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Dual Xeon System - Future CAD Use

G

gt07

Member
I'm building a PC that'll be used for CAD Design and a lot of Video Editing. Here are the specs below and can you all please let me know if everything will work together properly.

(1) Supermicro SC742S-420B Dual Xeon/PIII/Single P4 4U Rackmount Server Chassis (Black) Retail
(1) Supermicro X5DA8 Intel E7505 Dual Xeon DDR E-ATX Server Board w/Dual SCSI, Gigabit LAN Retail
(2) Intel® Xeon TM Processor 3.06GHz 533MHz 604pin .13u 512KB Retail
(1) Corsair 1GB DDR266 PC2100 CAS2.5 ECC Registered Double Data Rate Memory Retail
(1) Seagate 37GB 15,000RPM SCSI Hard Drive, Model ST336753LC, OEM Drive Only
(1) Sony 8X DVD+/-RW Drive, Model DWU18A Black Bazel w/ Software, OEM
(1) SONY Black 52x32x52 IDE Internal CD-RW Drive, Model CRX230E-B2, OEM

Do I NEED two sticks of RAM?
I won't be purchasing the quadro card that I want for a little while but will I need to purchase a crappy card to output video in the mean time?
 
I'm a CAD monkey and AMD is the way to go in my experience for a number of reasons. Namely price, performance, and future upgradeability. On top of that the Opterons kill the Xeons for the price.

For the video editing the Xeons might be better, but for strictly CAD I would suggest AMD. You should look at some benchmarks. In a dual scenario it's much different from the single CPU benchmarks because HyperTransport allows multiple CPUs to work together much more efficiently.

What kind of CAD work are you going to be doing? What kind of file size will you be dealing with? Generally I find that most of my CAD files are under 50MB and aren't all that CPU intensive to work with. Graphics cards are much more important, and your setup seems to be lacking in that area. I would mod a 5900XT into a Quaddro if it were my money.
 
correct me if i am wrong, but video editing is very ram hungry. If you willing to put up the case to get dual xeon's i would recommend more ram as well.
 
Originally posted by: Cawchy87
correct me if i am wrong, but video editing is very ram hungry. If you willing to put up the case to get dual xeon's i would recommend more ram as well.
Click to expand...

I would venture to say that dual Opterons would actually be faster in video encoding than the Xeons. I would love to see some benchmarks to confirm this. 2cpu.com anyone?

I stand corrected

It still depends on the software you will be using tho. The Opterons won in TMGPEnc over the 2.8 Xeons.
 
Originally posted by: Cawchy87
correct me if i am wrong, but video editing is very ram hungry. If you willing to put up the case to get dual xeon's i would recommend more ram as well.
Click to expand...

i absolutely plan on upgrading the ram, but at $330/1 gb stick i'm just going to grab 1 for now and grab probably 3 more throughout the year. 1 will physically work fine by itself won't it?
 
Originally posted by: SickBeast
I'm a CAD monkey and AMD is the way to go in my experience for a number of reasons. Namely price, performance, and future upgradeability. On top of that the Opterons kill the Xeons for the price.

For the video editing the Xeons might be better, but for strictly CAD I would suggest AMD. You should look at some benchmarks. In a dual scenario it's much different from the single CPU benchmarks because HyperTransport allows multiple CPUs to work together much more efficiently.

What kind of CAD work are you going to be doing? What kind of file size will you be dealing with? Generally I find that most of my CAD files are under 50MB and aren't all that CPU intensive to work with. Graphics cards are much more important, and your setup seems to be lacking in that area. I would mod a 5900XT into a Quaddro if it were my money.
Click to expand...

I'm mostly use CATIA V5, although i use solid edge occasionally. The way i'm setting this up right now is just to get it working and as a functional pc. throughtout the year I'll be adding the high-end cad video card and plenty more ram.

Are there any benchmarks comparing a modded 5900xt to a comparable quaddro?
 
1 stick will work, but you will lose dual-channel.

Are you sure this rig isn't overkill? What kind of work are you going to be doing?
 
Originally posted by: SickBeast
1 stick will work, but you will lose dual-channel.

Are you sure this rig isn't overkill? What kind of work are you going to be doing?
Click to expand...

