Access PCI from Guest OS

A

asyork

2[H]4U
Joined
Jan 3, 2002
Messages
2,059
I was wanting to set up a VM to be able to access a TV Tuner card, and I was wondering if there is any way to do that. I am currently using VirtualBox to run Mythbuntu.

My reasoning for this is that I only need an analog card because I will be using it with a satellite receiver and a PS2, but I can't seem to find any reasonably priced analog cards that will work on my system.

I've also always wanted to play around with some form of Linux, but never got around to it until now, but I don't really have any other use for it.
 
If you are going to use vt-d, I believe the following chipsets support it:
x58, and the Qxx chipsets. This also assumes
1) the cpu supports it (according to intel, for example, Pentium/E dual cores below E8xxx don't support it)
2) The motherboard has the correct bios option/s
3) The motherboard bios is implemented properly

Google "xen iommu" for more info.
A good thread for amd procs can be found with google "tweaktown iommu"
 
Thanks, I'll look into that. I just didn't want to go and buy a card I knew wouldn't work in Win 7 64-bit if it wouldn't work with a VM.

I've got an x58 board (EVGA x58 SLI LE), but I'm fairly certain there isn't an option for VT-d in the BIOS. I know it has VT-x, but I'm not sure if they are the same.

The system I'm doing this on is the one in my sig. So I'll be going from Win 7 64 to Mythbuntu 64 (or 32 if that doesn't work). I've got the guest OS pretty well set up now, I just need to google around for a bit to make sure my motherboard can do VT-d, and then buy the card.

It's fun working on something new to me. I stayed up until after 5:00 am messing around with it :p
 
It looks like it can't be done with VirtualBox. I'll have to try it on VMware Player or Server now. I still cannot find any confirmation on whether or not it works with my motherboard though.
 
I've seen several attempts on the internet to get something like this working. The closest i've seen getting tv working in a virtualized environment was a blog I read where the poster used a usb tv tuner, however, he couldn't get live TV working, but the recordings worked becuase he sent the recordings to a network location where he watched them from a 'bare metal' machine. He was using WMC, btw.
 
Vader said:
I've seen several attempts on the internet to get something like this working. The closest i've seen getting tv working in a virtualized environment was a blog I read where the poster used a usb tv tuner, however, he couldn't get live TV working, but the recordings worked becuase he sent the recordings to a network location where he watched them from a 'bare metal' machine. He was using WMC, btw.
Click to expand...

Thanks. My main reason for starting down this path was to use my old game systems on my computer monitor/sound. If live TV doesn't work, that won't work either. I guess I can go the boring route and just buy a more recent tuner card...
 
I use Xen with a PV guest with PCI-passthrough for situations like this. PV guest support is fairly good for most *NIX, *BSD support isn't so great. I'm currently using it to passthrough NICs to a firewall guest.

Oh, and no hardware requirements like IOMMU for pv pci passthrough.

EDIT: Nvm, it seems like you want to just have your win7 untouched and install a sandbox-sort of VM. I doubt xen will work for you then.
 
Yeah, the more I look into it, the less likely it seems it will work. I was hoping to save a little cash and have a learning experience while doing it. I did have the learning experience to a degree, but I'll still have to buy a more expensive card.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top