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Project: Fe NUTS

I

ICE_9

2[H]4U
Joined
Feb 28, 2005
Messages
3,459
I have been looking into making a fabled 5k PPD boxen and have only really seen one actually make it. It has inspired me to start the creation of Fe Nuts. (Fast Effective Numerous Unit Throughput System).

I am creating this work log in the hopes to build this system effectively while staying below a budget of $2000. I do not have all the money at this time but have began setting asside a budget for this project that inclues approximately 3 bonuses, part of a tax check and a biweekly pay check.

I will be posting pictures as well as potential purchase ideas on this thread so that it can be discussed and well put together. I have never built and "official server" before and am looking forward to this challange. Later in the next few days I will be posting information on purchases made and a road map outlining the future purchases.

So, on this day, the end of 2006, I begin the journey of creating Fe Nuts! (Iron Nuts was too hard of an acronym). I am still in the licensing stages of that name so it may not stick without permission. :eek:

Brief outline to look forward to:
Dual Quad Core Xeon processors
Dual ATI 1950 Video cards
Dual power supplies
5K+ PPD hopes.

Side note: Fe is the Elemental Name?? for Iron in case you didn't know.

NORCO RPC-910 Black Steel 4U Rackmount Chassis 3 External 5.25" Drive Bays - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16811219008 - 85.19 Bought 12/17/06

Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3400620AS 400GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822148138 - 99.99 Bought 12/17/06

Tyan Tempest i5000XL (S2692ANR) Dual Xeon/LGA771/5000X/SATA2/RAID/A&2GbE Server Motherboard
https://passport.burgesscomputers.com/Account.aspx - 343.64 (work discount)

Enhance ENP-5150GH 500W ATX12V Rev.2.2 (24/20+8/4+6), 80+ RoHS, Quiet PSU
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?p=PS-E5150GH&c=pw - 76.84

SUPER TALENT 1GB 240-Pin DDR2 FB-DIMM ECC Fully Buffered DDR2 667 (PC2 5300) Server Memory - Retail x2
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820609177 - 339.96

BOX QUAD XEON E5310 1.60G-2X4M 1066 64B XD VT FAN (will probably change due to discounts)
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?p=XEON5310BX - 342.64

Base cost (includes shipping) = 1288.26
 
At first I thought you were crazy. But then you mentioned that Fe is the atomic symbol for Iron, and suddenly it all became clear :p
 
Double your budget and you'll be able to do it. You can't get a quad core chip for under $1200 :(
 
Good luck, don't count on zim01's box being the first.... he's not so good with math!

I'd second guess running the GPU clients as you can't run GPU along with SMP currently. Running inside Vmware the SMP will take too much of a hit to offset the PPD off the GPU I'd fear.

In short, before you spend the money, pick a plan and overload that angle. Right now, SMP carries the highest bonus by far near as I can tell.

Zim was running 2.4 GHz quads, which I may add don't actually exist, so the current Dell offerings might not cut it- 1.6/1.86 speeds.
 
marty9876 said:
Good luck, don't count on zim01's box being the first.... he's not so good with math!

I'd second guess running the GPU clients as you can't run GPU along with SMP currently. Running inside Vmware the SMP will take too much of a hit to offset the PPD off the GPU I'd fear.

In short, before you spend the money, pick a plan and overload that angle. Right now, SMP carries the highest bonus by far near as I can tell.

Zim was running 2.4 GHz quads, which I may add don't actually exist, so the current Dell offerings might not cut it- 1.6/1.86 speeds.
Click to expand...

jealous I guess........???????..........how about 5355's?

processor : 0
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 15
model name : Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X5355 @ 2.66GHz
stepping : 7
cpu MHz : 2666.851
cache size : 4096 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 0
cpu cores : 4
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 10
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm syscall lm pni monitor ds_cpl est tm2 cx16 xtpr
bogomips : 5339.28
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 36 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:
 
come on....wheres the employee discount intel-boy :D


maybe you will be able to pass me again :) Good Luck
 
zim01 said:
jealous I guess........???????..........how about 5355's?


cpu MHz : 2666.851
cache size : 4096 KB
Click to expand...

Thought these were 8mb cache boy wonder.
 
marty9876 said:
Thought these were 8mb cache boy wonder.
Click to expand...

