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Xeon E5xxx Servies VS i7

Forum CPU & Components : CPUs - Xeon E5xxx Servies VS i7

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Dariusz   08-29-2009 at 05:56:02 PM

Hello

Im thinking of building new rendering farm for 3ds max/after effect etc and I duno what to take... the 2x E5xxx series on Nehelem core, probably e5520/5530(thy so expensive) or the i7 proc and simply OC it to 4ghz.... + 12 gb triple chanel memory 1tb hdd

From other hand can I also OC Xeons to rach 3ghz? ~~

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sportsfanboy   08-29-2009 at 06:04:52 PM
- 0 +

I would go with a single OC i7 for the best value, and 2 hard drives. Read with one drive and write to the other for best performance.

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obsidian86   08-29-2009 at 06:57:52 PM
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the i7 based xeons afe the w35xx xeons

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Bronze CPUs badge cjl   08-29-2009 at 08:46:37 PM
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obsidian86 wrote :

the i7 based xeons afe the w35xx xeons



Partially true - the 5500 series Xeons are also Nehalem based.

------------------------------ Asus P6T deluxe
i7 965 @ 4.2GHz (200*21), 1.384V
12GB Corsair Dominator DDR3-1600 CAS 7
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UltraO   08-29-2009 at 08:49:38 PM
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Both are true, but the Xeon 5xxx aren't they dual cores? :??:

Reply to UltraO
Bronze CPUs badge cjl   08-29-2009 at 09:20:42 PM
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Not all of them, no. This one is a quad, for example: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819117179

As for the OPs question, a pair of E5530s will be faster than pretty much any OC i7 you could get, assuming a well-threaded task (which should be true for rendering).

------------------------------ Asus P6T deluxe
i7 965 @ 4.2GHz (200*21), 1.384V
12GB Corsair Dominator DDR3-1600 CAS 7
 Reply to cjl
Dariusz   08-29-2009 at 09:33:23 PM
- 0 +

Heya


ERrr from what I know Xeon W series = SINGLE SOCKET CPU only (1 mobo 1 cpu 1 socket) where for E series we can have DUAL SOCKET CPU (1 mobo 2 cpu 2 sockets) I will be posting soon threat again.. or ill edid this1 if i can with full PC Specs..

Btw cjl so you saying that 2x E5530/E5520 will be > i7 3,5/4 ghz ? if yes thats great :D

Pc will be mainly for After Effect /Photoshop/3Ds max...but also in free time for some Hight End Games... :)

Reply to Dariusz
Bronze CPUs badge cjl   08-30-2009 at 01:28:07 AM
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W series can be dual socket - the W5580 is a dual socket CPU. W vs E is more determined by the TDP - W series are 130W.

As for the other question, 2xE5530 will be faster than 1 i7 3.5-4GHz in well threaded tasks only. For rendering and simulation, it will absolutely be faster, but it will almost definitely be slower for gaming than the i7 due to the lower clockspeed.

------------------------------ Asus P6T deluxe
i7 965 @ 4.2GHz (200*21), 1.384V
12GB Corsair Dominator DDR3-1600 CAS 7
 Reply to cjl
Dariusz   08-31-2009 at 06:22:02 PM
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HEya

cjl umh...yea but thats the only 1 W series processor that can go in dual..http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=37113&code=Intel%c2%ae+Xeon%c2%ae+Processor+W5580+(8M+Cache%2c+3.20+GHz%2c+6.40+GT%2fs+Intel%c2%ae+QPI)

The ohter one for example W3520 cant :(

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Bronze CPUs badge cjl   08-31-2009 at 06:43:58 PM
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Look at the numbers though to determine socket capability. 55xx series CPUs are dual socket capable, 35xx are not. L/E/X/W tell you the power usage. L cpus are rated at 60W, E at 80W, X at 95W, and W at 130W. This holds true for all Nehalem based Xeons (5500/3500 series) - it will vary on older models though.

Oh, and both the W5580 (i7-965 equivalent) and W5590 (i7-975 equivalent) are dual socket capable.

