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12.3. PCI passthrough with virt-install

To use PCI passthrough with the virt-install parameter, use the additional --host-device parameter.

  1. Identify the PCI device

    Identify the PCI device designated for passthrough to the guest. The virsh nodedev-list command lists all devices attached to the system. The --tree option is useful for identifying devices attached to the PCI device (for example, disk controllers and USB controllers). 
    # virsh nodedev-list --tree
    For a list of only PCI devices, run the following command: 
    # virsh nodedev-list | grep pci
    In the output from this command, each PCI device is identified by a string, as shown in the following example output: 
    pci_0000_00_00_0
pci_0000_00_02_0
pci_0000_00_02_1
pci_0000_00_03_0
pci_0000_00_03_2
pci_0000_00_03_3
pci_0000_00_19_0
pci_0000_00_1a_0
pci_0000_00_1a_1
pci_0000_00_1a_2
pci_0000_00_1a_7
pci_0000_00_1b_0
pci_0000_00_1c_0

    Tip: determining the PCI device

    Comparing lspci output to lspci -n (which turns off name resolution) output can assist in deriving which device has which device identifier code.

  2. Add the device

    Use the PCI identifier output from the virsh nodedev command as the value for the --host-device parameter. 
    # virt-install \
 -n hostdev-test -r 1024 --vcpus 2 \
 --os-variant fedora11 -v \
 -l http://download.fedoraproject.org/pub/fedora/linux/development/x86_64/os \
 -x 'console=ttyS0 vnc' --nonetworks --nographics  \
 --disk pool=default,size=8 \
 --debug --host-device=pci_8086_10bd

  3. Complete the installation

    Complete the guest installation. The PCI device should be attached to the guest.