2x X5670 2.93GHz, still any good?

[3LP]

Hi guys,
I'm looking into buying a little farm.
This is what looks to be really interesting.
http://www.befr.ebay.be/itm/HP-C7000...item1c47e8f725

I was just wondering if anyone had those cpu and could let me know what they are thinking about them.

The only benchmark I could find out was cinebench.
From what I've seen, the set of dual x5670 are doing 15 at cinebench 11.5 and about 1350 on R15.

I'm currently on a i7-4930K at 3.9Ghtz :

• cinebench 11.5 with 11.71 points
• cinebench 15 with 1100 points

From my quick maths this setup of 16 nodes would deliver ~20 times my workstation.

Would any one have any thoughts on this?

Cheers

Stan

[Dariusz Makowski (Dadal)]

Yeah they still good for the price they sell its a steal.

1 Node will be = to your i7 systen.

Just keep in mind, Noise is insane, heat is insane, power is insane. Make sure you can support that farm. Its not like your desktop system.

[3LP]

For the same computing power, would you think it's a better idea to go for 12 of those 5960k? If I OC them I might only need 10. This means it will be the same price or close.
I guess it will make less noise and not as much power drain.
What do you reckon?

Thanks
Stan

[Dariusz Makowski (Dadal)]

You cant OC them.

As a side note OC increases power draw a lot...

[baastyan]

You cant OC them.

I think 3LP meant i7 which he can OC of course

@3LP
There is no such a CPU as 5960k I guess But you can get 5930K or 5960x.
And keep in mind that less rigs means also: less money for software (at least: windows and Vray render nodes)
and less trouble with fixing hardware and software. You know, there is always something that needes to be fixed/update/upgraded

I would personally go for 5960x

[Dariusz Makowski (Dadal)]

Can you really get 10x 5960x Systems for the price of 16 server ones? I dont think so... Also keep in mind Server blade will take a lot less space than your normal desktop system...

[3LP]

@Baastyan yes you're right, it's the 5960x and not K, wrong typo

@Dariusz
Well I think it could be quite close actually with the 5960x.
I'll talk all Ex-VAT here :

• The blades I found on ebay cost €12k. They do not have any hard drive so adding 16 ssd ads up €1k. So €13k all summed up.
• The 5960x rig that I just put up could be something like this :

Total of €1600 by 10 so €16k. It's a difference of €3k.
To be completely honest, I should go for only 8 of those 5960k in stead of those 16 blades. And even OCed, I don't think 8 of those 5960x will make up the 16 baldes.

You're right, might not be the same price, but I'm just guessing the power drain and the ease of changing anything that breaks makes the i7 still more attractive.
If you look at this one :

http://www.digitalstormonline.com/un...arks-idnum324/

The 5960x OC at something reasonable like 4Ghtz will drain 400W. By 10 it means a bit more than 4kW/h.
The blades will drain 13.5kW/h, so 3 times more.

I'm not sure what to do but I'm tempted to go with the i7s

Stan

[Dariusz Makowski (Dadal)]

Heya

Interesting calculation. The 13.5kw from blades sounds very itneresting, where did u got that number from ?

AS to rigs yeah I think cooling is bit bad for that OC so you need better cooling but that wont be a lot. None the less getting 10, 8 core systems OC to 4 ghz will be a lot better than getting those Servers... Few points why:

Plus
1 New Warranty
2 More customization
3 Less licenses

Minus
1 Space it takes
2 A little slower per total but faster per blade.

Overall Its a hard choice... I would go with i7's too I think in this case. Just see if you can get for example a 2U-3U-4U server chassis and stick vertically cooler in to it. This way you can keep it nice and tight. Or get HPTC chasis, you can stack them on top of each other as well...
I got something simmilar to this over here http://www.scan.co.uk/products/silve...oBwBoCrzDw_wcB

Its nice because it pull the air from side and push away from other side, so I can stack them on top of each other...

Regards

Dariusz

[baastyan]

The funny thing is I am just building up one workstation with dual x5670 (MB: SR-2 wich allwos to OC them easlly to 4,1-4,2 GHz).

But stil ... I would definitelly go for 5960x for the render nodes. And there is one more thing. It is newer technology (DDR4 and 2011 v3 socket). I am not saying it is more efficient
Just want to say that if you decide (at some point) to sell those machines or use some components for other rigs then it will be much easier with 5960x machines.
Let say that you have noticed that render nodes are working fine with only 16GB RAM not necessary with 32GB. So you can save some money for RAM while buying new rigs for your render farm