caused the Device to break.  The Video Controller entry under "Devices and Printers" showed an exclamation point icon and the details read "Windows has stopped this device because it has reported problems (Code 43)".

    Hours of net searching have given me just little bits of information.  It is my understanding that without a product like Horizon View, we won't be able to shared the Video Card across multiple VMs - which is fine.  I also found lots about only certain cards being "compatible" - but I figured that passthrough would not be configurable from the ESXi host level if that was part of my problem.

    I just want to get past this in order to test an OpenGL-based 3D application on the VM.

    My questions:

    1.  Why does VMware Tools installation break the Video Controller ?

    2.  With the Device/Driver is available and working - how do I get the VM to actually use it ?

    Any/all input and experience in this area is greatly appreciated !



  • 2.  RE: Any experience with Nvidia cards with ESXi 5 ?

    Posted Nov 03, 2013 12:52 AM

    Yes sometimes VMware tools cause problems with Video controllers ( Only legacy one and legacy drivers ) and there are always a new driver that solve the problem  ,

    Try this scenario which is similar some how to a problem i passed by and it helped . hope it will help you too

    VMware KB: Troubleshooting SVGA drivers installed with VMware Tools on Windows 7 and Windows 2008 running on ESXi/ES…

    Best regards

    Yours, Oscar