AW 14 & 4700MQ for VM use, problems?

So I just bought an AW 14 with the 4700MQ, and I want to be able to run VM's on it through VMware or other virtualization apps. I know the 4700MQ doesn't support VT-d, but what exactly does that mean, and will it be an issue if I try to run VM's? Also has anyone tried to either Hackintosh or run a VM of OS X on the AW 14?

I am moving away from my Retina MacBook 15" in order to get the AW 14, but I still need to be able to code in Xcode on OS X and I don't have another Mac to work on. I'm hoping I don't need to buy another Mac if I can get the AW 14 to cooperate.

 

No it should have no problem doing virtualization, I think the thing ur seeing is virtualization for directed I/O vt-d, the thing u'd like to look for is vt-x which should be sufficient.

vt-d is for I/O virtulization I think is mostly used for Servers.

 

VT-D allows you to assign I/O devices to any of your VM's in any manner and any configuration. This includes any devices connected via USB, Serial, Firewire, esata, etc. IMHO, the feature is definitely very useful but if your virtualizaion doesn't involve I/O devices, then don't bother. I'd still go for the 4800 just in case.

 

All of the 4th series from Intel does not have vt-d on the mobile parts. Unless I missed something...

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Just checked Intel's site... There is no mention of vt-d on the 4800mq vs the 37XX price that have it specified under their advanced extensions.

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Here you go, starting from 4800mq the feature is present :

 

I got the 4700MQ to save a few bux, since you can't config an AW14 with the 4800MQ unless you go for the $1949 config. I got my AW14 for less than $2000 out the door (taxes/shipping included). If I find that I need VT-d i'll upgrade the CPU later to a 4700HQ or 4800MQ, depending what I can find cheap enough. I know that newegg is selling the 4900MQ for $399, so that's an option too. I'm really interested to see if I can dual boot a Hackintosh or VM OS X on the AW14.

 

Man I am blind... Thanks for correcting me

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LOL, yeah. It should not have any problems doing it.

 

So without VT-d I can't use my USB ports within a VM, am I understanding that right? Say I am running a VM of Ubuntu or some other Distro, and I want to access a USB thumb drive from the VM. Is that not possible without VT-d?

 

No, that is not right. You can and will be able to use the USB ports within the VM, no problem, BUT, they will be either dedicated to the VM or to the Host machine (if not used/allocated to the VM). with VT-d you get direct I/O for the device, meaning that the throughput will be better as the VM will have direct access to the I/O (USB port) rather than going through the Hypervisor layer for the I/O (which incurs overhead, but pretty minimal).
For normal VMWware Workstation or VirtualBox type VM's on a laptop you should be just fine with non-VT-d I/O. :thumbsup:

 

Perfect, that's exactly the info I was looking for! Thanks! :thumbsup:

 

No, you can but it does it through the VM software/host machine. This can cause issues in heavy IO use, hence the development of the VT-d, so it could do that on a hardware level if needed.

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