Confusion - Low PPD out of decent machines

If you want to get close to a 4P Opteron system your only bet is a Xeon dual socket 2011 setup with 8core/16thread Xeons. And unless you obtain the non-reference Xeons prepare to spend a fortune.
 
Cheapest route into 4P would be a quad Opteron 8439 (Hex core) rig.

CPU's are 8439 around £120 each
Memory 4 x 8GB DDR2-800 Registered is around £130
Motherboard (SUPERMICRO H8QM3-2) at around £4-500 new unless you can find a second hand one.

All prices are from a well known auction site.
Then you need a reasonable 750-800W PSU, say £100
Fans would be a necessity, around £10 each.

A rig like that, running Linux and accordingly optimised would pull between 130-160K PPD @ around 500Watts from the wall.

Next step up is a Dual E5-2650 ES type rig

2 CPU's @ £200 each = £400
Motherboard = £300
Memory 8 x 2GB PC3-12800 Registered = £220
PSU £100
Fans £100

Not including cases you can run them nekkid, but a case like the Elysium would be fine.

Should pull around 2-300K PPD depending on Work unit, and around 4-500W from the wall
 
I have seen H8QME and H8QM3 motherboards and said site for as low as £100:)

Opteron 8425's slower but are around £60 a pop.
 
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Yes, thats why I put "unless you can find a second hand one" as they are pretty rare now, they pop up every now and then just need to put a search watch on and hopefully you can get one.
 
The problem with those rigs is that you have met it's top spec right away. The 4P opteron setups can start low(ish) but can be upgraded time after time. You start with 4 6128s (50$ a piece on a certain auction website) and you can upgrade to 6166+ 12 cores later on and in the future to top spec 6300 16 core animals. The only downside for this is the mobo. Not available used and 650$ in the USA but 750 euros where I live :(
 
Sometimes available second hand :)

But yes I agree a 4p G34 rig is a good place to start if you have the initial outlay. Remember you need 32GB of RAM as well, which isn't so bad because it doesn't have to be Registered is still a fair wack. Plus once you start pushing the Opterons at the 62xx 63xx level needs serious amounts of power.

Power is a big factor in the UK as its so expensive, not sure what its like the Netherlands but I bet its not great either.

Getting into bigadv at the lowest price point is a balancing act, and a risk that could backfire if timed wrongly.

Still if you are in it for the science and for the fun of it then thats part of the equation right?
 
Biffa said:
Still if you are in it for the science and for the fun of it then thats part of the equation right?
Click to expand...

Exactly. I am a casemodder by nature. Building something like this is a blade with two sharp edges. My current build; i7 3770k + 2 GTX670s will also like to munch a lot of electricity overclocked. Perhaps I can even go less on power usage when I power up a 4P 6100 opteron rig. Especially the 6124HEs. But once the PPD addiction starts....you never know where it will end :)

Do you know if a 2P system (for the moment being) is any use? Or will it be even less than my current system? There is a 2P mobo on an auction website for very little.
 
Biffa said:
Sometimes available second hand :)

But yes I agree a 4p G34 rig is a good place to start if you have the initial outlay. Remember you need 32GB of RAM as well, which isn't so bad because it doesn't have to be Registered is still a fair wack. Plus once you start pushing the Opterons at the 62xx 63xx level needs serious amounts of power.

Power is a big factor in the UK as its so expensive, not sure what its like the Netherlands but I bet its not great either.

Getting into bigadv at the lowest price point is a balancing act, and a risk that could backfire if timed wrongly.

Still if you are in it for the science and for the fun of it then thats part of the equation right?
Click to expand...

This was one of my main worries, getting a nice rig capable of like 200k+ ppd, then realizing the power bill is enormous :( I don't get paid enough to keep it running :P
 
Also checked on both my rigs this morning, my X6 rig is actually putting out 5k PPD (purely on cpu) and my X4 is actually doing 9K PPD on cpu, somehow the x4 rig with less cores and a lower clock is out performing my x6 with a higher clock, wut!?
 
For each machine, what work unit type, and what time per frame are you getting?

Also you could try stopping the gpu on the X6 its probably affecting its performance somewhat, tweaking AMD cards for folding especially 6 series and before can take a bit of time and effort.
 
Biffa said:
For each machine, what work unit type, and what time per frame are you getting?

Also you could try stopping the gpu on the X6 its probably affecting its performance somewhat, tweaking AMD cards for folding especially 6 series and before can take a bit of time and effort.
Click to expand...

Bear with me a sec, I'll get some screenies, they won't be great quality as I'm remote accessing both from the office
 
This is the x4 rig

x4_1.png


and this is the x6

x6_1.png
 
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