[Donahue]

Hello all,

I am looking to get some advice on a new build for our sfd station. I do not personally use the software but I will be the one recommending what we buy and the one setting it up. I am comfortable with normal desktop computers but this will be my first venture into the server side of things. i am hoping i have not overlooked something or given to much attention to the wrong area and neglected the areas i really needed. i have to recommend a budget to work with as well so i am trying to balance cost over performance. i am looking for this cpu to last 5 years.

i am about $4700 so far:
Windows 7 x64
(2) Xeon E5-2650 8 core cpu's
128GB DDR3 1600 ram, non ecc regular gamer quality
supermicro MBD-X9DRH-IF-O Mobo
AMD Firepro v4900 videocard
(2) OCZ Vertex 4 VTX4-25SAT3-512G, 512GB SSD in Raid 1
(2) Dynatron R13 70mm 2 ball bearing CPU cooler (narrow type)
asus generic dvd drive
antec three hundred case
corsair tx650 power supply
MS office 2010 home and business

some of the questions i have is do i have too much ram? or do i need to use the more expensive ecc ram?

i am assuming i can fit all of this into a standard ATX mid tower, am i correct?

is there a better CPU combo?

i am building this to use autodesk's 2013 CFD and we currently use fluent, but i am unsure of the version. we do mostly hot oil modeling.

is there anything i am missing?

thanks in advance for the help.

[evcelica]

You must use windows professional or better to use more than 16GB of RAM, But I'm sure you knew that already.

What type of parallel licenses do you have (how many cores will you actually be able to run) I'd hate to get a 16 core computer and find out I only have enough licenses to run 1 core, or even 8, and I could have gotten 2 higher frequency quad cores for cheaper. 16 licenses for fluent would be a little odd, I don't know about Autodesk CFD though.

The general consensus is there is not a real need for ECC ram. 128GB isn't too much, that's just two 64GB kits, and would be cost around $500 total, so why not.

It would fit in an ATX tower if the motherboard was an ATX motherboard, and its not, so you will have to get a case that accepts extended ATX motherboards, not just standard ATX.

That Power supply only has one 4+4 pin for CPU power, you will need two. I'm not sure if you can use one of the other a PCI-E connector in place of the CPU power, There are differing opinions out there: here is an adapter: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-006-_-Product
You may want to do some more research on if you can do this or not, but The safest thing would be to get a server power supply that has two 4+4 CPU connectors.

I can't tell if that motherboard comes with 6GB/s sata cables or not, but most hard drives don't come with them either, so you might want to get two of those.

[Donahue]

Originally Posted by evcelica

You must use windows professional or better to use more than 16GB of RAM, But I'm sure you knew that already.

What type of parallel licenses do you have (how many cores will you actually be able to run) I'd hate to get a 16 core computer and find out I only have enough licenses to run 1 core, or even 8, and I could have gotten 2 higher frequency quad cores for cheaper. 16 licenses for fluent would be a little odd, I don't know about Autodesk CFD though.

The general consensus is there is not a real need for ECC ram. 128GB isn't too much, that's just two 64GB kits, and would be cost around $500 total, so why not.

It would fit in an ATX tower if the motherboard was an ATX motherboard, and its not, so you will have to get a case that accepts extended ATX motherboards, not just standard ATX.

That Power supply only has one 4+4 pin for CPU power, you will need two. I'm not sure if you can use one of the other a PCI-E connector in place of the CPU power, There are differing opinions out there: here is an adapter: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-006-_-Product
You may want to do some more research on if you can do this or not, but The safest thing would be to get a server power supply that has two 4+4 CPU connectors.

That is good to know about the power supply, that is something i would have missed for sure.

i will also have to take a look at the case, i caught that the mobo was "extended" but i did not really think about it.

as far as i know at this point, the new software ( the Autodesk stuff) does not have any limitations on cores or configurations. i will have to find out about our older software (the fluent).

thanks.

[CapSizer]

Forget about making it last 5 years. You will want to replace it in two years or so. Performance (if mostly in terms of the number of cores) has been escalating far too fast to justify hanging on to old equipment that long. Remember that with CFD, software and manhours cost far more than the hardware. That board is extended ATX, so you will need a chassis that can accomodate it. 128 GB sounds like an awful lot of memory for 16 cores.

