ES Xeon Discussion

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Stephan

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Apr 21, 2017
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Neat, digging further it does appear that some of the Cascade Lake Xeons (e.g. 5220) share a stepping with the ES2's so it should just work. Also bodes well for the ES2's, the fact that some of them made it to production would imply there are no showstopper bugs.
A statement that is both true and wrong. One of the biggest blunders from Intel was the JCC bug, see https://www.intel.com/content/dam/s...mitigations-jump-conditional-code-erratum.pdf Also affected are the Cascade Lake Xeons. What they did there was fix this in microcode. Performance cost: 0% to 8% according to Phoronix. Depends on your workload, 3-5% should be gone no matter what.

I looked really hard and well-intentioned at ES/QS Xeons but man, all those bugs and all those flaws costing 5% here and 3% there, made me rethink and look at EPYC instead. A Platinum 8180 QS would have to fall to 200 USD per piece to make me reconsider.

My 2 euro cents
 
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bayleyw

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A statement that is both true and wrong. One of the biggest blunders from Intel was the JCC bug, see https://www.intel.com/content/dam/s...mitigations-jump-conditional-code-erratum.pdf Also affected are the Cascade Lake Xeons. What they did there was fix this in microcode. Performance cost: 0% to 8% according to Phoronix. Depends on your workload, 3-5% should be gone no matter what.

I looked really hard and well-intentioned at ES/QS Xeons but man, all those bugs and all those flaws costing 5% here and 3% there, made me rethink and look at EPYC instead. A Platinum 8180 QS would have to fall to 200 USD per piece to make me reconsider.

My 2 euro cents
Yeah, I've generally concluded EPYC is the way to go this generation as well, especially with the new-as-of-today ability to overclock the Rome ES'es.
Sadly this system is a dev box for a simulation which is getting deployed on EC2, so there's a desire to match microarchitectures as much as possible for workflow reasons.
 

cloudkitten_

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Aug 17, 2016
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Was eyeballing the x11spm-tpf board for a single socket ES setup. From what I understood with v3 bios it should run most ES models, correct? Any other tips or CPU recommendations (14c and up).
 

JoshDi

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Jun 13, 2019
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Was eyeballing the x11spm-tpf board for a single socket ES setup. From what I understood with v3 bios it should run most ES models, correct? Any other tips or CPU recommendations (14c and up).
Use the latest 2.x version bios, v3.x and above wont work.

I run the same board with an Intel QL1K and 128gb of ecc - runs great.
 
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RolloZ170

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Apr 24, 2016
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Was eyeballing the x11spm-tpf board for a single socket ES setup. From what I understood with v3 bios it should run most ES models, correct? Any other tips or CPU recommendations (14c and up).
bios v3.x and later have different processor intialisation and wont support skl ES cpu.
use any v2.x bios.
16 core QL1M 1,8 Ghz
16 core QL28 2,4 Ghz
20 core QL1L 1,8 Ghz
24 core QL1K 1,8 Ghz
 

RolloZ170

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Apr 24, 2016
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So, I received my E5 2678v3 yesterday and cannot get it to post in my supermicro c7x99-oce-f. Motherboard was working yesterday with i7 5930k in it. I tried a new cmos battery, resetting cmos, leaving it on awhile. The motherboard led reads code 00. In the manual it states that the code is unassigned. Please help.
looks the E5-2678v3 is DOA, remove it and check the socket pin,s.
 

aloe

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Aug 17, 2019
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Does it say "intel confidential"?
No, I'm fairly sure it's not es, bought from the eBay listing that sparked this thread
EDIT:. SUCCESS AT LAST, RESEATED CPU AND ITS UP AND RUNNING!!! who wants to buy 5930k
 
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RolloZ170

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No, I'm fairly sure it's not es, bought from the eBay listing that sparked this thread
EDIT:. SUCCESS AT LAST, RESEATED CPU AND ITS UP AND RUNNING!!! who wants to buy 5930k
it should give you more than the code 00 even if the processor is not supported by the board.
i.e. code 55 for memory init. error.
the E5-2678v3 is a cpu with additional DDR3 support.
 

AmusedGoose

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Mar 16, 2019
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I can't test this until after I decommission my current server. But I created a BIOS mod for the X9DAi that should support ES CPUs off the latest BIOS version. Since this board doesn't have IPMI, the only way to recover if it doesn't work will be to desolder the chip. It's not a very complex procedure - I did it when I first purchased the board years ago to downgrade. I also added the module that supports NVMe boot.

