Quad Socket Monster

Jamiman

Jamiman

Jamiman

Associate
Joined
16 Oct 2010
Posts
618
Location
Nottingham
Hey all,

MY school approved the funding for the project, so we are go!

Got a budget of £2000, so thinking a Quad socket G34 board is the way to go!

Got a few quotes, cheapest I found was £1573 for the board, 4 processors and coolers.

Then, 32GB of RAM talkes us another £100 up (or £160...depends if I want to trust the OCUK ValueRAm :S)

750W OCZ PSU should be enough.....not sure about whether it needs 4 CPU power lines?

Getting a hard disk/disk drive from an old machine.

Might put my old 4870 in it, so there's some nice animations going on for the governors to look at...unless it's a massive performance hit :P

Then the case......currently I am going to be making this myself, from Acrylic/Aluminium. Should be able to make something which has nice airflow then...might even make ducting to go over the CPU's....depends.

Also, does this mean that I will need to run 32 instances of the CPU client (32 cores)

Will post a build log when I get further along the line in the build....
 
Yeah, currently getting the Supermicro H8QGI-F, which supports non ECC RAM up to 128Gb...as I'm only putting 32GB in, that shouldn't be an issue.

Got a couple of quotes from various places, all were around the same figure. The company I'm ordering from seems to have plenty of good reviews, and more importantly, I've not found any bad reviews yet (apart from one guy complaining about their customer service...but that out of 30 others seems ok to me - hell, OCUK has more complaints than that!)

But, that aside i'll check out the single rail Corsair PSU's on here.....something like an TX850 i guess is the way to go then?

And yeah, currently planning to run it on Linux.
 
I might trust you a few questions in the coming weeks, as and when they're needed :P Thanks for the offer m8 :)

and if they honour their quote i'll send you a link to the company :)

Only thing that's puzzling me ATM (aside from converting all the measurements on this SWTX motherboard design to CM from inches :D) is what you need to do with the 8 pin ports next to the 24 pin on the mobo. do these taket eh GFX power or what? I thought at first it was the CPU 8 pin, but noticed there's 2? Or do I need to be a little creative with my soldering iron? :D

Might take me a while to figure Linux out though......but meh, that's half the fun! :D
 
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Ah ok. I guess i'll just have to get some adaptors if the PSU doesn't have em :)

I'll make a thread in the project log thing soon, and put some pics of the CAD i've been doing for the case.
 
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jak731 said:
PSU looks fine, a gold or platinum rated supply would be nice but it's the school paying for leccy :p. You will probably need a couple of these:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CB-033-AK&groupid=1929&catid=153&subcat=

What speed are the cpus you're getting?
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Thanks for the link, i'll bear it in mind :)

And the CPU's are Opteron 6128 ones, rated at 2GHZ i believe :)

Biffa said:
Looks good, don't forget you need 4 x 4 sticks of memory. With those corsair you'll end up with 64GB

See how you go with the adapters, some people have had issues with them, last time I built one I made sure I got a PSU that had the 8pin and a 4+4pin

But you will be fine probably.
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I only got 32GB of RAM..... surely 1GB per core is enough? or is it quad channel mode you were thinking of?

And the adaptors will be the first thing I check if something goes awry :P
 
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Meh, i'll RMA it and be on the safe side.

Doesn't cost me much, and even if the difference is only small it's not much bother, and it's all in the name of science anyway! :D

And if the difference is huge....well then even better i guess! :D

/fail......Seems that OCUK won't do an RMA to a buisness....
 
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One quick question...do Opteron 6128 retails come with coolers?

I've budgeted for aftermarket coolers, but if they come with them as standard i can save some cash... the case has some epic level ducting currently in the CAD...so heat shouldn't be an issue...
 
Biffa said:
Personally I would get the HX1050 from somewhere other than here, same price as the ones you are looking at. Practice your google-fu :)
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Ah, a nice find :) Think this is the one i'll go for :)

jak731 said:
Why not get a more efficient one for the same price:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-052-OC&groupid=701&catid=123&subcat=

Same power rating and warranty length.
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Already been recommended away from OCZ PSU's :) Know more than 1 person with bad experiences with thier PSU's....also some people in here stated similar...
 
Update:

Just so you guys don't think i've been slacking :D

11l530l.jpg


All for less than £1500 inc VAT. Biffa, will give you a link to the company at some point, as they gave us a very good deal. As you know, the RAM could not be returned :( However, we may have enough in the budget to grab another 32Gb, so we got quad channel even if it's slightly OP :D


All we need now is a PSU (HX1050 still our best bet?) and to finish the case. Currently mid CAD, so nearly done, then it's to be laser cut and stuck together! :D
 
If only I had the budget! :D ^^

Although perhaps we can apply for a grant for more cash at some point in the future for an expansion :D
 
MikeTimbers said:
Can I ask?

What "project" has justified the school spending this money? Is it more than simply Folding?
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They wanted a new charitable project, and i suggested this. They like the idea, as it makes them feel self important and happy that they are actually doing something useful. Also, it's a good teaching aid for various things too.
 
I can send you a link to the company we got the stuff off if you like....and no, the 4870 is staying well clear :D

Update: CPU's and heatsinks fitted, along with RAM. I'm getting the mats into the laser cutter next week, as i've finalised the 2D designs for the case. Then to run the cutter, file the edges, glue it and assemble! :D We've used light collecting Acryllic for most of it, which gathers all the light from the sides of the case and spits it out the edges. Looks really good, especially on the engraved areas! :D
 
I'll post up a parts list shortly...detailing costs etc. The reason we kept it under 2k was because we built our own case....would have been much more expensive if we had to buy one.

No piccys of case yet as we hit some minor laser issues...we should be back on track next week when we'll get the final cutting done and then it's just to stick it all together! :D

Might get it going nekked though... :D
 
Sorry for the delay...didn't do anything over the easter break :D Case should be finished soon though (we're back) and then we're good to go! :D

Thanks for the Sub Tatty! :)

And Martin...If you want any tips then PM me, i'll give you some tips from what i've learnt. Also, Biffa and a few of the others are running similar machines, and have a lot more experience than me.
 
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