Overview

Process Explorerhas always been one of the best PC monitoring and troubleshooting tools around. In build v15.x is now possible to track graphics processor (GPU) usage on Windows 7 or later.

You won’t see this by default when the program first launches, but that’s easy to fix.
Click View > Select Columns > GPU and check the boxes next to whatever you’d like to watch: GPU Usage, GPU Private Data, GPU Committed Bytes, or GPU Shared Bytes.

A click or two later and you’ll be better able to spot any resource hogs that might be slowing your system down. This seems to work very well: we ran a few graphics benchmarks, and Process Explorer gave us a detailed view of what they were doing. But if you prefer a graph, rather than the raw data, just double-click a process, click the new GPU Graph tab, then watch to see how your app’s GPU usage varies over time.

Other improvements in this build include the ability to restart a service. Double-click a svchost.exe instance, click the Service tab, choose a misbehaving service and click Restart, and Process Explorer will stop and start it for you. (Be careful, of course. Restarting the Spooler service, for instance, may fix some printing problems, but choosing something more critical may lock or crash your PC.)

And elsewhere, the performance graphs have been revamped to have a cleaner look, while a range of optimisations mean the program now has a smaller memory footprint. Not that Process Explorer was ever exactly a resource hog, but this version is now more efficient than ever, requiring little more than 14MB (private working set) to monitor all the usual process properties on our test PC, and the new GPU details as well.

Process Explorer v15.x combined with XenDesktop HDX3D Pro Graphics

One of the big challenge in designing a XenDesktop HDX3D environment is how to understand, how much capacity of GPU do your users require for theirs 3D Apps and which GPU should you buy. With Microsoft Process Explorer v15.0 is easier to get an understanding how much GPU is being used with each 3D application.

Example – identifying GPU with XenDesktop with Process Explorer v15.0

In this example you have a Xendesktop machine that have a Nvidia Quadro 2000 graphic card that have  192 CUDA cores, you are using a heavy 3D app that requires lots of CUDA cores you then install the Process Explorer v15.0 from Microsoft and quick you can identify that the 3D app requires x CUDA cores, if the 3D app is using maximum CUDA cores what you can see via the Process Explorer v15.0 then you should consider buying a larger Nvidia Quadro card example (4000,5000) or Tesla.

Howto automate the identifying of the GPU

Use Citrix Edgesight Loadtester+VSI script+Microsoft Process Explorer v15.0 and you should have a pretty good idea how much GPU your user is requiring.

Process Explorer v15.0 combined with XenApp (v.5 or v.6) HDX3D Pro Graphics

HDX 3D allows graphics-heavy applications running on XenApp on a physical server to render on the server’s graphics processing unit (GPU). By moving DirectX, Direct3D and Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) rendering to the server’s GPU, the server’s central processing unit (CPU) is not slowed by graphics rendering. Additionally, the server is able to process more graphics because the workload is split between the CPU and GPU. This feature is only available on servers with a GPU that supports a display driver interface (DDI) version of 9ex, 10, or 11. DirectX and Direct3D require no special settings.

The challenge is its very hard to get an overview of how much GPU you require when you design a server with the amount of 3D applications. If you want 10,20,50 users, how many users can the GPU handle before it run into the limit, with Microsoft Process Explorer v15.0 its now possible of getting this identified.

Example – identifying GPU with XenApp

You have 1 physical server  4 CPU 6 cores each and 1 Nvidia Quadro 2000 graphic card.
The OS is Windows Server 2008R2 and Citrix XenApp6 is installed. GPU passthrough have to be enabled, look here for how to configure this.  AutoDesk AutoCAD 2011 (verified to run on XenApp 6) and Microsoft Process Explorer v15.x is installed

With this solution you have lots of CPU and a maximum of 192 CUDA cores. You can now tell your amount of users to connect to the server and do load testing. A simpler task to achieve load testing i would recommend using Citrix Edgesight for Load Testing combined with Login VSI and Process Explorer v15.0 then you should get a quick overview on how much load your GPU can handle and how big a GPU you require or if multiple GPU’s.

Sources

Click here to download Microsoft Process Explorer v15.x

XenServer 6.x makes it possible of passthrough of multiple GPU’s.

HP blade workstation WS460C is an enterprise solution for this area that fits perfect with Citrix XenServer 6.x multiple GPU passthrough. You can attach an Graphic Expansion to the WS460C so its possible to integrate two graphic cards like (Nvidia FX3800, FX4800, FX5800 or the new fermi cards 4000, 5000, 6000)

The target here is to support high-end 3D professional graphics applications with multiple GPU passthrough. Applications like Autodesk/Dassualt Systems and many more CAD/CAM systems are often using OpenGL and or Direct-X and Citrix provides the full user experience with HDX3D to deliver this everywhere. HDX3D is available both for XenDesktop 4/5.x> and XenApp 5/6.

This article descripes HowTo enable MultiGPU with HP blade workstation WS460C with HP Graphic Expansion blade and Citrix XenServer 6.x

Bios Settings for ws460cG6 with Graphics Expansion Blade

Option “HP Graphics Expander x16”
Help (F1 pressed) associated to this option

“When enabled will allow x16 PCIe connection on HP Graphics Expander slot 1.  Slot 2 will NOT be functional”

HowTo enable MultiGPU in HP WS460c with Graphic Expansion blade

Choose this BIOS setting for “HP Graphics Expander x16” for enabling both graphic cards. When the BIOS setting is disabled the Citrix XenServer 6.x is able to see both Graphic cards and you can then passthrough the GPU’s to the Virtual machines.