Gee realizing that you don't understand the newer clients like SMP :confused: :rolleyes:

it runs 2 x 4MB L2 Cache

maybe next time engage google before mouth :p
 
marty9876 said:
Thought these were 8mb cache boy wonder.
Click to expand...

Yeah, they are, but like everything else, it's probably reading them wrong as they're probably ES's. I have that problem with my 5150 ES's, nothing seems to read them right, yurt shows them as having 4 megs of L3 cache instead of being L2.

Good luck with your project, I'm waiting for the Asus 5000x board to see if it'll let me run dual x1950xtx's, since the dell board didn't because of the nvidia bridge chip. The xtx's are stuck in a 975 board for the time being.

Edit: on another note, don't forget ram, which isn't cheap, you're going to need 4 sticks to run in quad channel and you want to make sure they're doublesided so you get full bandwidth, so you'll need atleast 4 - 1 gig FB-Dimms, that's atleast 600 right there.
 
Ok. Here is my first rev list of parts. I have two of them already so I plan to stick with them.

NORCO RPC-910 Black Steel 4U Rackmount Chassis 3 External 5.25" Drive Bays - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16811219008 - 85.19 Bought 12/17/06

Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3400620AS 400GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822148138 - 99.99 Bought 12/17/06

TYAN S5380G2NR Dual Socket 771 Intel 5000P SSI / Extended ATX Server Motherboard - OEM
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813151033 - 407.63

Enhance ENP-5150GH 500W ATX12V Rev.2.2 (24/20+8/4+6), 80+ RoHS, Quiet PSU
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=PS-E5150GH - 79.84

Kingston 1GB (2 x 512MB) 240-Pin DDR2 FB-DIMM ECC Fully Buffered DDR2 667 (PC2 5300) Dual Channel Kit Server Memory - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16811219008 - 178.98

BOX QUAD XEON E5310 1.60G-2X4M 1066 64B XD VT FAN
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?p=XEON5310BX - 345.69

Base cost (includes shipping) = 1197.32

To max it out add one more processor then,

Sapphire Radeon X1950 PRO 256MB PCI-Express Video Card w/Dual-DVI & HDTV-Out Retail
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814102061 - 391.26 for 2 cards.

Thermaltake W0099RU Purepower Power Express 250W SLI Certified VGA Power Supply
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=371322 - 49.99

Full Build = 1981.21

I may be able to save some money on the processors but it will depend on some work factors. It appears I will need more RAM so I will have to look into that also. Suggestions?
 
I don't spend any time in the PSU forums, but I have never heard anything good about the Thermaltake PSUs.

Will this PSU power your rig, or blow it up?

Just trying to help.

If it was me, I would get a name brand PSU.

Looking forward to more posts about this idea. I'd like to do the same thing.

5,000 PPD is the holy grail!
 
I just noticed you have two PSUs listed up above.

Is your 2nd PSU just for your GPU?

and what about Ewiz... " XEON5310BX $ 334.75 "

are they any good? I have never bought from them.

Best of luck!
 
The power supply should handle the board. I got it because I am using that same series in my main rig and it works great. It even helped with the CPU temps and has a high efficiency rating. Also did well on Jonny Guru's site. http://www.jonnyguru.com/review_details.php?id=24
This is the review on the 400W model. Not much different.
 
I have bought from Ewiz before. I believe twice now. I haven't had a problem other than a minor issue with shipping my power supply. They did the minimum in packaging but it is an OEM power supply. No damage was had though due to sufficient peanuts.
 
Sever boards are in general not overclockable unlike normal motherboards. The processors are still changeable. Waiting on some pricing information.
 
Looks good, you may want to look into a 5000x board if you're going to run dual video cards. Your memory is definitely going to hurt performance, but if you plan on not running quad channel, I'd look into the tyan tempest 5000xl. It has a full bandwidth x16 PCIe slot and it's second slot is PCIe x8 electrical. It does not allow quad channel memory though based on it's design. You should be able to get the 1.6 quads up to 2.0 with a BSEL mod, that should help memory bandwidth as well as you'll be running at a 1333 fsb.
 
