[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread] 

List:       beowulf
Subject:    Re: Opteron (x86-64) compute farms/clusters?
From:       phblai <philippe.blaise () cea ! fr>
Date:       2003-06-25 9:28:26
[Download RAW message or body]

Mikhail Kuzminsky wrote:

> According to Thomas Alrutz
> 
> 
> > I just made some benchmarks on a Opteron 240 (1.4 GHz) node running with
> > Suse/United Linux Enterprise edition.
> > I have sucessfully compiled mpich-1.2.4 in 64 bit without any problems
> > (./configure -device=ch_p4 -commtype=shared). The default compiler is
> > the gcc-3.2.2 (maybe a Suse patch) and is set to 64Bit, the Portland
> > (5.0beta) compiler didn't worked at all !
> > 
> > I tried our CFD-code (TAU) to run 3 aerodynamik configurations on this
> > machine with both CPUs and the results are better then estimated.
> > We achieved in full multigrid (5 cycles, 1 equation turbulence model) a
> > efficiency of about 97%, 92% and 101 % for the second CPU.
> > Those results are much better as the results we get on the Intel Xeons
> > (around 50%).
> > 
> > 
> It looks that this results are predictable: Xeon CPUs require high
> memory bandwidth, but both CPUs share common system bus. Opteron CPUs
> have own memory buses and scale in this sense excellent. Better SPECrate
> results for Opteron (i.e. work on a mix of tasks) confirm (in particular)
> this features. CFD codes, I beleive, require high memory throughput ...
> 
> Mikhail Kuzminsky
> Zelinsky Institute of Organic Chemistry
> Moscow
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Beowulf mailing list, Beowulf@beowulf.org
> To change your subscription (digest mode or unsubscribe) visit \
> http://www.beowulf.org/mailman/listinfo/beowulf 
> 
> 
> 

the 4 cpus (ccNUMA) AMD Opteron scales very well (each cpu has its own 
memory with a 5.3 GB/s bandwith access),
compare to the (SMP) Intel / Itanium2 equivalent (I870 chipset), where 
the 4 cpus share a common 6.4GB/s memory access.
The 4 cpus Opteron is cheap, but the Itanium2 can perform quite better 
on some benchs (the 3MB L3 cache
has a 32 GB/s bandwith !).

In fact, the AMD Opteron architecture is very close to the 
HP/Compaq/Digital EV7 Marvel one,
that scales very well to 32 cpus (maybe 64 ?). But I don' know if AMD 
plans to make machines
with more than 8 cpus ?

   Philippe Blaise

_______________________________________________
Beowulf mailing list, Beowulf@beowulf.org
To change your subscription (digest mode or unsubscribe) visit \
http://www.beowulf.org/mailman/listinfo/beowulf


[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread]