Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2007 13:44:31 -0700 From: Darcy Buskermolen <darcy@ok-connect.com> To: freebsd-performance@freebsd.org Cc: Jack Toering <Jack.Toering@leadingedgeita.com> Subject: Re: Which SMP CPU for FreeBSD 6.2? Message-ID: <200707181344.32037.darcy@ok-connect.com> In-Reply-To: <032101c7c93c$3fe17770$6480010a@DELL9400> References: <029401c7c8af$e5d19c60$6480010a@DELL9400> <20070718120302.GA11968@voi.aagh.net> <032101c7c93c$3fe17770$6480010a@DELL9400>
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On Wednesday 18 July 2007 06:05:00 Jack Toering wrote: > >You probably don't need to follow every move, but it might make sense to > > do > > some actual research if performance matters to you? You don't even say > what your performance critical server is going to be doing ;)< > > At the moment I'm not too sure either. :) The reason I say this is we have > a 246 Dual Opteron that is handling 15,000 unique visitors an hour pulling > data from around the world, generating weather maps, and pounding MySQL. > It has no problems. There is host a large hotel site on the same server > that is doing 900 and hour. 2/3 of the bandwidth is inbound to make the > calculations. It took us a lot off tweaking to get it where it is today. > > >but K8's are still pretty good with many workloads thanks to their far > > superior interconnects.< > > Which is why we went with dual 246s at the time. The second processor on > the Intel was a waste of money and it dual chip at the server level > couldn't hold a candle to their laptop chips and the cost more than AMD. > That decision was a no-brainer. > > >Most numbers I've seen have been more based on games and media encoding in > > single socket configurations, and in 32bit mode at that;< > > Yes, I'm quite skeptical about benchmarks even on web servers having > learned the hard way. We tried 3 big names on Linux where the site fell > down before 9AM. A 4th, Rackspace, the salesman didn't return my calls > after they had an engineer check out what we were doing. Before and after > we tried 3 versions off Linux ourselves with lots of configurations. Based > on all of the benchmarks, FreeBSD didn't make sense which is why it took us > so long to get here. Our competitors are running 5 box server farms to do > what we accomplish with this setup and we have better response times. We > are running SCSI raid. There is no measurable user response difference > between a load of 17 or .7. Due to optimizations, our current load doesn't > exceed 6 or 7 with normal being more around 2. > > Then the NOCs hated us because we used the bandwidth they promised and we > were told to move along one way or another 3 times. The best NOC we've > ever had is SAVVIS, Texas. They could not handle it either where the > server was at first, but after I proved to them with a packet sniffer that > there was a problem, they worked hard for us to get us a place in the DC > that could handle it. We've lived happily ever after there. That's where > the next one is going also. We've had all we can handle of being a > fugitive and a vagabond. > > Naturally, my thoughts are drifting toward, "Hey, the new site should be > doing the 246s and the old site something new." In the mean time I've kept > up off and on, on the issues with AMD code not being nearly as efficient as > the Intel code due to optimization for the Intel due to its far greater > numbers. Next, the abosolute 180 degree change in the market between now > and then concerning AMD and Intel. I've read the Tom's hardware and > AnandTech (I think) comparisions. However, a lot of beautify theories get > beat up by ugly realities and I have the scars to prove it. That's why I'm > here fishing. I'm not expecting to find someone else with traffic and > loads like this, but any insights are welcome when it comes to rolling the > dice again because anything you can do to cut down the number of tries you > need to throw the dice is a huge help. Another site you can look at for reviews which is far less game/windows/office oriented is tweakers.net, http://tweakers.net/reviews/661/7 for a good test of a woodcrest based server. > > Thanks! > > _______________________________________________ > freebsd-performance@freebsd.org mailing list > http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-performance > To unsubscribe, send any mail to > "freebsd-performance-unsubscribe@freebsd.org"
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