[chegdan]

For this type of question, I would also consult pcpartpicker.com. The only drawback is that if you want multiple processor motherboards, pcpartpicker will not be able to help...you're best to check another place for advice (reddit /r/buildapc or on overclockers.com). Hope this is helpful.

[Donahue]

Originally Posted by CapSizer

Forget about making it last 5 years. You will want to replace it in two years or so. Performance (if mostly in terms of the number of cores) has been escalating far too fast to justify hanging on to old equipment that long. Remember that with CFD, software and manhours cost far more than the hardware. That board is extended ATX, so you will need a chassis that can accomodate it. 128 GB sounds like an awful lot of memory for 16 cores.

the 5 years is just an estimate, but i know our current machine is about that old, and that is the life span we are looking at for all of our other CAD stations too, but i am not married to it. with 128GB that is 8GB per core, should this be more like 4GB? our current machine is a single core xeon 3.6GHz with 8GB of ram.

i am finding our about our fluent license but assuming that will be ok.


as for the parts, i am limited to buying through newegg business because of our purchasing department.

[CapSizer]

Originally Posted by Donahue

the 5 years is just an estimate, but i know our current machine is about that old, and that is the life span we are looking at for all of our other CAD stations too, but i am not married to it. with 128GB that is 8GB per core, should this be more like 4GB? our current machine is a single core xeon 3.6GHz with 8GB of ram.

i am finding our about our fluent license but assuming that will be ok.


as for the parts, i am limited to buying through newegg business because of our purchasing department.

We have also at times hung on to old machines for a long time, but the old ones get relegated to "light duties" within two or three years. Even that doesn't make much sense, because of the higher power consumption of an old computer, particularly if it is only working as a license server, for example.

You need to look at the type of work requirement for the amount of memory that will be needed. 4GB / core is quite a sweet spot, in terms of memory cost and availability, as well as being a kind of limit on performance. If you are running such big models that you are actually using around 4 GB/core, chances are that runtimes will be unproductively long, and you need to look at a bigger facility.

Yes, check the Fluent licensing. AFAIK, parallel Fluent licensing these days is available in a sequence of bundles of 8,32,128,512, .... etc parallel processes. So if you have only 8, you won't be able to fully utilise your machine. If you have 32, you won't fully utilise the license.

[Donahue]

Originally Posted by CapSizer

We have also at times hung on to old machines for a long time, but the old ones get relegated to "light duties" within two or three years. Even that doesn't make much sense, because of the higher power consumption of an old computer, particularly if it is only working as a license server, for example.

You need to look at the type of work requirement for the amount of memory that will be needed. 4GB / core is quite a sweet spot, in terms of memory cost and availability, as well as being a kind of limit on performance. If you are running such big models that you are actually using around 4 GB/core, chances are that runtimes will be unproductively long, and you need to look at a bigger facility.

Yes, check the Fluent licensing. AFAIK, parallel Fluent licensing these days is available in a sequence of bundles of 8,32,128,512, .... etc parallel processes. So if you have only 8, you won't be able to fully utilise your machine. If you have 32, you won't fully utilise the license.

i called our ansys rep, and we have only a single license, so we will likely be using the autodesk software a lot more in the future.

[CapSizer]

Originally Posted by Donahue

i called our ansys rep, and we have only a single license, so we will likely be using the autodesk software a lot more in the future.

No parallel Fluent? Eek! You don't need a dual-socket Xeon, you need an overclocked Core-i7.

[Donahue]

Yeah, i will have to get with the engineers actually using it and see which software they want to lean towards. i will also be building new CAD stations with i7's. if they want to stick with the fluent then there may not be any reason to get a dedicated computer for it, or maybe just a second CAD station.

[Donahue]

we are going to be dropping fluent in time to use the autodesk software. does anyone have any thoughts on the hardware i picked out?

[Jaro]

i am about $4700 so far:
Windows 7 x64
(2) Xeon E5-2650 8 core cpu's

For $5k you can build PC with QUAD CPU mainboard and 4 CPUs form AMD - there are new 6300 series Opterons with 16 Cores - from about ~$650 each.
Core to core Intel is faster, but when you compare overall performance and price AMD is not bad option.

