Re: [PLUG] RAID6 or RAID5+HS?

["Keith C. Perry" <kperry@daotechnologies.com>]

Not as much as the "old days"...

Opterons are rated for a high duty cycle but that is a debatable metric.  I don't see how an FX or A series proc would not be able to run 24/7 for just as long.  When it comes to segmented and virtual computing, Opterons can be put into NUMA builds but I don't know if that is just because no one makes NUMA mobo's for FX or A series CPUs or if those have a technical limitation.  Opterons top out at more cores too but I'm sure if AMD wanted to put more cores in the FX or A series they probably could.

Personally I think more "server" CPUs are going to have to become more like the A series- scaler and vector cores on one processor.  There are real physical constraints with having to have GPUs to computer fabrics in a meaningful way without exceeding power and thermal needs.  As compiler and processor manufacturer get us closer to where planning jobs onto the right core type is done without special software and programming techniques, its going to start making sense to have some GPU processing on servers even if you're not intending to build out a GPU compute.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 
Keith C. Perry, MS E.E. 
Owner, DAO Technologies LLC 
(O) +1.215.525.4165 x2033 
(M) +1.215.432.5167 
www.daotechnologies.com

----- Original Message -----
From: "Rich Freeman" <r-plug@thefreemanclan.net>
To: "Philadelphia Linux User's Group Discussion List" <plug@lists.phillylinux.org>
Sent: Monday, August 22, 2016 2:54:54 PM
Subject: Re: [PLUG] RAID6 or RAID5+HS?

On Mon, Aug 22, 2016 at 2:43 PM, Keith C. Perry
<kperry@daotechnologies.com> wrote:
> Being primarily an AMD user I almost never have an ECC system but I've also
> never had enough for a failure that when I deconstructed the event the
> answer was add ECC RAM.  I'm also hoping AMD makes their ECC support more
> visible if for no other reason than to force Intel to do the same.  That
> will ultimately drive prices down because there is really no reason not to
> use ECC RAM if the performance and price is right.
>

With AMD the CPUs tend to support it across the board (I imagine
anything but the real low-end stuff); I suspect it probably works if
your CPU cost more than $30.  I imagine most motherboards work but
these almost never have it on their specs, and that is the main gap.
With AMD the Northbridge is on the CPU (I forget if Intel has fully
gone this route or not).

With Intel the CPU support is only at the very high end.  If you spent
less than $400 on your CPU I suspect it probably doesn't work.  I
haven't bought an Intel motherboard in eons so I'm not sure how those
work; I know they used to keep a lot of top-down control over their
motherboards in the past and that would probably make it easier to
tell what supports ECC.  Granted, people spending $700 on a CPU are
more likely to care whether it supports ECC, and are probably more
inclined to buy the RAM.  However, I don't know that it is really a
feature buyers really focus on until you get to Xeon/Opteron systems.

So, here is another question: Just what does a Xeon/Opteron actually
get you these days?  I've never really had any interest in the
server-class CPUs and could never figure out why people pay so much
for them.

-- 
Rich
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