Dual Xeon L5630 vs Single L5640 advice needed

[chinesestunna]

Hi all,

Trying to decide which route to go as they currently cost about the same on eBay, I can get dual L5630s (4 core, 40W TDP 2Ghz) or single L5640 (6 core, 65W TDP 2.26Ghz) for about the same price. They be be installed into a light ESXi host - running a few VMs, one of which drives a 3x10TB MDADM RAID6 NAS, some testing installs for various OSes and remote access Windows 7 instance.

Here's my main objects

1. Idle power - I'm guessing single L5640 will get edge here, not having to idle 2 CPUs vs 1 as Westmeres don't have the amazing low power states that IV-B/Haswell chips do. This server is sitting around idle most of the time so this will have a big impact on power bill
2. Cooling/Noise - I'm looking to passively cool the chips with CoolerMaster 212+ coolers, L5630 @ 40W TDP should be fine, L5640 @ 65W TDP might require some ducting
3. Performance - Dual L5630 should have the edge here in multithreaded applications/VMs
4. Expandability - L5640 would give me option of getting another matching chip down the road if needed for more performance

Any one have experience with power consumption of single vs. dual of these low power L Xeon chips? If you were in my shoes, which approach would you take?

 

[TType85]

Personally I would go with the single 6 core to start. Most VM's I work with are not CPU bound and you can go a lot further than you think with 6 cores. If it's not enough you have the option to add another one.

The other question comes down to ram density. How many ram sockets are there per CPU on your board? I run out of ram WAY before I run out of cpu. Most of these 1366 boards are between 6 and 9 slots for each CPU. If you are using 4GB sticks of ram you are only looking 24GB-36GB on a single CPU vs 48GB-72GB running both cpu's.

 

[chinesestunna]

Personally I would go with the single 6 core to start. Most VM's I work with are not CPU bound and you can go a lot further than you think with 6 cores. If it's not enough you have the option to add another one.

The other question comes down to ram density. How many ram sockets are there per CPU on your board? I run out of ram WAY before I run out of cpu. Most of these 1366 boards are between 6 and 9 slots for each CPU. If you are using 4GB sticks of ram you are only looking 24GB-36GB on a single CPU vs 48GB-72GB running both cpu's.

very good point about the RAM, I have 6x4GB sticks right now so loads up 1 CPU's 6 slots perfectly. Boards I'm looking at are mostly 6 slot ones (12 total) I figure It'll serve me fine until I need that extra processing power, I've been running a similar i7 920 + 24GB setup for past 3 years now.
Thanks!

 

[Patrick]

The other question comes down to ram density.

This was my first thought. I like the L5640 for expansion possibilities, but if you need more RAM then you need to populate the second socket.

 

[chinesestunna]

This was my first thought. I like the L5640 for expansion possibilities, but if you need more RAM then you need to populate the second socket.

I'm with you, Patrick, with your experience testing so many systems and especially with idle load, do you think running single vs. dual will yield say 20W power savings? I checked most of your articles on the matter and it's hard to get a assessment

 

[Patrick]

I'm with you, Patrick, with your experience testing so many systems and especially with idle load, do you think running single vs. dual will yield say 20W power savings? I checked most of your articles on the matter and it's hard to get a assessment

It is a bit different in the LGA1366 world but I would not be surprised. The reason is that single chip idle is going to be similar on your options above. Not having the second chip might not get you 20w, but there is a lot more going on with components connected to the socket. In essence, you are turning the signaling between the two processors, the 2nd processor and the IOH36 and etc all off when there is nothing installed. If you did get 20w I would not be surprised.

 

[chinesestunna]

Well, it seems like I'll be getting more RAM soon as a buddy is upgrading his server to 2011v3 with DDR4, L5630 it is, I will be trying to do passive cooling. Hopefully Supermicro motherboard monitoring won't scream bloody murder when both CPU fans are "not present"

 

[markarr]

Well, it seems like I'll be getting more RAM soon as a buddy is upgrading his server to 2011v3 with DDR4, L5630 it is, I will be trying to do passive cooling. Hopefully Supermicro motherboard monitoring won't scream bloody murder when both CPU fans are "not present"

If the board doesn't see it at post then it ignores it. The supermicro boards are designed to work with passive heatsinks, so they don't care about fans as much, now if a fan dies after post then it complains and ramps all the fans up. They have pretty sophisticated monitoring on the board to spin fans up and down depending on the temp of the components.

