upgrade thread(trying to make sense of it all)

[jasong]

This thread is for people who are upgrading, whether it be for DC or anything else, and have no or little idea of what to do. In my case, I want to start a computer farm soon, and I don't know what to do with the AMD XXXX+ numbers. So...(and this can include Intels, too):

If you had $150-$200 to spend a month and wanted to build a caseless farm in the back of your room, what would you do?

Alternate question, actually request for information: How important is cache size for DC projects in general? For things like FaD, and possibly EON, I'm thinking the small cache size would mean a cheaper chip. And I don't think some projects actually benefit from a large [L2?]cache, FaD definitely doesn't. On the other hand, if you're doing something like prime numbers, I think you want a big honkin' cache to avoid "swapping"(I'm guessing at the lingo, lol).

Anyway, I'm looking for some opinions about the value of cache for a dedicated DC farm, mostly for AMD, but maybe for Intel, too. And if you want to tell me what you'd do if you were starting out(or starting over), that would be great, too.(Remember $150-$200.

Edit(for clarification): I'm thinking cache size may be part of the AMD rating, and I'm trying to come up with my own baseline with your help.

[CaptainMooseInc]

LAURENU2 is the master of caseless pharms. I'd wait for his reply. I dunno if anyone else has any caseless pharms running.

I could never make a caseless pharm myself because I live in Indiana and the humidity is so volatile here that static electricity is horrible and even opening a door sometimes fires off all kinds of static charges in my rooms.

-Jeff

[LAURENU2]

Well fist you have to have some kind of rack to run thme in. I used a metal rack with 1/4" plywood slids that I got from menards
It contains 20 nodes

http://www.laurensnet.com/image/tower2.jpg

Then just look around at www.pricewatch.com (http://www.pricewatch.com) for good deals, or wait for good sales around you and buy and build it up peice by peice

duron 1600 - 40.00
MB W/vga/nic/ 46.00
128 MB ram 18.00
Hd 49.00
PS 15.00
--------------------------
>>>>>>>>>> 168.00
This setup will score you 150 point per Hrs or 3600 points a day
If you want more use a XP2400 they go for 80.00 then you just toped your 200.00 mark

[jasong]

Originally posted by LAURENU2
duron 1600 - 40.00
MB W/vga/nic/ 46.00
128 MB ram 18.00
Hd 49.00
PS 15.00
--------------------------
>>>>>>>>>> 168.00
This setup will score you 150 point per Hrs or 3600 points a day
If you want more use a XP2400 they go for 80.00 then you just toped your 200.00 mark
Are Duron's recommended by you because of heating bills, or...?

[Leviathann]

I'm sure he recommended duron's for the price, aren't they the competition for the celeron? How much are Barton 2500's going for now?

You mentioned swapping, I assume you mean paging file and such, if all they are doing is crunching then turn it off. As for cache size on the cpu's themselves, it's like ram on the cpu. L1 is the fastest 'ram' in existence, L2 is a little slower, and actuall ram is alot slower but still infinately faster than hard disk paging.

[LAURENU2]

Originally posted by jasong
Are Duron's recommended by you because of heating bills, or...?

No not for heating they run cool it was for price and points per hour
If you find a better deal take it

[jasong]

Originally posted by Leviathann
You mentioned swapping, I assume you mean paging file and such, if all they are doing is crunching then turn it off. As for cache size on the cpu's themselves, it's like ram on the cpu. L1 is the fastest 'ram' in existence, L2 is a little slower, and actuall ram is alot slower but still infinately faster than hard disk paging.
I'm not good with some of the lingo. When I said swapping, what I was looking for was something similar to what you said right after you misunderstood me. Funny how it worked out that you gave a partial answer to my question through sheer coincidence, huh? :D The question was referring to transferring information in and out of the cpu caches.

Other than LLRing, I can't think of a DC project which I know for a fact benefits from a large cache. Since I assume cache makes the chip more expensive, I'm wondering if it should be a concern for DCing.

[CaptainMooseInc]

I have a Sempron 2800 w/ a 256KB L2 cache.

Normally L1 caches aren't talked about too much when it comes to buying a chip for DCing (though I don't know why). The L2 cache always seems to be a more important topic.

I would've liked a 512KB L2 cache Sempron but I couldn't afford it (plus I think you can only get a 1MB L2 cache Sempron in the 3100+ edition, which is actually a toned down AMD64).

