Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.overclocking.amd (More info?)

Hello all,

Does anyone know where to get a fair benchmark comparison
between a Precision 670 and other equivalent Workstation system?

Because I think they just happen not to be extremelly
trustworthy anywhere:

- Apple claims their G5 is faster than Dell Precision 650.
http://www.apple.com/powermac/
- Sun claims their "Sun Java Workstation W2100z" AMD-based
system is faster than an equivalent Precision 650.
http://www.sun.com/desktop/workstation/w2100z/

Although all these statements are not contradictory, everyone
appears to fight competing against Dell Precision 650, this makes
me induce (as 650 is being used as THE reference) and considering
Precision 670 improved over the 650, 670 has to be the best :-)

I just bought and waiting to receive a new Precision 670:

------------------------
Dual Xeon 3.2GHz/800Mhz/1MB
2GB RAM DDR2 400 ECC Dual Channel
Intel E7525 chipset EM64T
128MB PCI-E ATI FIREGL V3100 (ELGA)
80GB SATA HDD 7200rpm
36GB SCSI HDD 10K rpm
16X DVD +/- RW + Soft
16X DVD ROM
UtraSharp FP 20''
Win XP Pro SP2
------------------------

No RAID though, but will most likely upgrade with time to
a SCSI RAID-0 of SCSI 15K rmp drives.

I am willing to exchange benchmarks and reports ... I have Sandra
Lite 2005 and PerformanceTest v4, can create baselines ...

Best Regards,
Giovanni

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.overclocking.amd (More info?)

Giovanni Azua wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> Does anyone know where to get a fair benchmark comparison
> between a Precision 670 and other equivalent Workstation system?
>
> Because I think they just happen not to be extremelly
> trustworthy anywhere:
>
> - Apple claims their G5 is faster than Dell Precision 650.
> http://www.apple.com/powermac/
> - Sun claims their "Sun Java Workstation W2100z" AMD-based
> system is faster than an equivalent Precision 650.
> http://www.sun.com/desktop/workstation/w2100z/
>
> Although all these statements are not contradictory, everyone
> appears to fight competing against Dell Precision 650, this makes
> me induce (as 650 is being used as THE reference) and considering
> Precision 670 improved over the 650, 670 has to be the best :-)
>
> I just bought and waiting to receive a new Precision 670:
>
> ------------------------
> Dual Xeon 3.2GHz/800Mhz/1MB
> 2GB RAM DDR2 400 ECC Dual Channel
> Intel E7525 chipset EM64T
> 128MB PCI-E ATI FIREGL V3100 (ELGA)
> 80GB SATA HDD 7200rpm
> 36GB SCSI HDD 10K rpm
> 16X DVD +/- RW + Soft
> 16X DVD ROM
> UtraSharp FP 20''
> Win XP Pro SP2
> ------------------------
>
> No RAID though, but will most likely upgrade with time to
> a SCSI RAID-0 of SCSI 15K rmp drives.
>
> I am willing to exchange benchmarks and reports ... I have Sandra
> Lite 2005 and PerformanceTest v4, can create baselines ...
>
> Best Regards,
> Giovanni
>
>
>

Awesome rig :-) Why not post some benchmark numbers while youre at it.

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.overclocking.amd (More info?)

> Awesome rig :-) Why not post some benchmark numbers while youre at it.
>
Thanks, I will, within the first hour when I receive it next
tusday :-)

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.overclocking.amd (More info?)

Giovanni Azua wrote:
> Does anyone know where to get a fair benchmark comparison
> between a Precision 670 and other equivalent Workstation system?

Depends what you're wanting to do with it, and what you're wanting to
compare it to. If you buy a dual-CPU system, then it's usually for a reason.
The only difference I can see between the 670 and the 650 (keeping in mind
that there's a huge number of variations of these two) is that the 670 has a
200MHz FSb compared to the 133Mhz FSB of the 650.

If you want a somewhat media-centric comparison, Hexus.Net has one between
Xeon 3.4 Nocona and an Opteron 250 based machines:
http://www.hexus.net/content/revie [...] d19JRD04Mj
I=
Anandtech has an article for 3.6's vs 250's:
http://www.anandtech.com/printarticle.aspx?i=2205
There's also lots here:
http://www.google.com/search?q=nocona+vs+Opteron


General consensus is that the FSB boost helps, but it's still not enough.
The 3.6 Noconas are fairly close to the 250's in some tests, behind in
others, but very rarely take the lead.

As far as the other bits of the system, it's more or less the same, given
that everything else is pretty option-able (large range of GPUs, HDDs,
screens, etc).

[...]

--
Michael Brown
www.emboss.co.nz : OOS/RSI software and more
Add michael@ to emboss.co.nz - My inbox is always open

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.overclocking.amd (More info?)

Hello Michael,

> Depends what you're wanting to do with it, and what you're wanting to
> compare it to. If you buy a dual-CPU system, then it's usually for a
reason.
> The only difference I can see between the 670 and the 650 (keeping in mind
> that there's a huge number of variations of these two) is that the 670 has
a
> 200MHz FSb compared to the 133Mhz FSB of the 650.
>
I think the FSB speed of Precision 670 is actually 800Mhz, isn't it?

I needed this config (Dual Xeon 3.2) mainly because I develop computation
intensive applications with Oracle. At any time I can have Oracle Server
doing very intensive batch operations along with Eclipse or JDeveloper
debugging, the PL/SQL development environment (TOAD) and even any
Application Server running as well and many other Java development
tools and plugins. I plan to develop and test using OS Virtual Machine
(VMWare) running Linux and XP simultaneously and interoperating.

