Render blade advice

[timmatron]

We are in the process of finally getting a small rackmounted render farm going. With all the latest advances in processors recently I am not totally sure which is the best way to go right now or in the near future.

Everyone here seems to rave about the X2 processors, but you cannot use those in a dual cpu setup correct? I think having 2x cpu's per blade is the way to go, so at the moment that means only the Xeons and Opterons? And as far as those two go, the Xeon Woodcrest is supposedly the fastest. But of course budget/economy is also a major factor.

Any advice or suggestions would be appreciated! I think we are going to put them together in house so it should be fun.

[Da_elf]

i thought www.racksaver.com was using x2 in dual format in their blades. i could be wrong though its been a few months since i visited the site

[timmatron]

Hmm I just looked and I didn't see any mention of the X2's. Seems they are either using Opterons or Xeons. Capable of fitting 132 processors in one rack - sweet!

[meanadam]

New boxx or iwill have 8 motherboard dual opteron based machines. These may die, however, with the new intel chips.

Blades are everywhere? Dell even.

I think you will find - the x2 are the most bang for the buck (esp. now with price drop) - which is most imoportant with render farm. Somtimes it is worth paying extra to save space, power, and headache of managing all the machines. Pros and Cons. I think there has been a lot of talk about this here.

[Da_elf]

if anyone puts in a quote for a racksaver bladeserver can you post the cost here? hehe. just curious how much it would cost

[timmatron]

if anyone puts in a quote for a racksaver bladeserver can you post the cost here? hehe. just curious how much it would cost

I'm not even gonna bother. The new server setup we just bought from CDW was well over 10k, so I can only imagine how much the racksaver would be.

[Da_elf]

10k USD? for how many nodes? the full 88?

[Syclone1]

10k USD? for how many nodes? the full 88?

Im assuming far less that 88 for 10K plus considering the cost of the rack which is usually outrageous

-dave

[timmatron]

That was for the rack, the monitor/keyboard, router, ups backup, a bunch of other add-on charges, and one dual xeon file server with 4 hard drives in raid5. I'm pretty sure we got gouged somewhere in that deal.

[timmatron]

I think the Opteron 270's are looking like a good deal at the moment. $490 a piece on newegg.

Does anybody have recommendations for a case and motherboard? There are only a few cases on newegg and I'm not exactly sure what would work best.

Can you get away with a 250w power supply for a render blade?

[gilpo]

If noise is not a factor, get a Tyan Barebone rack system. They come with 1u rack case, 350w psu, motherboard, heatsinks and fans. You add drives, cpus and ram. There are some models that include slim cd-roms and slim floppy drives. Newegg sells about a dozen different flavors. Go into the server section then into the barebone category.

Now, notice I said IF noise IS NOT a factor. These are the loudest systems I have ever worked with. You can hear them through insulated walls and doors. Our server room is upstairs in a corner, so it's no problem for us. I have known companies to return them because of the noise. Other than that, I've not had a single DOA and you can't ask for any easier setup.

We also like the Opteron 270's. We stick 2 cpus, 4gb ECC RAM and a 40gb hard drive with win64 in them and they've yet to balk at anything we've thrown at them. All told, they cost us about $2600 with shipping from newegg.

[timmatron]

Thanks Gilpo. I suppose if the noise was too intense, it might be possible to switch out the fans with a quiter model. But I know what you mean. The new HP server we bought is super loud. I thought something was wrong with it at first. I think there must be some rule that says all rackmounted computers must be as loud and annoying as possible.