9 ms·

To put this in perspective, The new $500 ryzen 9 3900x matches this $1700 xeon server in multi core geekbench, and kicks it in single core perf with a fraction

To put this in perspective, The new $500 ryzen 9 3900x matches this $1700 xeon server in multi core geekbench, and kicks it in single core perf with a fraction of the power usage. https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/2587 https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/2587

btgeekboy 7y ago
That $1500 includes the rest of the computer, though. That adds up.
- greatjack613 7y ago
  correct, but you can get build a full system with the Ryzen 9 plus 128gb of ram etc for definitely less than $1700. Especially given the drop in ram and ssd's these days
  - pedrocr 7y ago
    128GB of ECC RAM itself is going to be ~800-1000$ as far as I can find some to fit in a Ryzen build. So it won't be trivial to reach the price point for a full build although Ryzen is clearly great value anyway.
    - greatjack613 7y ago
      True, but only if ECC is necessary. In this case where he is mainly using the server for experiments and to try software, regular ram will do absolutely fine. Here is a 128gb kit for under $600 dollars. https://www.newegg.com/corsair-128gb-288-pin-ddr4-sdram/p/N82E16820233946 https://www.newegg.com/corsair-128gb-288-pin-ddr4-sdram/p/N8...
      - close04 7y ago
        > only if ECC is necessary If your workloads require 128GB of RAM then you probably want ECC. You'd be skimping in the wrong place.
      - ska 7y ago
        > True, but only if ECC is necessary. big "if" there really, and that makes it an apples-and-oranges comparison IMO.
      - mciancia 7y ago
        This is kit of 8 sticks. Ryzen supports max of 4 dimms, so you need 32GB per stick.
    - abarringer 7y ago
      I received a price quote on HPE ECC Server RAM this week from HPE that is $230 per 64GB stick. So make that $500 with shipping and tax for 128GB.
      - pedrocr 7y ago
        Consumer Ryzen requires unbuffered ECC RAM so most usual RAM options are not compatible.
        mamon 7y ago
        SUPPORTS ECC RAM, but does not require it. You can use plain old RAM chips with it.
        kadoban 7y ago
        Grandparent's point, presumably, was that _buffered_ ECC RAM would not work. Which is definitely correct. I'm not sure if the sticks in question are buffered or not though.
        snuxoll 7y ago
        Likely registered, not buffered - FBDIMMs fell out of favor some time ago. Technically still “buffered”, but only the control lines and it maintains electrical compatibility with UDIMMs.
        kadoban 7y ago
        Ah, thanks for that. I looked up the difference, I'll have to update my terminology.
- awinder 7y ago
  I almost went down this sort of road and went 3900x instead. I think the one non-replicated benefit of the older server route is cheap & large amounts of ECC ram, but you're also getting slower ddr3 ram which is why the pricing works out the way it does. I was in that same pricing ballpark with a new-build ryzen with a 2070 super, I think you could make it pretty much equivalent but maybe trading 64gb of fast ddr4 ram for the 128gb of ddr3. As long as you can "make by" with 24 cpu threads I think you'll be in a much better position at same-ish cost but with new / full warranty components but that's just my math :-).
- louwrentius 7y ago
  Exactly, watch what happens to the price when you add 128GB of DDR4 memory.
- burtonator 7y ago
  I mean why isn't this the first comment reply. The motherboard, RAM, SSDs, CPU, case, powersupply all have to be factored. This is an apples to oranges comparison. IMO it always makes more sense to build your own PC vs buy a used server. It's going to be have better ventilation and be much quieter in a home setup.
Aperocky 7y ago
Well that's used stuff, so Moore's laws ghost still in effect. The biggest problem I have with a used server is the inability to incorporate a GPU into the architecture. But I guess that really depend on what you want to do with it, serving a website will absolutely not require a GPU.
- gnopgnip 7y ago
  What kind of server does not support a GPU?
  - roel_v 7y ago
    The form factor is (can be) an issue. I used a 4u case for my build a few years ago, and to fit my 1070 I had to bring out the dremel to remove some parts of the cross bars.
- ivalm 7y ago
  Iirc dl380 gen 8 support 2x risers for gpu.
snuxoll 7y ago
It also won’t have iLO, etc. Even for a homelab these are useful features to have, I don’t want to go hooking up my monitor and keyboard every time I need to troubleshoot some boot issue or install a new OS. I can also get used DDR3 ECC memory for a hell of a lot cheaper than DDR4 right now. Unfortunately the person who wrote this article is in the EU who has much slimmer picking in the second-hand market. I can buy a Dell R620 for $200-300, two 10-core Xeons for another $300 if it doesn’t come with enough cores, and 128GB of 16GB DDR RDIMMs for $200 - total price is under $1000USD, and that’s excluding any components that come with the server I may opt NOT to replace.
- mey 7y ago
  Useful iDRAC features like remote display and remote ISO install isn't in the base Dell iDRAC license. So I still need to hook up keyboard/monitor if it's more than a reboot. Edit: iDRAC is the Dell LOM, iLO is HP
  - snuxoll 7y ago