HP Graphics Expander x16: DISABLED

• HP Graphics Expander slot 1 : x8
• HP Graphics Expander slot 2 : x8

 Enabling “VT for direct I/O” in the BIOS

HowTo identify the Multiple GPU’s in Citrix XenServer 6.x

Note XenServer 6.x XenCenter Console only shows 1 GPU if you have multiple GPU’s *this is default design belowed explains why:

If you have multiple GPUs in different PCI slots then Xenserver forms the groups of identical GPUs. For example if you have 2 – Quadro 4000 GPUs then there will be one Quadro 4000 GPU group identified by Xenserver.

Now when you try to assign the GPU to a VM from Xencenter it shows the GPU group and not the individual GPU. In your case one GPU group has 2 – Quadro 4000 cards, so you can assign this GPU group to 2 VMs wherein each GPU is attached to an individual VM

If you want to identify that XenServer 6.x is showing multiple GPU’s access local command shell

Execute #lspci to view multiple  GPU’s
In belowed picture you can see i have identified 2 GPU’s with the command #lspci

This years Citrix Synergy 2011 in San Francisco have been awesome, so many things to see and so many great people have attended.

Most of the Technical Preview that have been mentioned on the Citrix Synergy is now available for download

Access to tomorrow’s Citrix technologies today, including previews announced during Synergy keynote. See for yourself how Citrix plans to take your virtual computing experience further than ever before from enhanced video, audio and graphics for virtual desktops to new features that help deploy and manage virtual environments.

Public Previews

GoToMeeting with HDFaces

HDFaces adds high definition video conferencing to GoToMeeting’s web and audio conferencing solution to provide a telepresence-like experience for everyone.

Private Previews

XenDesktop

Extends the Citrix lead in desktop virtualization user experience with stunning video performance, superior audio quality and enhancements for graphics support and web content, even on low bandwidth connections.

XenApp

Puts the focus on user experience with features that increase user productivity and provide enhancements for graphics support and web content, even on low bandwidth connections.

XenClient

Incorporates features that enhance production deployment readiness, provide increased scalability, introduce broader device support and simplify the user experience.

Receiver for Windows

Provides a single client for delivery of XenApp and XenDesktop enabled desktops, Windows, Web and SaaS applications with audio and video improvements and simplified single sign-on. It supersedes the Online Plug-in for all applications.

Receiver for Linux

Offers new HDX enhancements such as flash redirection, multi-monitor support, video conferencing and Windows Media redirection.

XenServer

Puts specific focus on innovations that extend the efficiency, agility and manageability of virtual environments. Will also add new capabilities in networking, self service and optimizations for XenDesktop and Cloud infrastructures

Martin Lago from RES Software have posted this great article on howto get RES Workspace Manager to work with Citrix HDX 3D Pro Graphics.

The scenario

All the prerequisites for installation were perfectly met: Seperate DDC with Platinum licenses, Online plugin 12.0.33 (shipped with de HDX 3D Pro Installer) and de HDX 3d Pro server msi. The DDC runs on 2003 x64. The HDX 3D Host runs on a physical Windows XP SP3 X86 with VDA version 4.0.5010 (VDA 4 SP1) – Nvidia Quadro 6000 Graphics card. The Client is Windows XP SP3 with Citrix Online Plugin 12.0.33 and runs RES Workspace Manager with the Windows shell as default shell.

The actual problem

When a user session (with RES Workspace Manager) is started, the screen images do not look sharp. There is graphical “noise” at desktop icons and also the configured wallpaper image. When the same user session is started without RES WM, the images look perfectly sharp. With the HDX ConfigTool a slider (Quality Control tool) can be used to enhance the graphic performance. This works without RES WM, but it does not seem to have influence on the graphical performance (a value ’0′ of in the Quality Control tool looks the same as value ’100′).

Troubleshooting

To start such a challenge the first step is to forget all the cool technology for a moment and try to notice a difference in the user session between the RES WM managed and unmanaged session. Now this was actually the key to succes for this scenario.

In the RES WM unmanaged User session, there are two process responsible and present for the graphical performance: “ConfigTool.exe” and “PicaImpersonationClient.exe”.

In the RES WM managed User Session, the “PicaImpersonationClient.exe” process was absent. The “ConfigTool.exe” is started (systray icon visible), options can be configured, but they do not have effect at all, due to the fact the “PicaImpersonationClient.exe” is missing.

Resolution

Now that we found this, the solution was quite simple: add the ”PicaImpersonationClient.exe” as managed application in RES WM and set it to AutoLaunch and hidden. Works like a charm.

So lesson learned: both the “ConfigTool.exe” and “PicaImpersonationClient.exe” need to be started at session launch to ensure the correct working of this feature.
Important in such scenario’s is to skip all the existing technology for a moment and take a simple look at the User Session.

Resources

CTX124441 HDX 3D Pro Graphics User Guide – For XenDesktop 4 and Later
CTX123413 HDX 3D Professional Graphics Troubleshooting Guide

Source

I will be speaking at the upcoming events:

PubForum 2011 Dublin, 13-15 May 2011.  

Saturday 14th May 2011 from 16.00 – 16.30 i will be presenting:

3D Rich User Experience SMACKDOWN!

- 3D Rich User Experience with XenApp6
- XenDesktop HDX 3D Pro Graphics, XenServer MultiGPU.

Real Life experience. Which hardware options are available. Whats new and next generation with HDX 3D Pro Graphics, XenServer MultiGPU and Q&A.

for further info about PubForum the E2E Virtualization Conference check here