Workstation build I7 or Xeon?

[Adam Glover]

Hello,

 

I am building/upgrading from my 5yr old Xeon machine. (For Max, Vray, PS, AE)

 

I am stuck as to which way to go, even after reading dozens of pages of discussion on the web.

 

I was initially looking at:

 

Mobo- Tyan S7025

CPU- 2x Intel Xeon E5649 / 2.53 GHz processors

Mem- 24GB of triple channel DDR3 RAM " 1333

GPU- AMD ATI FirPro V8800 (for Vray RT and maybe creating the odd 3D content).

 

The rest will be my existing SSD, case etc..

 

Budget was around £2800

 

But will a single Core i7-980x system be better?

I'm a bit stuck, could someone offer some advice please?

 

Or even give a tally as to which is most popular with everyone?

 

Thanks Ad

[AJLynn]

The 5649 is a 6-core, right? That would come out faster than a single 980 for rendering and slower for everything else. Up to you which is preferable. For GPU rendering I actually wouldn't choose that generation of FirePro, because it's not ATI's newest GPU and it's putting the money into features that make the display in Max run faster instead of the GPU renderer. For what you're talking about I'd advise a 3gb Geforce 580 (not 590) card, and if you want to improve things a bit, dedicate that card to GPU rendering only but don't run a monitor on it, and add an ATI card (so the CUDA subsystem can only run on the dedicated card) to plug the monitor into.

[Adam Glover]

Hi Andrew

 

Thanks very much for replying. Your advice is greatly appreciated.

I hope you don't mind but I have a couple more questions before I build.

 

1st I think I was a little unclear in my description of the I7. Its a single - i7-980x (six core) chip. Sorry I realized after I posted.

Will this change anything? The 2 Xeons still preferable to render quicker?

 

I'd not considered two graphics cards. Dedicating 1 for rendering and using one to drive my displays - is this difficult to do?

 

I will take your advice on the 3GB GForce 580 card.

The AMD V5900 looks new/ good for the displays, what do you think?

 

I thought of swapping the mobo to the intel S5520SC as it can take more RAM in the future, I'm not too savvy with mobo's would you see a problem with this one or know of any better ones?

 

And last of all i've only built quad core desktops in the past, is there anything I should know about attempting a workstation?

(Apart from having to re-mortgage to pay for it)

 

Thanks again,

 

Adam

[AJLynn]

Adam, I'll get to the rest of your questions later, but being quick right now - for rendering, when the chips are of the same class (as this i7 and this Xeon are) add the total GHz in the box to get an idea of the render speed. For the dual six core Xeon, multiply the clock speed (2.something ghz) by 12. For the i7, multiply the 3.33 ghz by 6. The xeon's going to render faster. But for other purposes, like running the Max user interface or photoshop or things like that, the software can't use all those cores, it's not a sufficiently parallelizable task, so the speed of a single core is controlling and the i7 is faster.

 

The v5900 - yes, I like that one, it's current generation and a good value pick if a "workstation" card is what you want. A Radeon or Geforce will run Max but some people prefer a "certified" video card. Two video cards isn't hard. Just out the display card in the primary slot and the CUDA card in the second slot and don't give the CUDA card a monitor.

[Adam Glover]

Thanks Andrew, will be going down the Xeon route me thinks.

Look forward to hearing the other answers in your own time.

 

Cheers

Ad

[Tommy L]

Thanks Andrew, will be going down the Xeon route me thinks.

Look forward to hearing the other answers in your own time.

 

Cheers

Ad

 

Get the rendering tasks off your workstation. You have a decent rig specified there, but I'd seriously look at building two lower end machines. One for cpu power only, to render on. Other wise you are spending extra money to have a machine that renders fast..only to tie your hands whilst it is rendering. Its your hands that make the money.

[tecton3d]

Its your hands that make the money.

 

*nerd alert*

 

reminds me of what someone else named St. Benedict said: ""for then are they monks in truth, if they live by the work of their hands":

[Adam Glover]

Cheers Tommy,

 

I see your point.

Think its turned into an entire new workstation now instead of an upgrade. So I will be able to use my old one also.

 

Andrew, did you have chance to check out my other questions yet?

Also do I have to have ECC reg - RAM?

 

Thanks all

 

Ad

[Tommy L]

Cheers Tommy,

 

I see your point.

Think its turned into an entire new workstation now instead of an upgrade. So I will be able to use my old one also.

 

Andrew, did you have chance to check out my other questions yet?

Also do I have to have ECC reg - RAM?

 

Thanks all

 

Ad

 

yeah, its kinda counter-intuitive though. You need the nodes to be more powerful than the workstation. You need a good graphics card in the workstation then CPU grunt in the node. My nodes are 2600k's and my workstation is an i7-920.

[AJLynn]

Um, okay, where was I...

 

RAM: If you go with dual CPUs, get a 5520 board. I can't think of any of these that can't take more than enough RAM for whatever you're going to do. Remember, if you go with an 1155 board memory is in groups of two because there are two channels. An i7-9xx series (single 1366 board) takes memory in groups of three because there are three channels. But a dual 1366 Xeon board means you need to install memory in matched sets of six because there are six channels (three per CPU).

 

ECC: Many Xeon boards require it. Check the spec. If it's not required, don't bother, because in real use it offers no advantage.

 

MBs: Make sure it has enough PCIE lanes available for the video cards.

 

What Tom said: He makes a good point. If you offload render tasks onto another computer, your workstation remains available to work on. If you can budget it, a workstation with an 1155 board, a decent video card, a 2600 CPU and 16GB, plus render nodes with whatever CPU power you want and sufficient RAM (and pathetic video cards and hard drives) is a reasonable approach.

[Adam Glover]

Thanks,

 

Lots to consider then.

 

To be honest I understand where Tom is coming from. At this point I rarely need two computers as I render everything over night, which works fine for me.

It will be something I bare in mind in the future though thanks Tom.

 

"But a dual 1366 Xeon board means you need to install memory in matched sets of six because there are six channels (three per CPU)."

- So you mean 3 x 4GB Modules of triple channel Memory per CPU for example?

 

Thanks again for your help guys would have really struggled without your input!

 

Ad

[AJLynn]

Yes - in a dual Xeon system on a socket 1366 board (such as the 5520 boards) you need six, 12 or 18 identical DIMMs. (Preferably buy them as a package so you know you got the same thing.)

[Adam Glover]

Hi Andrew,

 

I've got most of the components through now just waiting on the motherboard. - (I chose a Supermicro X8DAI in the end) This ok?

 

I have one last question before I start this build.

 

Your earlier comment was to put the ATI V5900 in the primary PCIe slot with the displays plugged into, and the GFX 580 3GB in the secondary slot for the CUDA.

 

I'm new to this type of setup and there fore my troubleshooting abilities won't be great.

Are there any special settings I need to configure regarding Max or windows or the way the drivers are used etc or will your above instruction allow a simple plug and play?

If there is a dummy's guide to this out there, I would feel a lot less nervous?

 

Thanks again

 

Adam

Edited August 27, 2011 by Adam Glover

[AJLynn]

It should be fine. If windows complains it will be because it doesn't want to activate a GPU with no display - I'm pretty sure they fixed that in newer Windows versions - but if that happens, there are a bunch of workaround tricks to be found on the net.