Feedback needed on ML-CryptoMining-Dev box

[DWSimmons]

I've been coding and trying to run VMs on my ancient machine and it's not going well. I've been cleared by the wife for a budget up to $5000 but prefer less than 3K.

Here's the rub, I'm hoping to cryptomine to offset some of the cost when I'm not dev-ML-gaming.

Those of you who mine and do ML will immediately see my problem: Power efficiency while mining comes from AMD and CUDA for ML come from NVidia.


Operating System: I'm currently using Ubuntu though I'm leaning toward Ubuntu on Proxmox; I plan to continue to avoid a Windows VM though I may have to go they're at some point.

I'm open to whatever. And by whatever, I had planned to create, benchmark, and destroy this entire software stack several times before recreating my dev environment. Currently I'm thinking...

CPU:Single socket middle core count - I need to build/make and I'm running one to three VMs at a time. The VMs are constantly being created and snapped / destroyed. I believe I can get this down to a one transient VM with docker though I haven't explored it yet.
MOBO: I don't need a lot of drive slots though pci-e lanes and slots matter. M2 would be nice

RAM: Non-ecc ram, I've always wanted an obnoxious amount of ram though I suspect 32GB (even 16GB egads!) will be sufficient. I'm not against ecc I just don't see a need.

GPU: I'm currently leaning toward three 1070 as it is a good middle ground of energy efficiency, vram, cuda cores and hash rate. I could go down to two and as high as five or six. I'm still on three 1080 monitors and not concerned about 4K or SLI. (Would love to someday but the height makes it a no go.)

Hard drives: this will mostly be JBOD from previous rigs though I'll need another one or two SSD. M2 would be nice.

PSU: I'm not going more than one PSU so power must fall within 1200W.

Case: I have a couple of InWin q350 I can use (hahaha j/k). I have an oversized atx case that I'd like to use though I'm not against the cryptomining frames.

Random thoughts...
I'm not against mixing AMD and NVidia cards though I think that will be a ML-Dev box with this AMD appendage attached. I don't know if that really even matters.

This could be headless though I hadn't particularly thought through whether that would matter.

Nose is a concern though there's some expectation that it will be heard. Coil whine will not be acceptable.

Cooling is taken care of.

Power is 12 cents less whatever my solar makes.

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Looking forward to your questions, comments, and suggestions.

 

[TLN]

You can get all that way cheaper.
CPU: 2683v3 - $400.
Mobo - Any X99 mobo - $150-200
RAM: $300 for 64.
PSU - $100
Case - $100
M.2 SSD - TBD
Videocards - TBD

With E5-V3 CPU you can use so called all-core turbo hack. SO with 2683 you'll get 28 cores @ 3.0 Ghz(not 2.0). That's tons of horsepower available, if you need it. To use that I'd go with X99 mobo, X99 Taichi seems to be a popular choice.
Everything else is up to you: RAM/Drives/Videocards.
With CPU like that I'd invest in a good case and a good cooler. So your system will stay cool and silent, in case that matters.

 

[MiniKnight]

@TLN is right on all counts.

ML 1080 Ti are the beasts now NVIDIA Deep Learning / AI GPU Value Comparison Q2 2017

Your breakeven with a $700 GTX 1080 Ti mining Zcash is 95 days now using 12 cent kwh power. That's great. Fewer cards is also better than more cards.

I've seen Titan X Pascal's sell for $700-750 so maybe see if you can grab one of them. Maybe a 1070 for display and 1080 TI for dedicated crypto and ML?

NVIDIA + NVIDIA or AMD + AMD is fine. Don't mix if you don't have to. That's how you get to driver hell. AMD's sweet spot mining is the RX470 but you'd need many of them.

RAM you're still going to want more.

 

[DWSimmons]

@TLN and @MiniKnight Thank you.

I had spent a few hours trying to decipher the NVidia crypto scene and all I learned was there's a lot of chaff to dig through.

That's a lot of cores and I don't need the speed so the E5-2683v3 makes sense.

I'm not sure why I hadn't thought of the driver hell but now that you mention it, that seems cringeworthy.

I think the 1080ti max would be two with the 2.5 slot cards. I'll need to do some research to see how do able three is. Appreciate the direction, I had considered the X99 but for whatever reason I ignored used chips.