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wazow
Apprentice
Joined: 08 Jan 2004
Posts: 182
Location: Rødovre, Denmark
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 Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2004 2:25 pm Post subject: server configuration for heavy research computations |
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I am going to setup a linux box (most likely gentoo, but may happen differently) in several weeks for research purposes (at university). This is *not* going to be a file server, nor a web server, nor a mail server. Most likely no GUI front-end either. Just a text console, most of the administration done remotely.
The person responsible for buying suggested the following configuration from Dell (Danish division):
PowerEdge 1600SC - IDE (PE1012)
Support for 2 Xeon processorer, 533MHz FSB
Single channel Ultra 320 SCSI kontroller
integrated 10/100/1000 Gigabit NIC
6 stk PCI cardslots -
2x64-bit/100MHz (PCI-X), 2x64-bit/66MHz, 2x32-bit/33MHz
4 stk 1" IDE diskspaces (max 480GB)
3.5" 1.44MB floppy, Dell OpenManage & IT Assistant
keyboard, mouse
Intel Xeon DP 3,2GHz processor, 533MHz FSB - 2MB cache
4GB DDR SDRAM ECC 266MHz (4x1GB)
Non-Redundant Power Supply
160GB IDE Harddisk (7.200rpm, 1")
DVD-ROM, 16x
The machine is going to be used for data intensive computations (manipulation of large data structures in RAM), on ad hoc basis for several users.
Can anybody forsee any problems with running Linux on it? Or Gentoo specifically? What kind of improvements can you suggest?
This machine has 2MB FSB cache. Is it a real advantage comparing to stronger machines (PowerEdge 1800 series), which only have 1MB?
I will be grateful for any comments. We have to make the purchase next week. |
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Mattwolf7
n00b
Joined: 14 Mar 2004
Posts: 73
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| Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2004 2:43 pm Post subject: |
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Personally I wouldn't go with Intel Xeons. A Dual Opteron system would be more bang for your bucks. Because if you are running this in 32-bit mode a Xeon doesn't have native 32-bit support. It emulates it.
And why are you running it on a 160gb IDE disk when you have a SCSI controller? That would speed up the machine a lot.
But as far as I can tell the machine you are looking at right now should work fine with Gentoo. |
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wazow
Apprentice
Joined: 08 Jan 2004
Posts: 182
Location: Rødovre, Denmark
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| Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2004 2:51 pm Post subject: |
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| Mattwolf7 wrote: | | Personally I wouldn't go with Intel Xeons. A Dual Opteron system would be more bang for your bucks. Because if you are running this in 32-bit mode a Xeon doesn't have native 32-bit support. It emulates it. |
This sounds interesting, I can't immediately see if Dell has Opteron based machines. This might be the reason. Would it help a lot if I asked to add another Xeon?
Just out of curiosity: can one run Linux on Xeon in 64-bits? Not that I want to administer it then...
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And why are you running it on a 160gb IDE disk when you have a SCSI controller? That would speed up the machine a lot.
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Hmm, actually I thought these was planned to be an IDE machine, so it surprised me that the SCSI controller made it to a final config spit out by www.dell.dk. I will check it up again. Wouldn't it mainly speedup rebooting? The computations we run do not rely on disk too heavily. Well, perhaps except for portage, if I manage to run gentoo on the machine. |
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duhblow7
n00b
Joined: 04 Sep 2004
Posts: 37
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| Posted: Tue Jun 14, 2005 12:35 am Post subject: |
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i know i'm 10 years late but...
i don't know if it's possible to get Dell's OpenManage software working on gentoo. Dell releases it for RedHat, but so far i'm unsuccessful with Gentoo. (i found this thread by searching for OpenManage).
if the RAID array management software isn't important forget i posted this
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lenkki
n00b
Joined: 03 Mar 2004
Posts: 55
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| Posted: Tue Jun 14, 2005 1:41 pm Post subject: |
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As far as I remember, intel has been better at the kind of computations you expect of doing (simply because the higher clockspeeds, but that might have changed with the introduction of 64bit systems). Although myself an AMD fan would go with the dual opteron as mentioned before. Simply because the 32bit support from AMD blows intels 32bit emulation thinggie out of the window and the 64bit performance blows intel back to last year  . And you get the option to upgrade your system to 2x dualcore opterons for a total of 4 processing units.
Also from your configuration I think you could have a bottleneck at the memory speed, only running at 266mhz. I would go with the highest speed DDR1 ram you can find that is ECC (highest I found was 400mhz).
Dell doesnt supply systems with AMD processor, and frankly and this is just IMHO Dell sucks.
If you are sure that diskperformance is of no importance I don't see why you couldn't go with ide disks. Otherwise I'd recommend SCSI (This assumes you won't be using your swap memory ;D ).
Also if the data on the disks is critical you might consider some kind of backup plan and maybe a raid1 system to keep the box running even if one disk would fail. You can run raid1 in software for a a few cpu cycles extra when accessing the disk, if you don't want to buy a raid controller.
I assume this is taken care by dell as it is a server machine they are selling but... make sure it's well ventilated having a server machine run under full load constantly is going to generate some heat  especially if it's intel. That said I would go with another distributor who provides AMD based systems. Doing a custom job might not be feasible for a university.
That said I reserve the right to stab anyone who recommends another dell
edit: I fail at spelling |
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frameRATE
Guru
Joined: 28 Apr 2003
Posts: 386
Location: Orange County California
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