Opteron vs. Xeon vs. SPARC IV

[thecoolnessrune]

Which of these processors gives the best performance. And I do realise that I could setup 72 UltraSPARC IV processors but I don't have 3 million dollars. What would perform best in a 2way system???

 

[sonoma1993]

im not sure about the 72 ulta sparc Iv but i think a two way opteron will perform better than a 2way xeon. Because the the xeon has to share the fsb where as the opteron can use the hypertransport to link to the cpu. somelse can explain more on that. Also for the opteron from what id heard, as you add more cpu's, the amount of system bandwidth goes up, your adding more hypertransport links and i think because of the separte memory channels too.

 

[thecoolnessrune]

I agree. Basically, if you have anything with 1-8 processors. the Opteron is going to be the best. SPARC IV if you need any more (just because it happens to be the only option any higher). And Xeon......well.....ummm. paperwight. Yeah, thats right, an expensive french paperweight.

 

[ProviaFan]

For enterprise applications for which one can find ports to the SPARC IV architecture, then it's certainly something to be considered, though I have no experience there so won't comment. Unfortunately, as much as I'm a glutton for unusual or rare computing devices, Photoshop won't run on anything except Mac or Wintel/MD, so demands of work win over desire for the exotic, thus no SPARC IV for me.

 

[bersl2]

Originally posted by: ProviaFan
For enterprise applications for which one can find ports to the SPARC IV architecture, then it's certainly something to be considered, though I have no experience there so won't comment. Unfortunately, as much as I'm a glutton for unusual or rare computing devices, Photoshop won't run on anything except Mac or Wintel/MD, so demands of work win over desire for the exotic, thus no SPARC IV for me.

[cough]TheGIMP[/cough]

 

[Fox5]

Originally posted by: thecoolnessrune
I agree. Basically, if you have anything with 1-8 processors. the Opteron is going to be the best. SPARC IV if you need any more (just because it happens to be the only option any higher). And Xeon......well.....ummm. paperwight. Yeah, thats right, an expensive french paperweight.

Opterons can do up to 16 cores now.

Does SPARC IV even use the x86 architecture? If not, is it really even a choice for most people? Anyhow, since Opteron has a much larger market to sell to, I'd imagine its prices will be much cheaper per performance than a SPARC system, if it doesn't win on a processor per processor basis, you can probably add more processors and stay under the SPARC's cost.

Hmm, I just found an article on how great Solaris/SPARC is versus Linux/Intel....the interesting thing is that it says the fastest option is Sun's Opteron systems and it's also the cheapest, while Dell's Intel is the slowest and most expensive.
Then it goes on to hype up the Sun SPARC IV system which is calls the most reasonable.....it falls right inbetween the other two systems on both price and performance, but the hidden bonus they point out is an easy upgrade for those already using Sun systems.

So I guess Opteron is the winner then.

BTW, you don't consider Power as an option? I believe they've got awesome SIMD capabilities if you can make use of them.

Edit: N/m about the above thing about SPARC, I didn't read the additional comments on the bottom of the article, apparently SPARC is actually the most expensive price per performance option due to its low volume markets. Sun's Opteron systems running x86 Solaris are recommended for those who have old Solaris systems they want to upgrade.

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: bersl2

Originally posted by: ProviaFan
For enterprise applications for which one can find ports to the SPARC IV architecture, then it's certainly something to be considered, though I have no experience there so won't comment. Unfortunately, as much as I'm a glutton for unusual or rare computing devices, Photoshop won't run on anything except Mac or Wintel/MD, so demands of work win over desire for the exotic, thus no SPARC IV for me.

[cough]TheGIMP[/cough]

[cough]color management[/cough] [cough]rgb/16[/cough] [cough]etc.[/cough]

 

[bersl2]

Originally posted by: ProviaFan

Originally posted by: bersl2

Originally posted by: ProviaFan
For enterprise applications for which one can find ports to the SPARC IV architecture, then it's certainly something to be considered, though I have no experience there so won't comment. Unfortunately, as much as I'm a glutton for unusual or rare computing devices, Photoshop won't run on anything except Mac or Wintel/MD, so demands of work win over desire for the exotic, thus no SPARC IV for me.

[cough]TheGIMP[/cough]

[cough]color management[/cough] [cough]rgb/16[/cough] [cough]etc.[/cough]

:brokenheart:

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: bersl2

Originally posted by: ProviaFan

Originally posted by: bersl2

Originally posted by: ProviaFan
For enterprise applications for which one can find ports to the SPARC IV architecture, then it's certainly something to be considered, though I have no experience there so won't comment. Unfortunately, as much as I'm a glutton for unusual or rare computing devices, Photoshop won't run on anything except Mac or Wintel/MD, so demands of work win over desire for the exotic, thus no SPARC IV for me.

[cough]TheGIMP[/cough]

[cough]color management[/cough] [cough]rgb/16[/cough] [cough]etc.[/cough]

:brokenheart:

I thought GIMP was supposed to get some/most of those features in a recent upgrade, which would have put it in the "plenty good enough" category for me. Unfortunately, it still lacked some things which are important to me as a digital photographer, the last time I checked. Also, do you know if there is an open source solution for monitor calibration? Something that will take a colorimeter such as the Eye One Display 2 and perform the functions of the Windows-only software that comes with it?

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: thecoolnessrune
Which of these processors gives the best performance. And I do realise that I could setup 72 UltraSPARC IV processors but I don't have 3 million dollars. What would perform best in a 2way system???

I was just discussing this very thing yesterday...most of the IT guys I know are saying that the chips that will be hurt most by the Opteron aren't made by Intel...they are the UltraSparks. Both HP and Sun now know this, which is why they have begun adopting the Opteron so quickly!
The choice is Opteron by a fairly large margin...Xeons of course are no competition, nor can they be for at least 2 years.

 

[AMDrulZ]

Opteron is buy far the better choice. It has a faster bus than any intel xeon system. And the Opterons can communicate with one to the other much better than xeon. like other's said by hypertransport. And yes the bandwidth goes up with the more opterons you add. And i think i read some where that you can have more than 8 opterons but you have to use an additional chipset that disables the chipset functions in the opterons core. but it slows down some of the performance. not 100% sure but i will check it out!!!

 

[imported_michaelpatrick33]

Originally posted by: AMDrulZ
Opteron is buy far the better choice. It has a faster bus than any intel xeon system. And the Opterons can communicate with one to the other much better than xeon. like other's said by hypertransport. And yes the bandwidth goes up with the more opterons you add. And i think i read some where that you can have more than 8 opterons but you have to use an additional chipset that disables the chipset functions in the opterons core. but it slows down some of the performance. not 100% sure but i will check it out!!!

Right now with dualcore Opterons at 2.2 we can have 16 dualcore Opterons in an eightway configuration out of the box. If we wanted 2.4 or 2.6 Opterons in a greater than a eighway configurations your ideas/suppositions still apply. What a dilemna to have, LOL.