    Sure, but the licenses to unlock them are easy to acquire. Dell ties them to the service tag, which is quite easy to set via racadm and you can buy a license off eBay. Older Dell systems required a $30 part you can find on eBay. HP just uses a key they send you on paper. Hell, many times these decoms still have the license applied to them. I have 2xR210 II’s, a R320, R520 and formerly had a HP ML10 and a Lenovo TD340. The Lenovo was the biggest pain to get VKVM because of the stupid hard to find dongle. Don’t buy Lenovo servers for a homelab; BTW. Dell lets you override the ramp in fan speed when a non-Dell branded PCIe card is installed, newer Lenovo servers ramp them up to 100% and you can’t turn it off (I had to leave my TD340 on the initial BIOS revision with security issues because of this).
    - lozaning 7y ago
      Back when I was in the HP VAR game iLO licenses where some of my highest money makers. MSRP for those licenses was like $250.00. I was buying them grey market from ESISO for like $35 a pop.
srmatto 7y ago
I bought an HP Proliant DL380 G7 with Dual Xeon Hex-Core X5660 at 2.8GHz, 76GB DDR3 RAM, and about 1TB of 15K HDD for $370.
- greatjack613 7y ago
  The actual hardware is not bad, its just the perf per $ ratio is not great when you compare it to zen 2. Kudos to AMD
  - srmatto 7y ago
    Fair, but at $370 I think the ratio gets much better.
    - ThrowawayR2 7y ago
      Not sure it's significantly better after factoring in power and auxiliary costs like cooling.
    - roel_v 7y ago
      Not after you price the power. I have a Xeon system that is plenty powerful for my (C++) dev work, but I'm thinking of replacing it with an AMD build as it'll probably be cheaper over time. Then again, this is at Dutch energy costs, I'd imagine at (say) Texas cost it'd be different.
- bluedino 7y ago
  I always forget that used servers are dirt cheap in the USA compared to other countries. The other good thing about geting a Dell/HP rack server is you can have 16 drive bays (or more) easily.
- chx 7y ago
  On [H]ardForum, a kind user worked out for me a year ago the Handbrake performance comparison of a dual X5670 with some of the fastest consumer CPUs at that time: https://hardforum.com/threads/replacing-dual-x5670.1963388/#post-1043712895 https://hardforum.com/threads/replacing-dual-x5670.1963388/#... turned out the 2700X is 1.95 times as fast in Handbrake as a single X5670.
patrioticaction 7y ago
No worries, I am sure the Gen8 server makes for a good doorstop when it dies, have tested before.
paxys 7y ago
Something that was $1700 in 2013 is cheaper now? Shocker. FYI the E5-2680 is like $300 on Amazon right now, so that's a better comparison.
- r00fus 7y ago
  The CPU was $1700. The entire setup is now less.
rubyn00bie 7y ago
I have an almost identical setup hardware-wise (I opt'd for dual 2687 v2s [better single core performance]) and it only cost me $1000. It also supports 20 physicals disks with no extra hardware or configuration needed (aside from just plugging in the disks and adding 'em to ZFS). RAM (DDR3) and storage capacity (cheap SAS drives) in these systems is really where the savings is... I don't think I'll ever own a "regular" desktop again.
buildbuildbuild 7y ago
Good point. If looking for server features on AM4 I highly recommend the ASRock Rack X470D4U motherboard for IPMI. Buying used HPE G8/9servers is still a great deal when you need redundant power and large amounts of RAM. Their 10g and 40g FlexibleLOM cards can be found on the cheap too. TechmikeNY is a great source of refurbished servers in the NYC area.
gameswithgo 7y ago
With the ryzen 3950 with 16 cores coming soon for a bit more!
- tgtweak 7y ago
  Notably more... Epyc2 is what I'm fantasizing over lately.
parsimo2010 7y ago
It seems like the author wasn’t targeting benchmarks exclusively, and comparing the price of a CPU to the price of a whole system isn’t fair. I spent about $2200 on a system that was targeting compute value- I have 4x E7-4890v2 for a total of 60 cores and can get >80000 on multicore geekbench. I also have 512GB of RAM, which I think is more than Ryzen can handle. I paid $85 per CPU, so while a new Ryzen 9 does make sense for a lot of people with its fast single threaded speed and low power consumption, the old server gear I bought still wins in highly parallel tasks for less money. Edit for proof of my geekbench score: https://browser.geekbench.com/v4/cpu/13853828 https://browser.geekbench.com/v4/cpu/13853828 That was before I expanded the RAM, but the score didn’t change with the extra memory.
- nessunodoro 7y ago
  Thanks for this. How are the energy needs/costs?
  - parsimo2010 7y ago
    I haven't measured power consumption with a meter, but each CPU has a TDP of 155 W, so potentially 620 W plus whatever is required to keep the motherboard, RAM, and disks alive. My ballpark guess is 750 W at full load and under 200 W at idle. It runs off a 1600 W power supply, but I suspect that is overkill. It's definitely less power-efficient than a new Ryzen CPU.
tgtweak 7y ago
Yes but build it with 128GB of ram and try and get a lights-out kvm on it. Much better value can be had than OPs buy - just picked up a Dell R820 (quad 8core,3.2ghz v2 Xeons, hyperthreading is overrated yo) with 768GB of ram and dual 10G nics for $1500. Idles around 170W (about $5/mo where I live). The real magic: 8 full (16x 3.0) pcie slots. The 3900x is a beast for the workstation though, and I have it running there with nothing but praise.
- sireat 7y ago
  That's a great value! I just checked eBay and it seems R820 with 128GB and 4x v2 Xeons goes for 1200-1300. How did you manage to get the extra 640GB for 200-300 ? PS 6 months ago I upgraded my 2x Xeon 2697v2 Dell Precision T7610 and paid $200 for 128GB DDR ECC (8x16) Didn't expect to see another price drop.
  - tgtweak 7y ago
    They come up often enough - someone will be selling a lot of 20+. They go quick but you usually have enough time to send a few messages before they sell out.

