AMD's 3rd generation Opteron versus Intel's 45nm Xeon: a closer look
by Johan De Gelas on November 27, 2007 6:00 AM EST- Posted in
- IT Computing
Words of Thanks
Many people gave us assistance with this project, and we would of course like to thank them.
Trevor Lawless, Intel US
Sanjay Sharma, Intel US
Matty Bakkeren, Intel Netherlands
(www.intel.com)
Damon Muzny, AMD US
Joshua Mora, AMD US
Brett Jacobs, AMD US
(www.amd.com)
Randy Chang, ASUS
(www.asus.com)
Kelly Sasso, Crucial Technology
Benchmark configuration
Here is the list of the different configurations. We flashed all servers to the latest BIOS, and unless we add any specific comments to the contrary, the BIOS are set to default settings.
Xeon Server
1: Intel "Stoakley platform" server
Supermicro X7DWE+/X7DWN+ Bios rev 1.0
2x Xeon E5472 at 3GHz
8GB (4x2GB) Crucial Registered FB-DIMM DDR2-667 CL5 ECC
NIC: Dual Intel PRO/1000 Server NIC
Xeon
Server 2: Intel "Bensley platform" server
2x Xeon E5365 at 3GHz or 2x Xeon E5345 at 2.33GHz
Intel Server Board S5000PSL - Intel 5000P Chipset
8GB (4x2GB) Crucial Registered FB-DIMM DDR2-667 CL5 ECC
NIC: Dual Intel PRO/1000 Server NIC
Opteron 2350 Server: ASUS KFSN4-DRE
Dual Opteron 2350 2GHz
Asus KFSN4DRE BIOS version 1001.02 (8/28/2007) - NVIDIA nForce Pro 2200 chipset
8GB (4x2GB) Crucial Registered DDR2-667 CL5 ECC
NIC: Broadcom BCM5721
Opteron Socket F 1207 Server: Tyan Transport
TA26 - 2932
Dual Opteron 2222 3GHz/2224SE 3.2GHz
Tyan Thunder n3600m (S2932) - NVIDIA nForce Pro 3600 chipset
8GB (4x2GB) Crucial Registered DDR2-667 CL5 ECC
NIC: nForce Pro 3600 integrated MAC with Marvell 88E1121 Gigabit Ethernet PHY
Client Configuration: Dual Opteron 850
MSI K8T Master1-FAR
4x512MB Infineon PC2700 Registered, ECC
NIC: Broadcom 5705
OS Software
64-bit SUSE Linux SLES 10 SP1 (Linux 2.6.16.46-smp x86_64)
32-bit Windows 2003 Enterprise SP1
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43 Comments
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tshen83 - Tuesday, November 27, 2007 - link
Seriously, can you buy the 2360SE? Newegg doesn't even stock the 1.7Ghz 2344HEs.The same situation exist on the Phenom line of CPUs. I don't see the value of reviewing Phenom 9700, 9900s when AMD cannot deliver them. I am trouble locating Phenom 9500s.
alantay - Tuesday, November 27, 2007 - link
The MySQL scalability problem is not so much in MySQL as in the Linux kernel and Glibc used.To have it scale correctly to 8 CPUs you need kernel 2.6.22.x (alternatively you could try with a 2.6.24-RC -should be a bit faster-, but not with 2.6.23.x) and Glibc 2.6 or higher.
A default Ubuntu 7.10 for example should scale well with MySQL (OpenSUSE 10.3 *might* work, but they have backported the 2.6.23 scheduler which has a scalability problem).
Thanks for the article!
JohanAnandtech - Tuesday, November 27, 2007 - link
Excellent feedback.It is a bit frustrating that once again you need some ultra new kernel and libraries to get good scalability. THat is unrealistic for people who use SLES and who rely on their support contract to get updates.
MGSsancho - Wednesday, November 28, 2007 - link
how about opensolaris? i dont know how much different it is from solaris 10, but it should be able to scale to dozens of cores nicely. I was about to ask about oracle and DB2 benchmarks but you answered that in your article; expensive, and the oems usually publish that info.anyways awesome article
Roy2001 - Tuesday, November 27, 2007 - link
I cannot find a SINGLE one, nowhere.drebo - Tuesday, November 27, 2007 - link
Newegg has the Phenom 9500 in stock. At least, they did yesterday. I've also got a vendor I use that has them in stock.JarredWalton - Tuesday, November 27, 2007 - link
But Phenom isn't Opteron 23xx. Different socket, different market, and it has L3. (Does Phenom X4 have an L3 cache? Maybe I should go check....)drebo - Wednesday, November 28, 2007 - link
Yes, Phenom 9500 has an L3. But if you look at his question (in the subject line), he is asking about barcelona as a whole and phenom specifically. The answer is Yes, they are available.Slaimus - Tuesday, November 27, 2007 - link
They may be gobbled by up Cray for that Budapest supercomputer.Regs - Tuesday, November 27, 2007 - link
I would not expect any from vendors and wholesalers until early next year.Matter of fact I wouldn't want one until then anyhow. I would at least wait until B3 stepping.