Intel i3-13100—What am I missing?

[Zer0_C00L]

So I'm looking at building a small Home Server, I'm wanting a SAS Card & probably a ConnectX-3. At first, I was looking at the used Dell/Lenovo/HP workstations (the SFF systems). Since I'm planning on / hoping to Bifurcate the PCIe x16 into 8x8x. But for around the same price as a 10th Gen system, I can pick up a 13100 and Motherboard. Sure, I'd need to buy a PSU (I have a few spars, but they're not expensive), RAM (although the workstations typically only come with 8/16GB, so I'd be throwing more in them anyway), and case (although I have spars again).

The little i3 looks to get similar performance (both single threaded and multithreaded) as an i7-10700 (trading 20% single threaded performance for 10% all-core). Obviously, if you can pick up the Dell/Lenovo/HP Workstation for free(ish) that's another story. I'm wondering if anyone has a 13th Gen i3 system who can talk about power consumption etc. (Not a major concern for me since both SAS & ConnectX-3 are both fairly power hungry and don't like sleeping.)

Perhaps it's just warped pricing here in Australia, but the i3-13100 looks the duck's nuts! I'll probably hold off for the 14100 since that looks like it'll be worth looking at (especially since it's so close now).

 

[DavidWJohnston]

I don't have one, but I have read about it, and posted this article in another post:

7 watts idle on Intel 12th/13th gen: the foundation for building a low power server/NAS | mattgadient.com

Maybe a poem will help remember complicated power-saving settings for SSDs. Here goes. "ALPM for SATA, not N-V-M-e. The latter needs ASPM, and A-P-S-T"....

mattgadient.com

There is the T series in the 13th-gen with a base TDP of 35W, like the i3-13100T:

Low-Power Intel 13th Gen T Series CPUs Finally Hit Market

35W Raptor Lake CPUs for the masses

www.tomshardware.com

I'd probably take a 13th gen over an older system with bifurction, with PCIe5, DDR5, and such, you get a lot for your money. You may also find a mobo with 10G onboard.

 

[mach3.2]

My i5-12500 "idles"* at around 48W measured at the wall with a CX354 installed.

*idle as in ~3% load in ESXi.

If I shut down all the VMs in ESXi, it manages around 42W at the wall.

This is with a 500W 80+ Silver PSU, with a more efficient PSU you might see slight improvements.

 

[Zer0_C00L]

Ah, you might want to 'upgrade' to a CX4 LX the CX3 burns like 15-20W and won't let you go to higher C-States.

 

[mach3.2]

Ah, you might want to 'upgrade' to a CX4 LX the CX3 burns like 15-20W and won't let you go to higher C-States.

My plan was to get the MCX512A in a few months time since the writing is on the wall for CX4 driver support and I don't want to "upgrade" to something that'll get dropped in future ESXi releases.

CX5 costing more than double of CX4s are also kinda delaying that transition for me...


Anyway, going back on topic, with the CX3 card installed and the same VMs running, "idle" power draw measured at the wall decreased from ~55W to ~49W going from an i7 4770 to i5 12500.

If you're running anything Haswell and newer, I won't expect much changes to idle power draw if you have a PCIe card (CX3) preventing the CPU going into C states deeper than C2.

 

[SnJ9MX]

So I'm looking at building a small Home Server, I'm wanting a SAS Card & probably a ConnectX-3. At first, I was looking at the used Dell/Lenovo/HP workstations (the SFF systems). Since I'm planning on / hoping to Bifurcate the PCIe x16 into 8x8x. But for around the same price as a 10th Gen system, I can pick up a 13100 and Motherboard. Sure, I'd need to buy a PSU (I have a few spars, but they're not expensive), RAM (although the workstations typically only come with 8/16GB, so I'd be throwing more in them anyway), and case (although I have spars again).

The little i3 looks to get similar performance (both single threaded and multithreaded) as an i7-10700 (trading 20% single threaded performance for 10% all-core). Obviously, if you can pick up the Dell/Lenovo/HP Workstation for free(ish) that's another story. I'm wondering if anyone has a 13th Gen i3 system who can talk about power consumption etc. (Not a major concern for me since both SAS & ConnectX-3 are both fairly power hungry and don't like sleeping.)

Perhaps it's just warped pricing here in Australia, but the i3-13100 looks the duck's nuts! I'll probably hold off for the 14100 since that looks like it'll be worth looking at (especially since it's so close now).

Two data points for your consideration:

1. Dell Precision 3240 Compact - i7-10700, 2x16GB 2933 MHz, Micron 512GB NVMe - 8W idle with Windows installed
2. Dell Optiplex 3070 - i5-9500, 1x8GB 2666 MHz, Samsung 991 128GB NVMe - 9W idle with Windows installed (and 20-22W running 7 cameras on BlueIris around 240 MP/s with motion detection on all)

 

[Tony G]

I have a 13th gen i3 headless linux server with a b760 micro atx motherboard with ddr5, nvme storage, and 10Gb ethernet and it runs at 21watts average at the power outlet. I’ve never seen it use more than 25% cpu, but I don’t do anything gpu intensive. For reference my i7 3060ti build uses 95watts idling at the wall without using the gpu.

I’m thinking a psu-less, commercial grade mini itx running an intel 300 cpu w/sodimms could probably come in closer to 10watts and take up a quarter of the space. I’m interested in building such a device for my parents figured I throw my results in. I know nothing about the 300 series chips though, let me know if anyone has experience with them.

 

[pimposh]

Go NUC. 13th gen i7-1360P equipped with TDP fixed at 28W is really decent performer and with one SATA and one TLC NVMe idles at 9,5W@win10 and 8W@Linux.

Getting low-end CPU's does not guarantee low idling power at all while going with more decent ones at least gives you performance expected.

 

[DougQuaid]

I have N100 minipc and after long bios tweaking and trying few different nvme drivers I achieved 1.5W idle at windows and 1.9W at linux (measured at wall), but there are many limitations. These values are possible only when screen is turned off, pc is connected through wifi and all lan cables are disconnected and also nothing is plugged to usb ports (I'm using bluetooth keyboard/mouse combo), with usb keyboard and connected through lan it is around 3W, with display on 4.5W.

 

[pimposh]

Russians invented water in pills. Unfortunately they ran out of water and cannot dissolve it anymore.

More or less thats worth of 1,5W idling pc.