If anyone wants to give it a go off a spare board, please report back. Otherwise I'll be testing in a few weeks. Also included is the hard to find factory 1.0 BIOS that supports ES chips.

https://mb300sd.net/files/X9DAi.7z

I can attempt this for any other boards with an early BIOS that supports ES and no support in later versions. No guarantees it won't brick, but recovery should be easy if it has IPMI.

Here's X11SPM9_521 with the ES microcode
https://mb300sd.net/files/X11SPM.7z
I'd like to try a Gigabyte board with 8260 QS (A0), how risky would that be? I can take the loss if Ebay would not cover my return, would very much like to try.
Also what about the legality of this? I can't find Intel actually forbidding this?
 

RolloZ170

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Apr 24, 2016
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I'd like to try a Gigabyte board with 8260 QS (A0), how risky would that be? I can take the loss if Ebay would not cover my return, would very much like to try.
Also what about the legality of this? I can't find Intel actually forbidding this?
8260 QS ?
QS is production unit with(only) ES bit set.
If you talk about a QQ89 that is not a QS, but this cpu shares same cpuid with the (first rev) prod.unit.
this should run fine with a bios that supports the prod. unit.

Intel says "eng.samples are not for sale or resale"
If a user becomes one or more eng.samples from intel:
intel and the user conclude a contract. if the user sells the eng.sample(not allowed) the user has a problem, not the buyer.
 

AmusedGoose

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Mar 16, 2019
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8260 QS ?
QS is production unit with(only) ES bit set.
If you talk about a QQ89 that is not a QS, but this cpu shares same cpuid with the (first rev) prod.unit.
this should run fine with a bios that supports the prod. unit.

Intel says "eng.samples are not for sale or resale"
If a user becomes one or more eng.samples from intel:
intel and the user conclude a contract. if the user sells the eng.sample(not allowed) the user has a problem, not the buyer.
So I won't find out if my Gigabyte board supports it until I try?

Not really sure what you mean with QQ89. The ad says "Xeon Processor Platinum 8260M QS CPU LGA3647 2.3GHz 24Core 165W QPKD SRF9J" if that helps any. According to a screenshot of cpu-z and HWInfo it supports the entire instruction set including VT-x.
 

RolloZ170

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So I won't find out if my Gigabyte board supports it until I try?
Not really sure what you mean with QQ89. The ad says "Xeon Processor Platinum 8260M QS CPU LGA3647 2.3GHz 24Core 165W QPKD SRF9J" if that helps any. According to a screenshot of cpu-z and HWInfo it supports the entire instruction set including VT-x.
QQ89 is the intel q-spec of a ES2 well known eng.sample sold on taobao.

QPKD is the Q-spec(QDF) of the processor you are going to buy,
this is the stepping A0 QS of the 8260M with only 2.30Ghz.
the cpuid is 50655, this is the same than 8260M prod.unit.
Your Gigabyte board runs it with a bios that supports cascade-lake.
 
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AmusedGoose

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QQ89 is the intel q-spec of a ES2 well known eng.sample sold on taobao.

QPKD is the Q-spec(QDF) of the processor you are going to buy,
this is the stepping A0 QS of the 8260M with only 2.30Ghz.
the cpuid is 50655, this is the same than 8260M prod.unit.
Your Gigabyte board runs it with a bios that supports cascade-lake.
Thanks a lot for the info!

So the main difference is that the CPU's base clock is 2.3 instead of 2.4 and boost clock seems limited to 3.1GHz?
I could live with that given the amount of cores and these can't run 24/7 at full boost anyways.

If CPU-z states support for vt-x I can assume that it is so?

Are people with compatibility issues mainly struggling with ES units? I was reading about people requiring modded bios'.
 

RolloZ170

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So the main difference is that the CPU's base clock is 2.3 instead of 2.4 and boost clock seems limited to 3.1GHz?
If CPU-z states support for vt-x I can assume that it is so?
there are 3 Xeon 8260M
stepping A0,B0 and B1
3.10 Ghz is the all core turbo. single core turbo is 3.90 Ghz. see HWinfo screenshots.
i think you don't understand what is QS is. if you take a production unit processor and JUST set the ES bit, you get a QS one.
there will be no compatibilty issues with QS cpu.
QS are given from Intel to software eng. to update drivers and test systems.