 

[chinesestunna]

If the board doesn't see it at post then it ignores it. The supermicro boards are designed to work with passive heatsinks, so they don't care about fans as much, now if a fan dies after post then it complains and ramps all the fans up. They have pretty sophisticated monitoring on the board to spin fans up and down depending on the temp of the components.

I just realized this as I posted as well with 1U/2U systems many use "Passive" cooling on the CPU heatsink and rely on chassis airflow. Thanks for confirming!

 

[canta]

just my alternate suggestion when your future machine is idling much:
how about e3 processor, the limitation is 32gb memory and required unbuffered DDr3 ECC ram(more expensive than registered ddr3 on ebay).
less heat, and amazing idle power consumption with max 6 sata 6g on boards.

you can get ~$300 lenovo e3 ts440 or 140 with single 4gb udimm ecc ram from amazon with free shipping.
And can be transplanted easily to supermicro 2U-4U case with an additional pwer cable converter for $6 from ebay.

I transplante two ts140 with i3 and e3 to 3U supermicro and 2U supermicro server, which was $165 AR+visacheckout promo and 275 AR+visacheckout promo (free shipiing too)

that is just the basice, since needed to add more RAM sticks and drives including raid card when running esxi or proxmox or other bare metal system.

 

[chinesestunna]

just my alternate suggestion when your future machine is idling much:
how about e3 processor, the limitation is 32gb memory and required unbuffered DDr3 ECC ram(more expensive than registered ddr3 on ebay).
less heat, and amazing idle power consumption with max 6 sata 6g on boards.

you can get ~$300 lenovo e3 ts440 or 140 with single 4gb udimm ecc ram from amazon with free shipping.
And can be transplanted easily to supermicro 2U-4U case with an additional pwer cable converter for $6 from ebay.

I transplante two ts140 with i3 and e3 to 3U supermicro and 2U supermicro server, which was $165 AR+visacheckout promo and 275 AR+visacheckout promo (free shipiing too)

that is just the basice, since needed to add more RAM sticks and drives including raid card when running esxi or proxmox or other bare metal system.

I thought long and hard about that approach as well esp. hanging out at Slickdeals and those hitting frontpage every month. The challenge really came down to ECC UDIMM had such a premium over RDIMM and cost, even if the E3 was a good deal at that price. (I've used my Amex offer on other things already as well).
Comparison:

1. E3 Lenovo which nets us board + chip + 4GB stick of RAM for about $300
2. Supermicro board + 2X 5600 Xeons + 6x4GB RAM for less or same price

the 2nd option has much higher processing power and significantly more RAM and while is less power efficient, it would take years before option 1 can reach parity cost wise with option 2, especially if adding in similar amounts of UDIMM RAM.
Fellow member @Joel and I had a similar discussion/exchange about this in this thread: https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/e5-2600-v1-v2-v3-article.4683/#post-39871

 

[canta]

I thought long and hard about that approach as well esp. hanging out at Slickdeals and those hitting frontpage every month. The challenge really came down to ECC UDIMM had such a premium over RDIMM and cost, even if the E3 was a good deal at that price. (I've used my Amex offer on other things already as well).
Comparison:

1. E3 Lenovo which nets us board + chip + 4GB stick of RAM for about $300
2. Supermicro board + 2X 5600 Xeons + 6x4GB RAM for less or same price

the 2nd option has much higher processing power and significantly more RAM and while is less power efficient, it would take years before option 1 can reach parity cost wise with option 2, especially if adding in similar amounts of UDIMM RAM.
Fellow member @Joel and I had a similar discussion/exchange about this in this thread: https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/e5-2600-v1-v2-v3-article.4683/#post-39871

udimm ecc can be bought from ebay, you just need take a bit time than buying rdimm.
I bought 2X8Gb $160 total + 1X4Gb $25 total = 185 for total 24gb (including 4gb from tiss140) memory. this is 1.35V version
the other one 4X4gb $100, this is for 1.5V version.
a bit higher but not too high.