btgeekboy 7y ago

That $1500 includes the rest of the computer, though. That adds up.

greatjack613 7y ago
correct, but you can get build a full system with the Ryzen 9 plus 128gb of ram etc for definitely less than $1700. Especially given the drop in ram and ssd's these days
- pedrocr 7y ago
  128GB of ECC RAM itself is going to be ~800-1000$ as far as I can find some to fit in a Ryzen build. So it won't be trivial to reach the price point for a full build although Ryzen is clearly great value anyway.
  - greatjack613 7y ago
    True, but only if ECC is necessary. In this case where he is mainly using the server for experiments and to try software, regular ram will do absolutely fine. Here is a 128gb kit for under $600 dollars. https://www.newegg.com/corsair-128gb-288-pin-ddr4-sdram/p/N82E16820233946 https://www.newegg.com/corsair-128gb-288-pin-ddr4-sdram/p/N8...
    - close04 7y ago
      > only if ECC is necessary If your workloads require 128GB of RAM then you probably want ECC. You'd be skimping in the wrong place.
    - ska 7y ago
      > True, but only if ECC is necessary. big "if" there really, and that makes it an apples-and-oranges comparison IMO.
    - mciancia 7y ago
      This is kit of 8 sticks. Ryzen supports max of 4 dimms, so you need 32GB per stick.
  - abarringer 7y ago
    I received a price quote on HPE ECC Server RAM this week from HPE that is $230 per 64GB stick. So make that $500 with shipping and tax for 128GB.
    - pedrocr 7y ago
      Consumer Ryzen requires unbuffered ECC RAM so most usual RAM options are not compatible.
      - mamon 7y ago
        SUPPORTS ECC RAM, but does not require it. You can use plain old RAM chips with it.
        kadoban 7y ago
        Grandparent's point, presumably, was that _buffered_ ECC RAM would not work. Which is definitely correct. I'm not sure if the sticks in question are buffered or not though.
        snuxoll 7y ago
        Likely registered, not buffered - FBDIMMs fell out of favor some time ago. Technically still “buffered”, but only the control lines and it maintains electrical compatibility with UDIMMs.
        kadoban 7y ago
        Ah, thanks for that. I looked up the difference, I'll have to update my terminology.
awinder 7y ago
I almost went down this sort of road and went 3900x instead. I think the one non-replicated benefit of the older server route is cheap & large amounts of ECC ram, but you're also getting slower ddr3 ram which is why the pricing works out the way it does. I was in that same pricing ballpark with a new-build ryzen with a 2070 super, I think you could make it pretty much equivalent but maybe trading 64gb of fast ddr4 ram for the 128gb of ddr3. As long as you can "make by" with 24 cpu threads I think you'll be in a much better position at same-ish cost but with new / full warranty components but that's just my math :-).
louwrentius 7y ago
Exactly, watch what happens to the price when you add 128GB of DDR4 memory.
burtonator 7y ago
I mean why isn't this the first comment reply. The motherboard, RAM, SSDs, CPU, case, powersupply all have to be factored. This is an apples to oranges comparison. IMO it always makes more sense to build your own PC vs buy a used server. It's going to be have better ventilation and be much quieter in a home setup.