The two processors I included actually to really evaluate, find out
and benchmark Oracle parallelizing long running SQL statements and
PL/SQL processes, this is also why I include SCSI drives in my
config (but unfortunately could not afford the RAID system at this
time, can upgrade later on).

I developed some time ago a multi-threading C++ application and would
like to continue its development and testing with two (or four i.e. using
HT)
physical CPUs.

When was evaluating what to buy I considered:

- Local hardware house custom built system (considerably more pricy
than the offer I received from DELL indeed!) their warranty offer
was very poor for the investment, one year only.

- The Apple PowerMac G5 but then I have lot of development done
in C++ for Windows that I would like to continue at some point.
I also considered that even though Java Development would be
not a problem using Mac OS X, developing application for Oracle
would be a problem e.g. Oracle is not (I would say) extremelly tested
and used under Mac), my development PL/SQL tools are also only
Windows e.g. QuestSoftware TOAD, Performance Tuning, etc.

- IBM and Sun Worstation, immediately discarded because their prices
are astronomic for a system equivalent to what I selected at DELL, even
with AMD-based processors, their prices are really ridiculously high.
The Sun blade systems were somehow attractive but then I would be
locked-in on Solaris OS.

I negotiated VERY hard with the DELL sales person and got a final price
that I am even affraid to publish here :-) considering the prices in
Switzerland
(I live in Zurich).

Best Regards,
Giovanni

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.overclocking.amd (More info?)

Giovanni Azua wrote:
> Hello Michael,
>
>> Depends what you're wanting to do with it, and what you're wanting to
>> compare it to. If you buy a dual-CPU system, then it's usually for a
>> reason. The only difference I can see between the 670 and the 650
>> (keeping in mind that there's a huge number of variations of these
>> two) is that the 670 has a 200MHz FSb compared to the 133Mhz FSB of
>> the 650.
>
> I think the FSB speed of Precision 670 is actually 800Mhz, isn't it?

800 marketing MHz The actual bus speed is 200MHz with QDR.

> I needed this config (Dual Xeon 3.2) mainly because I develop
> computation intensive applications with Oracle. At any time I can
> have Oracle Server doing very intensive batch operations along with
> Eclipse or JDeveloper debugging, the PL/SQL development environment
> (TOAD) and even any Application Server running as well and many other
> Java development
> tools and plugins. I plan to develop and test using OS Virtual Machine
> (VMWare) running Linux and XP simultaneously and interoperating.

Incidentally, DB and Java work are the Opterons' strongest points

[...]
> - IBM and Sun Worstation, immediately discarded because their prices
> are astronomic for a system equivalent to what I selected at DELL,
> even with AMD-based processors, their prices are really
> ridiculously high. The Sun blade systems were somehow attractive
> but then I would be locked-in on Solaris OS.

This is one thing I didn't mention because I couldn't find any reasonable
data on pricing between the two Also, local pricing and warranties vary
significantly. I don't think it would be too hard to build an Opteron
machine that outperformed the Dell for less if you were in the states, but
then you still have the "problem" of having to fix it yourself if it breaks.
The motherboard/CPU/video card/RAM would probably come with a 3yr+ warranty
(the first two definately), but you have to do all the work when it goes
wrong, as opposed to getting Dell to do it.

And then, you are not in the states If Switzerland is anything like NZ
price-wise, I know exactly how you feel. Prices over here on high-end stuff
are horribly expensive compared to what they "should" be from the exchange
rate alone. If you order a Dell, you're effectively paying US prices instead
of local prices, so this helps the price side of things a lot.

In any case, it sounds like you a fair bit of homework before you bought, so
probably got pretty close to optimal price/performance for your local area.

[...]

--
Michael Brown
www.emboss.co.nz : OOS/RSI software and more
Add michael@ to emboss.co.nz - My inbox is always open

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.overclocking.amd,alt.comp.hardware (More info?)

> I just bought and waiting to receive a new Precision 670:
>
> ------------------------
> Dual Xeon 3.2GHz/800Mhz/1MB
> 2GB RAM DDR2 400 ECC Dual Channel
> Intel E7525 chipset EM64T
> 128MB PCI-E ATI FIREGL V3100 (ELGA)
> 80GB SATA HDD 7200rpm
> 36GB SCSI HDD 10K rpm
> 16X DVD +/- RW + Soft
> 16X DVD ROM
> UtraSharp FP 20''
> Win XP Pro SP2
> ------------------------
>
> No RAID though, but will most likely upgrade with time to
> a SCSI RAID-0 of SCSI 15K rmp drives.
>
> I am willing to exchange benchmarks and reports ... I have Sandra
> Lite 2005 and PerformanceTest v4, can create baselines ...
>
I received my "monster" but I muss confess I am a bit dissapointed
by the performance. Its rating using Passmark's PerformanceTest
is around 450 (this score I reached enabling HT, without HT I got
something like 400) which is less than half!!! of a:

Single AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 3200+
1GB RAM
RADEON X800 XT Platinum Edition
=> which rating is 830.80 ...

http://www.passmark.com/baselines/topten.php

I don't have additional information about this one but
might or seems to be that it has additional features to
score like that e.g. SCSI RAID who knows, for sure I know
its video adapter "RADEON X800 XT Platinum Edition" is
better than mine, but what would justify such huge
overall performance difference?

Additionally using Sandra Lite software I found out
that every single RAM memory chip in my DELL Precision
is from a different vendor!! Hyundai, Samsung, I would
not be surprised to find even Toyota there!! unbelievable!
and DELL even claims "Trust no one else but only DELL
(RAM) when upgrading your DELL systems" !!!

All in all, probably I would have been better off with
a simple 32b AMD-based Athlon system ...

Regards,
Giovanni