Virtualization, Servers and Storage : How-to configure and licence a provisioned vGPU

Created by JM Lopez, last modified on Jul 31, 2024

When you provision a vGPU on The ITS Private Cloud, a couple of steps must be performed before using the resource. First, a driver must be installed in the guest operating system and a license must be assigned. This how-to provides the necessary steps to get your vGPU ready for action.

(blue star) Download and Install the driver

  1. From the Guest Operating system open a sftp, scp or your vskey-stor.eis.utoronto.ca MinIO interface and browse to the following path /ut-vss-lib/nvidia-grid-vpshere-7.0-525.147.01-525.147.05-529.19/Guest_Drivers.

  2. Download the driver based on your operating system. i.e. using sftp to install nvidia-linux-grid on Ubuntu:

    sftp {vss-user}@vskey-stor.eis.utoronto.ca
cd /ut-vss-lib/nvidia-grid-vsphere-7.0-535.183.04-535.183.01-538.67/Guest_Drivers
get nvidia-linux-grid-535_535.183.01_amd64.deb

  3. Install the driver in the virtual machine guest operation system. i.e. on Ubuntu: 

    apt install dkms
dpkg -i nvidia-linux-grid-535_535.183.01_amd64.deb

(blue star) License your vGPU

(blue star) Windows

  1. Open cmd as Administrator.

  2. cd into C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools 

    cd C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools

  3. Extract the token from the guest info interface: 

    .\vmtoolsd.exe --cmd "info-get guestinfo.ut.vss.nvidia_token" > "C:\Program Files\NVIDIA Corporation\vGPU Licensing\ClientConfigToken\client_configuration_token_12-05-2023-11-26-05.tok"

  4. Restart services:

    net stop "NVDisplay.ContainerLocalSystem"
net start "NVDisplay.ContainerLocalSystem"

  5. The virtual machine will check-in with our on-premise license server and activate any requested feature.

(blue star) Linux

  1. As root, copy the file /etc/nvidia/gridd.conf.template to /etc/nvidia/gridd.conf.

  2. Open a text editor and edit the FeatureType to select either of the following values: 

    # Description: Set Feature to be enabled
# Data type: integer
# Possible values:
# 0 => for unlicensed state
# 1 => for NVIDIA vGPU
# 2 => for NVIDIA RTX Virtual Workstation
# 4 => for NVIDIA Virtual Compute Server

  3. To enable NVIDIA RTX Virtual Workstation, select 2:

    FeatureType=2

  4. Extract the token from the guest info interface and save it to a file in the directory /etc/nvidia/ClientConfigToken/ as follows:

    echo -n -e $(vmware-rpctool "info-get guestinfo.ut.vss.nvidia_token") > /etc/nvidia/ClientConfigToken/client_configuration_token_12-05-2023-11-26-05.tok

  5. If necessary, change the mode of the client configuration token to 744: 

    chmod 744 /etc/nvidia/ClientConfigToken/client_configuration_token_*.tok

  6. Restart the services. 

    systemctl restart nvidia-gridd

  7. The virtual machine will check-in with our on-premise license server and activate any requested feature.

References