Aperocky 7y ago

Well that's used stuff, so Moore's laws ghost still in effect. The biggest problem I have with a used server is the inability to incorporate a GPU into the architecture. But I guess that really depend on what you want to do with it, serving a website will absolutely not require a GPU.

gnopgnip 7y ago
What kind of server does not support a GPU?
- roel_v 7y ago
  The form factor is (can be) an issue. I used a 4u case for my build a few years ago, and to fit my 1070 I had to bring out the dremel to remove some parts of the cross bars.
ivalm 7y ago
Iirc dl380 gen 8 support 2x risers for gpu.

snuxoll 7y ago

It also won’t have iLO, etc. Even for a homelab these are useful features to have, I don’t want to go hooking up my monitor and keyboard every time I need to troubleshoot some boot issue or install a new OS. I can also get used DDR3 ECC memory for a hell of a lot cheaper than DDR4 right now. Unfortunately the person who wrote this article is in the EU who has much slimmer picking in the second-hand market. I can buy a Dell R620 for $200-300, two 10-core Xeons for another $300 if it doesn’t come with enough cores, and 128GB of 16GB DDR RDIMMs for $200 - total price is under $1000USD, and that’s excluding any components that come with the server I may opt NOT to replace.

mey 7y ago
Useful iDRAC features like remote display and remote ISO install isn't in the base Dell iDRAC license. So I still need to hook up keyboard/monitor if it's more than a reboot. Edit: iDRAC is the Dell LOM, iLO is HP
- snuxoll 7y ago
  Sure, but the licenses to unlock them are easy to acquire. Dell ties them to the service tag, which is quite easy to set via racadm and you can buy a license off eBay. Older Dell systems required a $30 part you can find on eBay. HP just uses a key they send you on paper. Hell, many times these decoms still have the license applied to them. I have 2xR210 II’s, a R320, R520 and formerly had a HP ML10 and a Lenovo TD340. The Lenovo was the biggest pain to get VKVM because of the stupid hard to find dongle. Don’t buy Lenovo servers for a homelab; BTW. Dell lets you override the ramp in fan speed when a non-Dell branded PCIe card is installed, newer Lenovo servers ramp them up to 100% and you can’t turn it off (I had to leave my TD340 on the initial BIOS revision with security issues because of this).
  - lozaning 7y ago
    Back when I was in the HP VAR game iLO licenses where some of my highest money makers. MSRP for those licenses was like $250.00. I was buying them grey market from ESISO for like $35 a pop.

srmatto 7y ago

I bought an HP Proliant DL380 G7 with Dual Xeon Hex-Core X5660 at 2.8GHz, 76GB DDR3 RAM, and about 1TB of 15K HDD for $370.

