Los Alamos to Use AMD's Opteron in Linux Clusters

nuke-alwin writes "eWeek is reporting that Los Alamos National Laboratory announced it will use more than 3,300 Opteron chips in two of its Linux clusters. According to the article 'The key to Opteron, as it tries to gain traction not only against Intel Corp.'s 64-bit Itanium chip but also its 32-bit Xeon offerings, is its ability to run both 32-bit and 64-bit applications equally well.'"

Comments

Re:The key

[jerkychew]

But Intel has something in the server market that AMD doesn't: a reputation. AMD is just breaking into this market, and we'll see how many companies jump on the bandwagon this early.

I've worked for enough good-sized companied to know that a difference of a few thousand (even a few hundred-thousand) dollars isn't as important as reliability when you get into enterprise-level systems. The old saying, 'nobody ever got fired for buying IBM', rings true for Intel as well.

Not to mention that Intel's profit margin is HUGE when it comes to the server market - such is the luxury of being the only x86 gig in town. Intel can stand to slash prices dramatically and still turn a profit. Remember how they almost bankrupted AMD a few years back when AMD promised its 6x86 chips would always be 25% cheaper than a comparable Pentium.

Yeah, this will be very interesting.

Re:The key

[javiercero]

" The old saying, 'nobody ever got fired for buying IBM', rings true for Intel as well."

Are you for real? LOL, Intel entry in the server market was as cheap low end, nothing to do with "reliabitlity" or anything. All that intel has in corporate accounts is: well we are cheaper than sun. Now there is someone saying, well we're cheaper than Sun AND Intel. Intel is SOL, this whole new representation of Intel as quality server stuff is laughable. LOL!

The real key...

[DeathPenguin]

...is that AMD opened their platform well enough to the LinuxBIOS developers while Intel basically told them to screw off and live with EFI. Here is what Ron Minnich had to say earlier on the LinuxBIOS mailing list.

Al Gore never claimed he invented the Internet.

[C3ntaur]

What he *actually* said was, "During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet." Granted, it's debatable as to how much initiative he took in its creation, but he was in fact involved in legislation and funding that helped to shape it.

Whenever I see this twisting of words and facts perpetuated, it reminds me of the fools who just can't say nuclear (it's "noo-clee-ar", not "noo-kyoo-lar", damn it!!!).

Re:The key

[Dub Kat]

quote:
I've worked for enough good-sized companied to know that a difference of a few thousand (even a few hundred-thousand) dollars isn't as important as reliability when you get into enterprise-level systems. The old saying, 'nobody ever got fired for buying IBM', rings true for Intel as well.

This is definitely right, but I wonder if the name-brand is worth it if they're paying twice the amount for Intel vs. AMD.

The article says Linux Networx got the contract for just under $10 million, and will deliver 2816 Opterons.

Now, I've no idea how much the hardware costs them, but let's assume $8 million; the other $2 million goes towards salaries/profit.

$8 million / 2816 Opterons = $2850.91 per Opteron.

Compare that to the PowerEdge 3250 (Itanium) from Dell: $6229 per Itanium.

I'm sure Intel has quite a mark-up on Itaniums and could get the price lower when trying to win a contract, but AMD is in the same position with the Opteron as well.

Either way, a nice win for AMD, as it seems that the Opteron really is the best x86 processor at the moment.

Colocated Linux Server - $60/mo

Re:The key

[MoThugz]

Have you ever had to design a Windows-based network from scratch? Have you ever had your boss come to you and tell you you have $100K to spend? I have.

Hate to break it to you but most corporate networks are built from scratch if you're expanding to new physical locations. Well, if you're actually serious about your question, then I'd say yes... in fact this year alone I've done roughly 6 such projects and with budgets ranging from (approx) US$50k to a cool mil.

To go really low-end then build your own damn servers dammit... heck some of the custom servers we've built are at least at par with the 8450, if not better. 2U and/or 3U casings are not that expensive nowadays.

Well anyway, if IIS server farms (wtf?!) are your "thing"... there is still AMD... and don't tell me your "IIS server farm" (which of course implies Windows 2000) which costs under 100k runs Xeons?

Man if I'm the one in charge of whatever it is you've done... I'd fire your ass and kill that asshole of a boss of yours.

Re:The key

[evilviper]

The opteron's pricing is similar to the xeons

I really don't think you can compare an Opteron to a Xeon. Think Opteron v. Itanium.

but Intel so far isn't losing anything. They're still profitable

My point is that, on price, AMD's processors are far less expensive than Intel, while still being better than them in just about every way. For Intel to prevent Opteron systems from taking over the market, they are going to have to eat some of the cost of their own chips long enough to keep people from even thinking about using AMD products. As I said, I don't believe they have enough cash to make that happen... That means they either need to make a HUGE leap forward with their processors, and come out with something that is actually better than AMD has, or their market is going to quickly slide out from under them.

The hammer chips are nice, but so far they're don't kill Intel in performance, they're just competitive.

Again, you are comparing two entirely different product lines. I wouldn't expect the first few chips (that are almost completely redisigned) to come out and be completely competitive with old technology, established chips. It won't take long for prices to drop, performance to improve, etc., but don't expect everything from the very first of an entirely new processor line.