comparing opteron processors

[MattM76]

Hello,


How would you characterize the Opteron 246, 252 and 265 in terms of:

1. Computational power
2. Value


I do alot of intense simulation/computation and need a processor that can support it.

Would I see much of a difference in intensive computational usage (no gaming/few graphics) between the 246 (inexpensive) and more expensive processors, or would I be better off investing in RAM/harddrive/other?

Thanks,
Matt

 

[davegraham]

Matt,

well, the quick 'n dirty questions i have for you are:

1.) why a 2xx processor? Remember, these are all s940 (not s939) and require ECC memory. Additionally, they can be used in 2P/4core systems (when using dual core procs [e.g. 265]) but if you definitely don't need the power, i'd suggest the 1xx line.

2.) What mainboard are you going to be using with this? i can suggest the new supermicro boards and would even go so far as to offer you a bundle to that end (proc. and mainboard).

feel free to hit me up offline (dave AT flickerdown.com) or in this thread. would be happy to help out wherever possible.

dave

 

[ribbon13]

What type of software are you going to be running?

 

[MattM76]

I use Matlab/R/SAS primarly for Data analysis/simulation. Also PAUP and a few others for DNA sequence data.
Matt

 

[ribbon13]

How often do these run simultaneously? How much of it is SMP aware? If this is a single machine I'd suggest going with am Opteron 175 or 180 for the most computational performance per dollar.

 

[MattM76]

none of the applications are multithreaded (for now) but some simulations/analyses will take several days of processor time to complete so different applications will be sunning simultaneously.

Matt

 

[WhipperSnapper]

Wouldn't he be better off getting two dual core Opterons (four cores) on a dual processor mobo? Is there a 940 board that would support that?

 

[MattM76]

so something like the opt. 265??

 

[Mloot]

What kind of budget are you talking about? If you are only looking at one 265, then you would save some $$ by getting a single dual-core 165 or 170. If you are seriously thinking about 2x265 dual-cores, along with the motherboard and RAM necessary to complete such a build, then you are looking at quite a bit more of an investment.

 

[davegraham]

Originally posted by: WhipperSnapper

Wouldn't he be better off getting two dual core Opterons (four cores) on a dual processor mobo? Is there a 940 board that would support that?

yes, there are several dual socket, dual core capable boards. however, they START at upwards of $400.00 soooooo, it's quite an investment (as Mloot has stated above).

four cores will not matter much if the program he's running doesn't have the ability to set processor affinity. that being said, there is a good chance he'll notice a slight speed increase if he's running several programs at once. a single program that is NOT multi-threaded or processor-core aware will not benefit at all.

btw, you'll also need to buy a significant amount of RAM. just a heads up.

dave

 

[mdkinsal]

What type of budget are you working with Matt?

 

[MattM76]

I have about 2000 to spend right now. Ill have an additional funding on a few months to update RAM and other things, so Ill go low on this for now.
-Matt