-Jeff

[PCZ]

Jasong

The cache size is a concern for DC.
Some projects will perform poorly on Durons because of the small cache.

FAD is one of the Projects that doesn't care about Cache size and the Duron will perform just as well as it's XP brother.

Durons have 64k L2 Cache.
Athlon XP's have 256k L2 Cache.

My 2 cents
If you want a chip for use on all DC projects then spend a few dollars more on the Athlon XP or Sempron as it is now called.

Note:
The Duron isn't made by AMD anymore and has been replaced by the Sempron
which has 256k L2 Cache anyway


Swapping.

Most Operating Systems reserve a piece of HD Space for a Swap File.
This is called Virtual Memory.

The Operating System uses this Virtual Memory when the Physical RAM in the machine is getting low.

Swapping is bad because HD's are much slower than RAM and it impacts on the performance of the machine.

To minimise Swapping you need to make sure you have enough RAM in the machine.
How much depends on the OS and the applications being run.

Older OS's such as Windows 95/98 and ME are happy with 128mb, and providing the DC client being run has a small memory footprint like FAD, then they work fine without too much Swapping.

Newer OS's such as XP need more memory, 256mb is a sensible minimum.
If you run DC clients with low memory requirements then you will get away with 256mb without too much Swapping

DC clients such as FAH which have large memory footprints would perform very poorly with the the minimum memory as suggested above.


Caseless Nodes

You will certainly get the best bang for the buck buiding a farm with bare MB's
Mine are in racks like Laurens.
I got some cheap wooden ones, each shelf can hold 2 mini ATX or one full size MB.

The basic ingredients are MB, CPU, RAM and PSU.
Choose MB's with onboard Video and Network preferably in a mini ATX format.

You can run them discless booting linux over the network or attach HD's and run Windows.

You don't need KVM's {Keyboard Video Monitor} on them as you use telnet on the linux nodes and Terminal Services on the Windows nodes.

On the older windows OS's such as ME you would need something like remotely anywhere to manage them.

Note:
If you have a small farm and the nodes are all in the same room then you will be able to use a KVM.

Also
If you ever decide to go down the linux/PXE root there are several of us on the forum who have built and run discless PXE setups who can advise you.

[jasong]

Here is the motherboard serial number(copy and paste didn't work for the web address):

SY-K7VME

The stuff I looked at didn't claim it could overclock that I could see.

[MerePeer]

Looks like it might be a SOYO, see here

http://www.soyo.com.tw/products/proddesc.php?id=281

Since the Sempron you have needs FSB 333 just to run normal (not OverClocked), the mobo would need to support higher than 333 to overclock it -- and from this bullet it doesnt appear to:

Supports 266/333 MHz FSB.

Sounds like it has some nice temp monitoring in it tho.

If you're wondering if it will work under Linux you can always try burning a Knoppix CD and booting from that.

[LAURENU2]

Compatibilities
WinXP / Win2000 / WinNT / WinME / Win98SE / Linux / FreeBSD

[PCZ]

Looks like the FSB is set by jumpers and the bios doesn't allow multiplier changes so you are a bit limited in the overclocking department.

166mhz is probably the fastest FSB you can select.

The chipset you have can do 200 MHZ FSB but when the graphics are integrated into the chipset they limit support to 166mhz FSB.


BTW it is motherboars like you have that I use for PXE nodes.
Reliability above overclockability is the order of the day when you run 24hrs a day flat out.

[jasong]

I'm going to see if I can find some websites about overclocking Semprons.

Stay tuned.

[jasong]

Originally posted by PCZ
BTW it is motherboars like you have that I use for PXE nodes.
Reliability above overclockability is the order of the day when you run 24hrs a day flat out. PXE? Are you recommending for me NOT to overclock? And if so, do you mean don't overclock for DC, or are you talking about some other situation?

If overclocking can screw up DC work, I want to discuss that aspect before moving on, since DCing is my whole reason for wanting to overclock in the first place. The 500MHz processor I had four months ago would've been more than enough, if not for my DC hobby. :rolleyes:

[LAURENU2]

Yes I believe OC past 8% maybe 10% does seem to make the client time out more on the Moil, and perhaps over look some HITs

Each CPU has it's own rating so to speak
It is something you have to test on your end