greatjack613 7y ago
The actual hardware is not bad, its just the perf per $ ratio is not great when you compare it to zen 2. Kudos to AMD
- srmatto 7y ago
  Fair, but at $370 I think the ratio gets much better.
  - ThrowawayR2 7y ago
    Not sure it's significantly better after factoring in power and auxiliary costs like cooling.
  - roel_v 7y ago
    Not after you price the power. I have a Xeon system that is plenty powerful for my (C++) dev work, but I'm thinking of replacing it with an AMD build as it'll probably be cheaper over time. Then again, this is at Dutch energy costs, I'd imagine at (say) Texas cost it'd be different.
bluedino 7y ago
I always forget that used servers are dirt cheap in the USA compared to other countries. The other good thing about geting a Dell/HP rack server is you can have 16 drive bays (or more) easily.
chx 7y ago
On [H]ardForum, a kind user worked out for me a year ago the Handbrake performance comparison of a dual X5670 with some of the fastest consumer CPUs at that time: https://hardforum.com/threads/replacing-dual-x5670.1963388/#post-1043712895 https://hardforum.com/threads/replacing-dual-x5670.1963388/#... turned out the 2700X is 1.95 times as fast in Handbrake as a single X5670.

patrioticaction 7y ago

No worries, I am sure the Gen8 server makes for a good doorstop when it dies, have tested before.

paxys 7y ago

Something that was $1700 in 2013 is cheaper now? Shocker. FYI the E5-2680 is like $300 on Amazon right now, so that's a better comparison.

r00fus 7y ago
The CPU was $1700. The entire setup is now less.

rubyn00bie 7y ago

I have an almost identical setup hardware-wise (I opt'd for dual 2687 v2s [better single core performance]) and it only cost me $1000. It also supports 20 physicals disks with no extra hardware or configuration needed (aside from just plugging in the disks and adding 'em to ZFS). RAM (DDR3) and storage capacity (cheap SAS drives) in these systems is really where the savings is... I don't think I'll ever own a "regular" desktop again.

buildbuildbuild 7y ago

Good point. If looking for server features on AM4 I highly recommend the ASRock Rack X470D4U motherboard for IPMI. Buying used HPE G8/9servers is still a great deal when you need redundant power and large amounts of RAM. Their 10g and 40g FlexibleLOM cards can be found on the cheap too. TechmikeNY is a great source of refurbished servers in the NYC area.

gameswithgo 7y ago

With the ryzen 3950 with 16 cores coming soon for a bit more!

tgtweak 7y ago
Notably more... Epyc2 is what I'm fantasizing over lately.

parsimo2010 7y ago

It seems like the author wasn’t targeting benchmarks exclusively, and comparing the price of a CPU to the price of a whole system isn’t fair. I spent about $2200 on a system that was targeting compute value- I have 4x E7-4890v2 for a total of 60 cores and can get >80000 on multicore geekbench. I also have 512GB of RAM, which I think is more than Ryzen can handle. I paid $85 per CPU, so while a new Ryzen 9 does make sense for a lot of people with its fast single threaded speed and low power consumption, the old server gear I bought still wins in highly parallel tasks for less money. Edit for proof of my geekbench score: https://browser.geekbench.com/v4/cpu/13853828 https://browser.geekbench.com/v4/cpu/13853828 That was before I expanded the RAM, but the score didn’t change with the extra memory.

nessunodoro 7y ago
Thanks for this. How are the energy needs/costs?
- parsimo2010 7y ago
  I haven't measured power consumption with a meter, but each CPU has a TDP of 155 W, so potentially 620 W plus whatever is required to keep the motherboard, RAM, and disks alive. My ballpark guess is 750 W at full load and under 200 W at idle. It runs off a 1600 W power supply, but I suspect that is overkill. It's definitely less power-efficient than a new Ryzen CPU.

tgtweak 7y ago

Yes but build it with 128GB of ram and try and get a lights-out kvm on it. Much better value can be had than OPs buy - just picked up a Dell R820 (quad 8core,3.2ghz v2 Xeons, hyperthreading is overrated yo) with 768GB of ram and dual 10G nics for $1500. Idles around 170W (about $5/mo where I live). The real magic: 8 full (16x 3.0) pcie slots. The 3900x is a beast for the workstation though, and I have it running there with nothing but praise.

sireat 7y ago
That's a great value! I just checked eBay and it seems R820 with 128GB and 4x v2 Xeons goes for 1200-1300. How did you manage to get the extra 640GB for 200-300 ? PS 6 months ago I upgraded my 2x Xeon 2697v2 Dell Precision T7610 and paid $200 for 128GB DDR ECC (8x16) Didn't expect to see another price drop.
- tgtweak 7y ago
  They come up often enough - someone will be selling a lot of 20+. They go quick but you usually have enough time to send a few messages before they sell out.