Well, I've used a buddies PC to use CATIA V5 and his specs are p4 3.0, 1gb with an ATI 9700 (not sure of the exact model) and i'll say that it absolutely wasn't performing 100%.

This system as shown is $2100, and after adding a good vid card and another gig of ram i'd say will be closer to 2800 which isn't too bad. heck of a lot cheaper than getting a company like alienware, dell or falcon to build it
 
I guess $2100 is reasonable, I was thinking it would be at least $3000. If you need that much power, you need it.

Oh, as a measure of cost-cutting, can't you just go with dual 74GB SATA Raptors? Would they not perform the same if not better? I would go with a Pioneer 107 for the DVD burner too...it's the best on the market according to the AT guy that does the burn tests.
 
I suggest you download the manual for the Supermicro and read it to answer the question about the RAM and whether single-channel will float the boat to start with. If you're interested in an Opteron alternative, the Tyan Thunder K8W plus an LSI Logic 21320R dual-channel 64-bit 133MHz PCI-X SCSI controller might be nice 🙂 You do want four memory modules to completely set the dual-Opteron setup on fire, since each CPU has two memory banks (effectively quad-channel PC3200, yummy 😀). Of course, you could start with one Opteron and two memory modules, then spring for the second Opteron and memory modules later.

The only Xeon system I've used left me unimpressed, a 2.4B with HT got its clock cleaned by my A64 3000+ by a factor of nearly 2 to 1, in a timed antivirus scan of the same set of files (both systems 1GB RAM and SCSI-equipped). But I know there are places where they do make a much better showing, and probably video editing most of all.

(interestingly, even a SCSI-equipped AthlonXP 1800+ with 256MB of PC2100 was 20% faster than the Xeon :Q)
 
Originally posted by: mechBgon
I suggest you download the manual for the Supermicro and read it to answer the question about the RAM and whether single-channel will float the boat to start with. If you're interested in an Opteron alternative, the Tyan Thunder K8W plus an LSI Logic 21320R dual-channel 64-bit 133MHz PCI-X SCSI controller might be nice 🙂 You do want four memory modules to completely set the dual-Opteron setup on fire, since each CPU has two memory banks (effectively quad-channel PC3200, yummy 😀). Of course, you could start with one Opteron and two memory modules, then spring for the second Opteron and memory modules later.

The only Xeon system I've used left me unimpressed, a 2.4B with HT got its clock cleaned by my A64 3000+ by a factor of nearly 2 to 1, in a timed antivirus scan of the same set of files (both systems 1GB RAM and SCSI-equipped). But I know there are places where they do make a much better showing, and probably video editing most of all.

(interestingly, even a SCSI-equipped AthlonXP 1800+ with 256MB of PC2100 was 20% faster than the Xeon :Q)
Click to expand...

everybody seems to have huge praise for the opteron chips. I think i'm going to configure an opteron system and then see the price vs. xeon and repost and see what you all think.

in the mean time, do you have any suggestions for motherboard with opterons. honestly, i've never built an amd system so i'm semi-lost. I just know that you can't relitively compare clock speeds to intel.

thanks everybody for the help thus far.
 
The one that makes me drool is the Tyan Thunder K8W 😀 One option would be to start with four 512MB R-ECC PC3200 modules. You'd still have four memory slots free.

If you don't seriously need the monster I/O of dual PCI-X buses and a PCI-X gigabit NIC, you could think about the Tiger K8W, which routes all the memory traffic through one CPU's memory controller and has only 32-bit PCI. The benchmarks I saw at GamePC.com seemed to indicate that the use of just one CPU's memory banks is not as big of a deal as it sounds, unless you're doing mammoth database work or something (they tested Thunder v. Tiger if I remember correctly, to answer this question). So here you could use memory modules in pairs instead of fours. It also uses a standard ATX power supply instead of 24-pin + 6-pin EPS.
 
To throw out some more ideas on the Intel branch, you might also look at the Asus PC-DL Deluxe, which is a dual-Xeon board in a standard ATX format. It uses the i875P chipset and accepts dual-channel PC2700 ECC memory (but not Registered). You could add a $35 LSI Logic U160 SCSI card for SCSI support (I use one, works fine) plus an LVD cable and terminator, or splurge for this dual-channel U320 card/cable/terminator kit, and either way you'd be money ahead versus the Supermicro board and probably enjoy CPU/memory/AGP performance that's just as good, maybe better (my speculation).
 
Alright, here's the latest. Below is the AMD Opteron system that is a possible alternative.

(1) Thermaltake Black Xaser V Damier Full-Tower Case w/ 420W, Model "V5420AU" - Retail: $165
(1) TYAN Thunder K8W AMD-8000 M/B - Retail: $436
(1) AMD Opteron Model 148, 1MB L2 Cache 64-Bit Processor - Retail: $424
(1) Corsair TWINX2048RE-3200 2GB Kit DDR400 XMS3200 ECC Registered Memory - Retail: $656
(1) Seagate 37GB 15000RPM SCSI HDD - OEM: $259
(1) WD Caviar SE 200GB/7200/8MB/ATA-100 EIDE HDD: $130
(1) Sony Black 52x32x52 IDE Internal CD-RW Drive - OEM: $27
(1) Sony 8x DVD+/-RW Drive, OEM: $80

TOTAL: $2174

That is about the same price as the dual xeon. Do you think it'd be worth it to go with 1 opteron for the time being with 2gb of memory instead of the xeon machine? In the future I'd obviously want to add a 2nd processor with 2gb more memory so that'd be an extra $1100.
 
You can't run a 148 in a dual rig. You would need the 248, which will cost twice as much. :brokenheart:

I would take dual Xeon 3.06's over a single Opteron 148 any day of the week.
 
Originally posted by: SickBeast
You can't run a 148 in a dual rig. You would need the 248, which will cost twice as much. :brokenheart:

I would take dual Xeon 3.06's over a single Opteron 148 any day of the week.
Click to expand...


if i lower the ram to corsair 1gb i could get a 248. honestly would you recommend a single 248 over dual 3.06 xeons?

Edit: Just realized that the 246 is ~460. how do you feel about that chip?
 
Also note that you are one SCSI controller shy of a system there. Thunder K8W doesn't feature onboard SCSI, unlike the server-oriented Thunder K8S and Thunder K8S Pro where it is either an option or a standard feature (the K8S's have no AGP tunnel, so they aren't a solution for you).
 
No, but what about 246's? 244's? I'm not an Opteron expert by any means, but $424 seems like hella cash for a CPU, especially if you need two of them.

From what you're saying the Xeons seem like a better deal, which is contrary to intel's pricing philosophies.
 
Ooops, and also get an EPS power supply into the brew if you're planning on a Thunder K8W.
 
Originally posted by: mechBgon
Ooops, and also get an EPS power supply into the brew if you're planning on a Thunder K8W.
Click to expand...

mech & beast, thanks for the help thus far. how do i know what cases have an EPS ps?
 
Originally posted by: gt07
Originally posted by: mechBgon
Ooops, and also get an EPS power supply into the brew if you're planning on a Thunder K8W.
Click to expand...

mech & beast, thanks for the help thus far. excuse my ignorance but what is EPS
Click to expand...
EPS power supplies use a 24-pin main power plug (not 20-pin like ATX) and have a six-pin or eight-pin secondary power plug besides the four-pin ATX12V plug. So you want to keep an eye on that when looking at dualie boards... which do they take, ATX or EPS.
 
Originally posted by: mechBgon
Originally posted by: gt07
Originally posted by: mechBgon
Ooops, and also get an EPS power supply into the brew if you're planning on a Thunder K8W.
Click to expand...

mech & beast, thanks for the help thus far. excuse my ignorance but what is EPS
Click to expand...
EPS power supplies use a 24-pin main power plug (not 20-pin like ATX) and have a six-pin or eight-pin secondary power plug besides the four-pin ATX12V plug. So you want to keep an eye on that when looking at dualie boards... which do they take, ATX or EPS.
Click to expand...

oh, thanks for the heads up.

so do you think it'd be advisable to get 1 opteron 246 with 2gb ram vs 2 3.0 xeons with 1gb ram (possibly 2gb). Would the single processor have considerably lower performance until i get the second?
 
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