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Server Benchmarking Lone Wolf Bites Intel Again
Ian Lamont writes "Neal Nelson, the engineer who conducts independent server benchmarking, has nipped Intel again by reporting that AMD's Opteron chips 'delivered better power efficiency' than Xeon processors. Intel has discounted the findings, claiming that Nelson's methodology 'ignores performance,' but the company may not be able to ignore Nelson for much longer: the Standard Performance Evaluation Corp., a nonprofit company that develops computing benchmarks, is expected to publish a new test suite for comparing server efficiency that Nelson believes will be similar to his own benchmarks that measure server power usage directly from the wall plug."
OK, I'm intrigued. What kind of fudge do the current efficiency tests consist of? Measuring generated heat with a thermometer?
They used to but now they time how long it takes to toast a marshmallow. Its useful because you can use the melted mallows as thermal paste. Its not as efficient as Arctic Silver 5 but I hear its better than the standard ceramic stuff.
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"What do AMD have in their design methodologies that Intel don't?"
Digital Equipment Corp's Alpha engineers.
Sorry to beat a dead horse to a pulp but those that know still know.
The truth about Led Zep should never be told on
Except that there is a very small performance difference in the 32bit world and a non-existent performance difference in the 64bit world. The Opteron actually outperforms quite commonly in the 64bit world much like the Athlons do against Core 2 Duo on the desktop side. Intel has an edge on 32bit optimization right now which is why the Core 2 Duo looks so good right now.
Add 4 and 8 sockets and you've got to be joking considering Intel's shared bus. They cores are chocked for memory throughput at that point while the Opterons just perform better and better as they scale. In a 2 socket system they compete very well. In a 4 socket system the Opteron is by far the superior choice both with power consumption and performance especially with 64bit database,email, and web servers.
It's fairly common for 3rd party data centers to charge based on power consumption. If you want to rent spaces to have a few machines hosted, you can save a bunch of money by building servers that aren't power hogs. Any data center worth hosting at pays very close attention to how much power they have available, so even in the event of power loss, then have an alternate circuit to draw from and/or sufficient emergency generator power.
It depends upon what's important to you. Is power consumption important? AMD wins. Is multiple CPU cores in single servers important? Anything over 4 until recently, and now 8, is an AMD win. Do you need the most processing power possible for a single process in a 2P or less unit? Intel wins that one. Need high density stacked CPUs with loads of RAM? AMD wins that one (That's a power/heat/space issue). Need to process web calls? Sun wins that one hands down on a /$, /kW, and /J measure.
There are definite differences in performance between the various CPUs. A mere 5% difference in power draw across a day times 1000s of CPUs is significant. Same with a 5% thermal dissipation difference, as that turns into increased cooling requirements.
These things all matter in the server world.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.