Costs associated with high computation render farms.

[posterus]

Hello
I thought I'd share with you our recent article where we take an in depth look at the costs associated with high computation render farms. We took into account the cost of each system, infrastructure, power consumption costs, heat loads and air conditioning costs. It might be a bit wordy for some but I'd like to get some feedback from the group on how it reads.

http://blog.renderstream.com/?p=113

Thanks
-joe

[sea2stars]

There's no Plaid option?

[posterus]

hehe not yet. but thanks for being one of the first to get the joke behind the product names. we're actually working on an Impulse Speed server priced below Sub-Light...but that's a star trek reference

[Morne]

Render speed for animation

So then for rendering an animation of which an average frame takes 20 minutes since you can't buy 3.7 computers you'll have to get 4 computers.

I'm I correct in reading in your article then even if I get 4 X Option2, it will be the same speed for rendering an animation as 1 X Option3. But the Option3 will be cheaper? (both for the initial costs and also for the running costs)?

Regards,
Morne

[posterus]

That's a good point. You would need 3.7 Option 2 servers to equal one Option 3 system. Like you said, you can't buy 3.7 so you would need to get 4 but 4 Option 2 servers would have more computation power than one Option 3 and it would cost more as well.

Here is the cost breakdown not including infrastructure:

Option 2
4 servers : $7,521.00
AC and power for 1 year: $1,949.07
Total: 9470.07

Option 3:
1 server: $6,007.50
AC and power for 1 year: $1,423.46
Total: $7,430

So Option 3 is the better buy in this example. I say in the blog that 4 Option 2 servers would be the recommended configuration but after looking at this again, 3 servers would be best (brings total cost down to $7,590) and if you need more than that go with Option 3.

Best,
-joe

[Morne]

does Option3 have 4 CPU's total? As in 4 X Quadcore = 16 cores X 2(for hyperthreading) = 32 cores?

[posterus]

yes, in a 1U form factor you get 4 Quad-Core Intel Xeon E5530 (2.40 GHz Nehalem) 80 watt CPU, 8MB L3 cache 5.86GT/s. keep in mind that while you get 32 virtual cores that's not the same as having 32 physical cores. our tests with the i7 920 showed hyperthreaded speed improvements of 1.4X. we haven't tested the E5530 chip yet but it's likely a similar factor.

best,
-joe

[arobbert]

Thanks for putting the info. together. I suspected this was the case based on personal experience.

[Morne]

I tried to get a price for option3 for similar stuff from Dell, but it doesn't look like they have a blade option with dual system in 1U unit. I mean as in a dual system each with dual CPU ie 4 cpu's in a 1U unit. Best I could find was 2 cpu's. I was looking at Dell's M610 and the M710 and with only 2 CPU's it is already more expensive than the Renderstream system with more or less similar specs (except only 2 CPU's instead of 4). Then there is the Dell M905, but that uses 4 AMD cpu's.

I haven't looked at HP or Intel blades yet...

[dlparisi]

I doubt the ridiculous option is a blade system since it's a 1U (I've never seen such a thing). Most likely it's something along these lines...http://www.supermicro.com/products/s...-6016TT-TF.cfm Still a very powerful, compact arrangement IMO. You had also asked on another thread about remote starting slaves and these servers (as well as others) can get an IPMI card to allow full power control in addition to a lot of other features: KVM over LAN, system and temp monitoring, virtual CD-ROMs, etc.

[Morne]

I'm very interested in something like Option3. Problem is I'm in South Africa. Where can I get something like that here?

[posterus]

we sell and support our systems worldwide. drop me an email at joe@renderstream.com and i'll work up a quote for you. i know you are interested in our Ridiculous Speed farm but if there was anything else you wanted quoted just let me know.
best,
-joe