From reading the woodcrest overclocking thread on 2cpu, the BSEL mod doesn't adjust memory frequency. The 5000-series chipset instead uses a divider to get the memory running at SPD timings. Depending on the clock gen on the board, you may be able to use SysTool to overclock in windows. I'm pretty sure tyan's 5000x board is supported by it, not sure about he 5000p board though.

the black knight always triumphs!
 
rogue_jedi said:
From reading the woodcrest overclocking thread on 2cpu, the BSEL mod doesn't adjust memory frequency. The 5000-series chipset instead uses a divider to get the memory running at SPD timings. Depending on the clock gen on the board, you may be able to use SysTool to overclock in windows. I'm pretty sure tyan's 5000x board is supported by it, not sure about he 5000p board though.
Click to expand...

Even so, you'll still be running running 1:1 at a 1333 fsb, instead of running with a divider if you're running PC 5300 FB-Dimms.
 
With R600 around the corner for an SRP of ~$600 and double the performance of the X1950xtx, I would suggest purchasing your video cards after everything else, as the prices will undoubtedly fall. And about Thermaltake PSUs, I've had good experiences with some models, and bad experiences with others. I would still suggest Enermax (stable and high efficiency [power savings]) or Antec (stable, great performance)..

Also, if you're running a quad core setup, the GPU client will be sharing some CPU cycles with the SMP client, will this throw the SMP client's threads off sync enough to bring the SMP client's performance down?

X1950PROs are great folders, and have awsome performance-per-watt aswell as they're new 80nm cards (I believe all the other new cards from both the red and green team are still 90nm).

Great choice of parts though, I think.. keep it up!
 
ND40oz said:
Even so, you'll still be running running 1:1 at a 1333 fsb, instead of running with a divider if you're running PC 5300 FB-Dimms.
Click to expand...
Ah, I get it now, I didn't look at his memory choice. So yeah, 1:1 should be faster, definitely worth trying the BSEL mod.
 
So, I know that thermaltake power supplies are not the best in the world, but this one is only for the GPUs. I selected this option to help save me from getting a 1KW power supply to run this setup and having to pay close to 300 for the power supplies. Should I go for a higher wattage power supply still? I was thinking originally the SilverStone ST-850? maybe.

Also, I was reading that some people were seeing very little difference in running the cards on an 8x PCI-E signal vs a 16x one. Running it in 4x did have an effect so that is why I avoided those boards.
 
I am estimating that the mobo and processors should use between 450 and 550W. I also chose the GPU power supply so that the load can be balanced across two power supplies. As a further measure, if the GPU supply goes out, I still retain the main system without having lost everything waiting on another very expensive power supply. Good suggestions though. I like the Enhance and Silverstone mostly for power efficiency. Helps on heat and power consumption. What is the efficiency of the PCP power supplies?
 
Some good news! The processor selection will probably change later this month. Gonna get a good deal from a connection. Hoping to save a bunch! :)
 
ND40oz said:
Looks good, you may want to look into a 5000x board if you're going to run dual video cards. Your memory is definitely going to hurt performance, but if you plan on not running quad channel, I'd look into the tyan tempest 5000xl. It has a full bandwidth x16 PCIe slot and it's second slot is PCIe x8 electrical. It does not allow quad channel memory though based on it's design. You should be able to get the 1.6 quads up to 2.0 with a BSEL mod, that should help memory bandwidth as well as you'll be running at a 1333 fsb.
Click to expand...

I like that board more because its about 50 bucks cheaper. Anyone else?
 
I'm planning on a (hopefully) 2800PPD build when the QX6600's drop in price.
QX6600...............~$500
GA-965P-S3........~$111
1gig DDR2-800......$105
HD I have an 8gig to use
case.....................$25
Powersupply I have a 450w to use
ATI X600...............$20

Total ~$766 my goal is <$800 and if I have to go aftermarket on the cooler I'll be close
I plan on O/Cing (of course) to ~3.0ghz
 
Additional purchases: None
Pictures: Coming
Taxes: filing at the end of the week
Bills: Final one paid on Friday.
Time: Gone

Trying to get some 60 hour weeks in to help pay for additional hardware. The processor selection is still up in the air. Waiting on more discounts which I hope will be soon. This is begining to look like a single purchase place thing if I can save on the shipping. Will drop some photos soon.
 
