Over the past year we have been busy working on several requested features and capabilities for RemoteFX vGPU. During this time, we have been talking to several customers and partners like you to improve the features and capabilities for graphics virtualization in the next version of Windows Server. Today, I am excited to share with you key improvements to RemoteFX vGPU.
The previous RemoteFX graphics implementation was optimized for a better user experience when using Windows features (e.g. Aero) and ‘Knowledge Worker’ application workloads (Office, line of business applications, and web browsing). Delivering a rich user experience is very important for desktop virtualization deployments especially when using graphic intensive applications such as Adobe Photoshop in the video above.
With the release of Windows Server Technical Preview, we are excited to announce capabilities that improve the experience for end users in a Windows VDI environment for ‘Engineering/Designer’ application workloads that require OpenGL API support and all graphics applications (DX and OpenGL) that require higher video memory.
The RemoteFX vGPU enables hardware acceleration in a Windows virtual machine which contributes to a superior application remoting experience.
The requirements for RemoteFX vGPU are:
I will go into detail on three specific improvements we are making with the next release:
Prior to the Windows Server Technical Preview, running a virtual machine on Hyper-V limited you to OpenGL 1.1 with CPU acceleration and no support for OpenCL regardless of the presence of a capable GPU. This was a limiting factor for delivering a virtual desktop for users with applications such as Adobe Photoshop, Maya, Blender and Houdini which require these APIs. With a capable GPU on a Hyper-V host, RemoteFX vGPU now delivers support for OpenGL up to version 4.4 and OpenCL 1.1 in a Windows virtual machine.
Some OpenGL applications such as Adobe Photoshop include features that use OpenCL for compute/GPGPU tasks. These applications will greatly benefit by the OpenCL capabilities now supported in RemoteFX. OpenCL is of course also available for GPGPU tasks.
2. Configurable, Larger Dedicated Video MemoryIn Windows Server 2012 R2, the RemoteFX video adapter has a limitation of 256MB for the maximum amount of dedicated VRAM it exposed. The amount of dedicated VRAM is also tied to the number of monitors and resolution. For the next version of Windows Server we have decoupled this and allowed increasing dedicated VRAM without assigning a specific resolution or number of monitors.
In addition, the 256MB of dedicated VRAM reported by the RemoteFX adapter resulted in some applications limiting features or disabling hardware acceleration. This was due to insufficient dedicated video memory. For instance, Adobe Photoshop requires a minimum of 512MB to enable hardware acceleration – this feature meets the VRAM requirement for these applications.
The RemoteFX adapter now provides two capabilities in regard to VRAM:
Note: 32-Bit guests virtual machines prior to Windows 10 will not be able to use more than 512MB of dedicated VRAM and will not boot if set to 1GB.
These settings can be configured using PowerShell. The syntax and examples are below.
SyntaxSet-VMRemoteFx3dVideoAdapter [-VMName] <string[]> [[-MonitorCount] <byte>] [[-MaximumResolution] <string> {1024x768 | 1280x1024 | 1600x1200 | 1920x1200 | 2560x1600}] [[-VRAMSizeBytes] <uint64> {67108864 | 134217728 | 268435456 | 536870912 | 1073741824}] [-Passthru] [-ComputerName <string[]>] [-WhatIf] [-Confirm] [<CommonParameters>]
ExampleIn addition to the above features we have also improved our VM to Host transport to use a performant VMBus implementation and made targeted stability and application compatibility bug fixes.
All the above investments, in the next version of Windows Server, result in a much better experience in a RemoteFX vGPU VDI environment.
Resources to test API & Performance ImprovementsBelow is a list, with links, of applications and benchmarks you can use to validate the Technology Preview API and performance improvements in RemoteFX vGPU:
We are happy to be able to announce the above additions to RemoteFX vGPU and encourage people to download the Windows Server Technical Preview and start to validate the new vGPU functionality.
Note : Questions and comments are welcome. However, please DO NOT post a request for troubleshooting by using the comment tool at the end of this post. Instead, please use our feedback forum . Be assured that we are paying close attention and will be very responsive. Thank you!
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