Configuring vGPU passthrough

Your virtual machines can access a virtual GPU (vGPU) hardware. Assigning a vGPU to your virtual machine allows you do the following:

  • Access a fraction of the underlying hardware’s GPU to achieve high performance benefits in your virtual machine.

  • Streamline resource-intensive I/O operations.

vGPU passthrough can only be assigned to devices that are connected to clusters running in a bare metal environment.

Assigning vGPU passthrough to virtual machines

Use the OKD web console to assign vGPU devices to your virtual machines.

Prerequisites

  • Ensure your cluster and virtual machines are deployed in a bare metal environment. At this time, no other environments are supported.

Procedure

  1. Assign a virtual GPU device to your virtual machine:

    1. In the OKD web console, click Virtualization → Virtual Machines from the side menu.

    2. Select the virtual machine to which you want to assign the device.

    3. Click the Details tab:

      • The Hardware Devices field includes links to add or remove GPU devices and Host devices.

      • Assigning a vGPU using GPU devices enables VNC console access for the attached virtual GPU. Assigning a vGPU using Host Devices does not enable VNC console access.

      • Use the minus icon to remove an existing hardware device.

      • You can only add or remove devices from your virtual machine when it is stopped.

    4. Click the pencil icon and use the pop-up windows to add or remove devices, selecting the appropriate hardware resource names.

    5. Click Save.

  2. Click the YAML tab to verify that the new devices have been added to your cluster configuration in the hostDevices section.

You can add hardware devices to virtual machines using the OKD web console when you create a virtual machine or create a virtual machine using a template that you customize. You cannot add devices to pre-supplied boot source templates for specific operating systems, such as Windows 10 or RHEL 7.

To add or remove hardware devices to a custom template that you create, click the Advanced tab in the Create Virtual Machine wizard and click Hardware devices. Use the minus icon to remove an existing hardware device. You can only add or remove devices from your virtual machine when it is stopped.

To display resources that are connected to your cluster, click Compute → Hardware Devices from the side menu.

Additional resources