How about 42.56GHz for $10000can?

Supermicro 2x Dual socket 771 in one 1U case (4 Quad core Xeons 16 Cores total)
http://www.supermicro.com/products/system/1U/6015/SYS-6015T-TV.cfm
$2100can aprox at NCIX

Add some 5355's ($1550ea at NCIX)
add a few GB's of Kingston FB-Dimms ($1600 for 8GB at NCIX)

comes to about $10k canadian on their site, $235 per GHz for everything but a harddrive

Yeah thats way overkill but, if one were to buy the server setup now, 2 small FB-Dimms and 2 cheaper Xeons, you'd be in fairly cheap and have the best upgrade path known to mankind :)



 
4DoorGTZ said:
How about 42.56GHz for $10000can?

Supermicro 2x Dual socket 771 in one 1U case (4 Quad core Xeons 16 Cores total)
http://www.supermicro.com/products/system/1U/6015/SYS-6015T-TV.cfm
$2100can aprox at NCIX

Add some 5355's ($1550ea at NCIX)
add a few GB's of Kingston FB-Dimms ($1600 for 8GB at NCIX)

comes to about $10k canadian on their site, $235 per GHz for everything but a harddrive

Yeah thats way overkill but, if one were to buy the server setup now, 2 small FB-Dimms and 2 cheaper Xeons, you'd be in fairly cheap and have the best upgrade path known to mankind :)



Click to expand...


Now I just need to win the lottery to buy a rack of those...........that would be sick....
 
4DoorGTZ said:
How about 42.56GHz for $10000can?

Supermicro 2x Dual socket 771 in one 1U case (4 Quad core Xeons 16 Cores total)
http://www.supermicro.com/products/system/1U/6015/SYS-6015T-TV.cfm
$2100can aprox at NCIX

Add some 5355's ($1550ea at NCIX)
add a few GB's of Kingston FB-Dimms ($1600 for 8GB at NCIX)

comes to about $10k canadian on their site, $235 per GHz for everything but a harddrive

Yeah thats way overkill but, if one were to buy the server setup now, 2 small FB-Dimms and 2 cheaper Xeons, you'd be in fairly cheap and have the best upgrade path known to mankind :)
Click to expand...

That is just .. sick.

Though a rack of 42 of them would be under $500,000.00, would have 1.79 THz, and outproduce the top ten folders combined, I think.
 
mwarps said:
That is just .. sick.

Though a rack of 42 of them would be under $500,000.00, would have 1.79 THz, and outproduce the top ten folders combined, I think.
Click to expand...

no

i have over 1.7thz... so it would definately not be the top 10 combined
 
FLECOM said:
no

i have over 1.7thz... so it would definately not be the top 10 combined
Click to expand...

Are they all Core2? There's a biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiig difference between 2.8GHz of P4 and 2.8GHz of Core2.

Edit:

From reading around people seem to think that each quad core will conservatively yield about 1,500ppd.
There'd be 168 quad core chips in there, so that's 252,000ppd conservatively.

Not that it matters since it's a massive pipe dream....
 
mwarps said:
From reading around people seem to think that each quad core will conservatively yield about 1,500ppd.
There'd be 168 quad core chips in there, so that's 252,000ppd conservatively. ....
Click to expand...

My Dual Opterons @2.4 Ghz drop 850 PpD running the SMP client.
My Dual-Dual Opterons @2.6 Ghz drop 2,000 PpD running the SMP client.
So I would look for a Xeon 5355 to give around the same points per day.

4,000 PpD with only ~300 watts used per Boxen so very cheap to run.

Luck ............ :D
 
mwarps said:
Are they all Core2? There's a biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiig difference between 2.8GHz of P4 and 2.8GHz of Core2.

Edit:

From reading around people seem to think that each quad core will conservatively yield about 1,500ppd.
There'd be 168 quad core chips in there, so that's 252,000ppd conservatively.

Not that it matters since it's a massive pipe dream....
Click to expand...

how about this bet: I will play the lottery sometime this week. If I win (double digit Millions payout required), I will fund the hardware for that setup for the team and we'll find out.

edit: so yeah it's a massive pipe dream.
 
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