------------------------------ Asus P6T deluxe
i7 965 @ 4.2GHz (200*21), 1.384V
12GB Corsair Dominator DDR3-1600 CAS 7
 Reply to cjl
Dariusz   08-31-2009 at 07:28:50 PM
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oh right thats W 5xxx wrrr im blind sory ! :s

ok so in that case...E5520 / E 5530 is my future tool...from other hand.... can we OC xeons? :x Im thinking of getting this mobo Asus Serverboard Z8pe-d18

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Bronze CPUs badge cjl   08-31-2009 at 07:37:39 PM
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Overclocking is motherboard dependent, but I'd be surprised if you could on pretty much any board out there. Despite that, multi socket will still be faster for rendering and the like, and slower for gaming.

------------------------------ Asus P6T deluxe
i7 965 @ 4.2GHz (200*21), 1.384V
12GB Corsair Dominator DDR3-1600 CAS 7
 Reply to cjl
azraffi   09-26-2009 at 12:25:35 PM
- -1 +

Xeon is "workstation" chipset... i7 is " Home @ family @ gaming " chipset....xeon is suitable for extreme working atmosphere..for example is 3d making( making film like transformer @ 3ds max rendering),factory machine.Even its slow..but its have high performance when doing extremely work for example is no lag when doing 3d modelling stable when rendering 3d.......i7 is power..but can't doing extreme task like XEON...its just for gaming and home intertainment...so..if u just want to play game...its better for u to get i7...if you doing 3d works like animation rendering...its better to get intel xeon...i already use xeon E5520 nahalem...and its run so nice...i also play game like COD and else, and its run soooooo fine..

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Dariusz   09-26-2009 at 01:29:11 PM
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o humh so then... since I finnaly find some1 with xeon... can u OC it? :D

Message quoted 1 times
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MU_Engineer   09-26-2009 at 06:35:04 PM
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Dariusz wrote :

o humh so then... since I finnaly find some1 with xeon... can u OC it? :D

 

Yes and no. There are generally no BIOS options to overclock anything in dual-socket motherboards- no Bclk, Vcore, Vdimm, or memory timing adjustments. The most you might be able to do is decrease the RAM strap from DDR3-1066 to DDR3-800. However, you can use some purely software tools to twiddle the Bclk via messing with the clock generator chip. Some people have had success with that, but I do not know that the boards have bus locks like a lot of consumer boards do, so you may have to be careful with how much you raise the Bclk, else your PCIe peripherals and disk controllers quit working. You also may be able to do a pin mod to increase the CPU's Vcore as well.

 

All in all, I'd not try to overclock a server board, but there are some limited, highly-unofficial ways to overclock them if you really, really want to.


Message edited by MU_Engineer on 09-26-2009 at 06:42:49 PM
------------------------------ Upcoming Overdue Build: Dual-socket workstation, ~32 GB DDR3, OS on a fast SSD, high-end GPU, all wrapped up in a huge tower case. Coming H2 2011.

Yes, I am actually still running the Pentium III 1.0B Coppermine in the picture.
 Reply to MU_Engineer
Dariusz   09-26-2009 at 06:51:14 PM
- 0 +

humh well thats bad... I was hoping that once I got my xeon I will be able to OC it a lil bit to get 2.5-3ghz :/ well in that case... any1 know how does thinks looks like on asus Z8PE-D18?
http://uk.asus.com/product.aspx?P_ID=sqbdCm0nmFxn3sS4

Reply to Dariusz
V_masters   10-09-2009 at 11:54:30 PM
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Actually, Xeon CPU's are overclockable... I'm running two Harpertown's E5410 X 2 (originaly 2.33Ghz, oc'd to 2.8Ghz) on Asus W7S board, runs very stable with heavy loading (compositing in AE CS4, exporting media in Adobe Encoder and running Premiere). I also read that Intel Skultrail oc's very well as well.

Message quoted 1 times
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Bronze CPUs badge cjl   10-10-2009 at 12:31:03 AM
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The CPUs are overclockable, but the workstation boards don't typically have the options in the BIOS.

------------------------------ Asus P6T deluxe
i7 965 @ 4.2GHz (200*21), 1.384V
12GB Corsair Dominator DDR3-1600 CAS 7
 Reply to cjl
Dariusz   10-10-2009 at 08:19:18 PM
- 0 +

humh V_masters I was trying to find ur mobo but I cant... only laptops come up can you meybe post link to it? Also the Skultrail is old mobo and dont support Nehelem from what I can saw soo I dont think I'm gona get this mobo...

cjl yap unfortunatly thats right...but I heart that you might be able to do soft oc using some Software from windows... duno if it will work tho :/

Reply to Dariusz
MU_Engineer   10-11-2009 at 05:23:15 PM
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V_masters wrote :

Actually, Xeon CPU's are overclockable... I'm running two Harpertown's E5410 X 2 (originaly 2.33Ghz, oc'd to 2.8Ghz) on Asus W7S board, runs very stable with heavy loading (compositing in AE CS4, exporting media in Adobe Encoder and running Premiere). I also read that Intel Skultrail oc's very well as well.