if your machine mostly idle, e3 is the best bang.
believe it or not, with only e3 and motherboard with full RAM slots, idle is 14W!
my celeron 847 can not beat that. on SSD, with 2 slot ram running esxi free; takes 17W idle
the other thing is running less heat on e3 or i3 haswell.

even with 5600 path. your price would be identical . the plus is RAM. e3 can be maxed to 32Gb

I did the calculation before jumping, I used amex promo, discover promo (10% cash back), and visacheckout) including mastercardpass.
assuming you will stay with your new build for 6 years... that would save $, specially for high rate on electrical on certain areas.

this is the main reason, buy patiently to get a good deal .
my dream is e5 v2/v3 , but away $$$ on my purpose.

 

[chinesestunna]

udimm ecc can be bought from ebay, you just need take a bit time than buying rdimm.
I bought 2X8Gb $160 total + 1X4Gb $25 total = 185 for total 24gb (including 4gb from tiss140) memory. this is 1.35V version
the other one 4X4gb $100, this is for 1.5V version.
a bit higher but not too high.

if your machine mostly idle, e3 is the best bang.
believe it or not, with only e3 and motherboard with full RAM slots, idle is 14W!
my celeron 847 can not beat that. on SSD, with 2 slot ram running esxi free; takes 17W idle
the other thing is running less heat on e3 or i3 haswell.

even with 5600 path. your price would be identical . the plus is RAM. e3 can be maxed to 32Gb

I did the calculation before jumping, I used amex promo, discover promo (10% cash back), and visacheckout) including mastercardpass.
assuming you will stay with your new build for 6 years... that would save $, specially for high rate on electrical on certain areas.

this is the main reason, buy patiently to get a good deal .
my dream is e5 v2/v3 , but away $$$ on my purpose.

Very good analysis and 14W idle is amazing! Is that measured from the wall? I guess it ultimately comes down to what you need and priorities, honestly I was even thinking about using a Mini-ITX AMD E1200 board to run the array only but that would require separate ESXi box.
I have cheap electricity where I am, at about $.10 per KWh, I like lower power just for being green and less noise. I think we're just optimizing in different directions, e3 is definitely king in idle power hands down in this case, but I doubt 1 e3 can match 2x L5630 in performance and RAM capacity in case of ESXi would put me easily in the 48-96GB levels.

All about where you want to make the concessions. There's a difference between getting a "good deal" on something vs. a "good deal for me"

 

[canta]

Very good analysis and 14W idle is amazing! Is that measured from the wall? I guess it ultimately comes down to what you need and priorities, honestly I was even thinking about using a Mini-ITX AMD E1200 board to run the array only but that would require separate ESXi box.
I have cheap electricity where I am, at about $.10 per KWh, I like lower power just for being green and less noise. I think we're just optimizing in different directions, e3 is definitely king in idle power hands down in this case, but I doubt 1 e3 can match 2x L5630 in performance and RAM capacity in case of ESXi would put me easily in the 48-96GB levels.

All about where you want to make the concessions. There's a difference between getting a "good deal" on something vs. a "good deal for me"

"good deal" is objective
"good deal for me" is subjective (which can not be good deal aka bias), I think; this is your goal.

14W from AC input with original lenovo psu 450W.
I explain on objective way
E3 v3 is only 32gb ram, max!
please remember, e3 is an entry level xeon. this is good but can not compete with 2xl5630.
but... e3 can beat 1Xl5630 processing power.


I try to be objective on taking my final decision, e3 is my choice for 24/7 baremetal or i3 for ZoL.
if I need running more VM and more ram for 24/7, I would pick e5 that would last longer objectively, but with more $ in front.

 

[T_Minus]

WOW that's some great power information.