128GB DDR3 1600 ram, non ecc regular gamer quality

For CFD (and FEA) ECC and ECC-R (registered) modules are highly recommended. Twice as expensive, but much more reliable. For CFD I personally wouldn't go for Non-ECC.

supermicro MBD-X9DRH-IF-O Mobo
AMD Firepro v4900 videocard

Good choice.

(2) OCZ Vertex 4 VTX4-25SAT3-512G, 512GB SSD in Raid 1

Very good choice.

asus generic dvd drive

I would go for PIONEER or TEAC or other Japanese manufacturer - better quality, more reliable. I have TEAC DVD and BR at home - works perfectly.

antec three hundred case

Have same at home

corsair tx650 power supply

Good brand, consider modular version.

[Donahue]

Originally Posted by Jaro

For $5k you can build PC with QUAD CPU mainboard and 4 CPUs form AMD - there are new 6300 series Opterons with 16 Cores - from about ~$650 each.
Core to core Intel is faster, but when you compare overall performance and price AMD is not bad option.




For CFD (and FEA) ECC and ECC-R (registered) modules are highly recommended. Twice as expensive, but much more reliable. For CFD I personally wouldn't go for Non-ECC.




Good choice.



Very good choice.



I would go for PIONEER or TEAC or other Japanese manufacturer - better quality, more reliable. I have TEAC DVD and BR at home - works perfectly.




Have same at home



Good brand, consider modular version.

unfortunately, i am somewhat limited to ordering from newegg due to our purchasing agreements with them. that being said, they do not carry any of the 6300 series, and they only have 1 mobo (not a great one at that) that can run 4 of the 6200 series. if that mobo was in stock (which it is not) it would be cheaper to run (4) 6276's than the (2) e5-2687w's that i am considering now. but i am not finding much information to compare the two. how would (2) e5-2687w stack up against (4) 6276? the opterons would give me 64 cores and a total of 147.2 ghz total, the xeons would be 32 cores (16 real, 16 virtual) and 121.6 ghz. i am still leaning towards the xeons but i dont have a lot to base my decision off of.

it is interesting that you seem to be the only one claiming ecc ram is needed on this forum. can you tell me what problems i would run into or avoid with ecc ram?

for the hdd's i am now considering a single 120Gb ssd for the os and a pair of 3tb barracuda's in raid 1 for the storage.

for the dvd drive, i am going to be using a drive with 881 reviews with a 4/5 average. but that is such an insignificant part of the build to worry about.

i will need a different case, because the multi cpu boards are either EATX or SSI EEB.

[Donahue]

i have changed the specs since the last i posted them.

now:

ASUS Z9PE-D16/2L MOBO

XEON E5-2687W (2)

COOLER MASTER RR-T812-24PK-R1 (2)

COOLER MASTER SILENT PRO RSA00-AMBAJ3-US

SILVERSTONE TEMJIN SERIES CASE

G SKILL RIPJAW Z 64GB DDR3 1333 (2)

FIREPRO v4900 VIDEO CARD

OCZ VERTEX 3 120GB

SEAGATE BARRACUDA 3TB (2)

LITE-ON LIGHTSCRIBE DVD BURNER

WINDOWS 7 64BIT PRO

OFFICE SUITE 2010 HOME AND BUSINESS

the total is about $6k.

i have also considered the firepro W5000 for the graphics but am unsure if i need it.

[evcelica]

1333MHz RAM?!? No way, go 1600

[Donahue]

Originally Posted by evcelica

1333MHz RAM?!? No way, go 1600

What is better?

128GB of UDIMM 1333 or
64GB of RDIMM 1600

[CapSizer]

Originally Posted by Donahue

What is better?

128GB of UDIMM 1333 or
64GB of RDIMM 1600

Depends on the size of your problem. No use getting 128 GB if you are never going to run problems that need more than 64 GB. By the same token, if you are ever going to need 128 GB, getting only 64 GB would be a bit silly. If you don't need the 128 GB, it is definitely worth getting the faster 1600 MHz memory.

[evcelica]

Why not 128GB of 1600? should cost about $600

[Donahue]

Originally Posted by evcelica

Why not 128GB of 1600? should cost about $600

More like double that, at least for RDIMM