Let me bet- did you do the BSEL pin mod to crank the FSB speed up from 333 MHz (1333) to 400 MHz (1600)? Your E5410 has a multiplier of 7x and 7x400 would give you 2.80 GHz, so that seems pretty likely. The BSEL mod is generally considered a stable tweak as it doesn't mess with the PCIe bus or memory speeds due to the chip requesting a higher but still officially supported FSB clock speed.

Unfortunately, I don't think there is anything like the BSEL mod for Opterons or IMC-enabled Xeons. All Opterons have a base clock of 200 MHz and I don't think there are any CPU pin values that can change it. All Nehalems run at a 133 MHz Bclk and I don't know if there are pin settings to change the Bclk like there is with the BSEL on older FSB-enabled Xeons. My guess is you'd have to do the clock chip twiddling to overclock these CPUs.

------------------------------ Upcoming Overdue Build: Dual-socket workstation, ~32 GB DDR3, OS on a fast SSD, high-end GPU, all wrapped up in a huge tower case. Coming H2 2011.

Yes, I am actually still running the Pentium III 1.0B Coppermine in the picture.
 Reply to MU_Engineer
ZeroNeed   10-19-2009 at 09:18:07 PM
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I was in the process of building my dream system when my significant other caught the vacation bug.

I purchased:

2 - Xeon w5590 3.33ghz
1 - SuperMicro X8DAL - i Motherboard
6 - 4GB sticks of Crucial DDR3 (24GB Total)

Luckily, everything is still sealed in the retail packaging. Guess what is going on eBay later this week... :( I am hoping for $3k for it all, but I see $2700 in my future.

I looked at the i7 975's and it was a tough choice between them, but it is very hard to beat dual w5590's. Ehh, one day I will build my dream system.

Reply to ZeroNeed
Dariusz   10-20-2009 at 02:20:46 AM
- 0 +

hello

Can you mb explain a bit more what you mean by that bug ? Didnt catch it o.o And did you put it on ebay already ? :]

Reply to Dariusz
sagartotal3ds   10-20-2009 at 05:13:27 AM
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Hi i also have a same configuration what you are looking for and Trust me its worth it

Reply to sagartotal3ds
ZeroNeed   10-20-2009 at 08:39:28 PM
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Yeah, she is worn out between going to college full time and working full time. She wants to take a week off from both and go either to Grand Cayman or Las Vegas. Since I do not want to take another $3k - $4k hit to my savings, my dream system has to go. It is not on eBay yet. I will more than likely put it on Saturday or Sunday.

JD

Reply to ZeroNeed
Dariusz   10-20-2009 at 09:31:31 PM
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oh o well... then... how much you want for ur xeons? :]

Reply to Dariusz
ZeroNeed   10-21-2009 at 03:45:13 PM
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I hope I can see $3k for everything. I know I have over $4k in.

Reply to ZeroNeed
one-shot   10-22-2009 at 10:58:41 AM
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Are you selling it as parts or all together?

------------------------------ Antec P182, i7 920 3.7Ghz @ 1.3V, Xigmatek 1283, Asus P6T X58, 3 x 2048MB OCZ Plat DDR3 1600 RAM, 2 EVGA GTX260 Core 216 in SLI, WD 160gb,320GB 1TB WD Black. Corsair 750TX. Acer 24" Monitor. Vista x64 Home Premium.
 Reply to one-shot
ZeroNeed   10-22-2009 at 02:26:12 PM
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All together; 2 Xeons, motherboard, and 24GB of RAM.

Reply to ZeroNeed
Dariusz   10-22-2009 at 02:48:03 PM
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Oh thats too baad :/ Id mb grab that xeons... duno :]

Reply to Dariusz
ZeroNeed   11-06-2009 at 03:19:20 AM
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The w5590's are on eBay. $1480 each

Reply to ZeroNeed
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