I was looking at going from one of my dual x56xx to a dual L setup, eliminate the 2nd PSU and that looked to cut power usage by 50% in some cases and keep the 12 cores but clocked MUCH less. Then I got a 12Core Haswell and now I'm confused about what to do LOL, it too is clocked much less. I need to determine where I'll be running my software testing I guess, or just keep them all for now... (My software maxes CPU instantly, so higher clocks gets things done faster but I need to compare to more/newer cores. No matter, 24c>12c)

Where is this cheap DDR4 RDIMMs people are talking about? I think I paid ~$750 for 64gb 1.2v CAS15 from an online store. And where is the DDR3 64gb for $300 I need some of that too I've seen some cheap with motherboards but am not sure which sellers to trust, and I try to go for NOT 4gb sticks.

 

[NeverDie]

just my alternate suggestion when your future machine is idling much:
how about e3 processor, the limitation is 32gb memory and required unbuffered DDr3 ECC ram(more expensive than registered ddr3 on ebay).
less heat, and amazing idle power consumption with max 6 sata 6g on boards.

you can get ~$300 lenovo e3 ts440 or 140 with single 4gb udimm ecc ram from amazon with free shipping.
And can be transplanted easily to supermicro 2U-4U case with an additional pwer cable converter for $6 from ebay.

I transplante two ts140 with i3 and e3 to 3U supermicro and 2U supermicro server, which was $165 AR+visacheckout promo and 275 AR+visacheckout promo (free shipiing too)

that is just the basice, since needed to add more RAM sticks and drives including raid card when running esxi or proxmox or other bare metal system.

What kind of memory (ECC or not) comes with the ts140? Also, exactly which motherboard comes with it?

 

[NeverDie]

By the way, according to Passmark, 2x L5630 performs slightly less well than a single L5640:

PassMark - [Dual CPU] Intel Xeon L5630 @ 2.13GHz - Price performance comparison

PassMark - Intel Xeon L5640 @ 2.27GHz - Price performance comparison

 

[NeverDie]

I thought long and hard about that approach as well esp. hanging out at Slickdeals and those hitting frontpage every month. The challenge really came down to ECC UDIMM had such a premium over RDIMM and cost, even if the E3 was a good deal at that price. (I've used my Amex offer on other things already as well).
Comparison:

1. E3 Lenovo which nets us board + chip + 4GB stick of RAM for about $300
2. Supermicro board + 2X 5600 Xeons + 6x4GB RAM for less or same price

the 2nd option has much higher processing power and significantly more RAM and while is less power efficient, it would take years before option 1 can reach parity cost wise with option 2, especially if adding in similar amounts of UDIMM RAM.
Fellow member @Joel and I had a similar discussion/exchange about this in this thread: https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/e5-2600-v1-v2-v3-article.4683/#post-39871

Interestingly, the E3-1225v3 used in the E3 Leveno that you linked to above looks as though it has pretty nearly the same performance as the dual L5630:
PassMark - Intel Xeon E3-1225 v3 @ 3.20GHz - Price performance comparison

 

[chinesestunna]

Interestingly, the E3-1225v3 used in the E3 Leveno that you linked to above looks as though it has pretty nearly the same performance as the dual L5630:
PassMark - Intel Xeon E3-1225 v3 @ 3.20GHz - Price performance comparison

That is impressive/interesting, L564o does turbo up a good bit higher @ 2.8 vs 2.4 and with 2 more cores I guess it's better even at 6 vs 8? In my case it was a very up front cost driven decision, I didn't have a huge need for high processing speed/power and focused on low up front cost. I managed to get board + 2 L5630 for $160 shipped.
I was going to get a single L5640 and run with that initially but buddy is getting me his DDR3 ECC RAM as soon as he gets his socket 2011 setup going so I needed both sockets to drive all that RAM, hence the L5630. Also 40W TDP should be easier to manage with passive cooling, not that 60W is that hot either

 

[canta]

What kind of memory (ECC or not) comes with the ts140? Also, exactly which motherboard comes with it?

the entry level system comes with single 4G ECC RAM 1.35V UDIMM .
TS140/440 uses lenovo motherboard support Haswell i3/e3 ( later motherboard version supports "refresh" broadwell, check on lenovo site on motherboard version)
the motherboard supports 16X pcie 3.0, 1X and 4X pcie2, and 1 legacy pci 32.