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Over the past few weeks I have had the chance to play with some 8 core 16 thread Intel Sandy Bridge-EP based Xeon samples which will ultimately be part of the Xeon E5-2600 lineup. I will say that the turbo frequencies seem to be working a little strangely on these chips, but the one I am using for the benchmarks can maintain 3.1GHz across all eight cores quite nicely and the memory controller supports eight DIMM sockets fully populated. I figured I would share a preview of the Intel Xeon E5 series’ performance. Again, please see this as a preview so final shipping numbers should be a bit better. The most comparable CPU ise the Xeon E5-2687W which is a 3.1GHz 150w 8C/16T part designated for workstations. Yes, the new LGA 2011 dual socket Xeons are going to be expensive, but with AMD’s Bulldozer-based Opteron 6200 series CPUs putting out performance numbers well below expectations, Intel has a lot of leeway to price these for aggressive margins. I will also note however, that the G34 platform still has some very compelling use cases, especially with 4P systems and using very low-end chips to build memcached 2P/ 4P servers. Read the full story

I have a fairly strong opinion that Intel’s LGA1155 platform has a stronger set of single processor server motherboards than AMD. I actually hope the new Socket AM3+ based Opteron 3000 series will change this in the near future, but until then at the low end, Intel has the better overall platform (integrated Intel NICs supported out-of-the-box by ESXi, KVM-over-IP and etc.) Upon Sandy Bridge’s initial release, there was a huge gap between the Core i3-2100 at just over $120 (USD) and the lower-end Athlon’s at around $40. Over time, Intel has pushed the Sandy Bridge architecture down the chain to the lower-end of the marketplace, replacing 2010′s Pentiums. Today we are looking at the Pentium G630 which is one of Intel’s lower-end parts that one can get at retail for around $65. Read the full story

One thing that I have been looking forward to in 2011 is AMD’s Bulldozer architecture in the server space. AMD recently released its next-generation, Bulldozer based Interlagos and Valencia CPUs. Interlagos is the successor to AMD’s Magny Cours CPU and will be available in single, dual and quad socket G34 configurations. Valencia is essentially half of an Interlagos but can be put in single or dual socket C32 configurations. Here is the complete list: Read the full story

This mid-range guide was originally intended to have an AMD Bulldozer based build and an Intel E3 series based build. I have been playing quite a bit with the Bulldozer CPUs and frankly, it is very difficult to do at this point. On the plus side, the desktop AMD FX series Bulldozer CPUs support ECC so long as the motherboard can. Frankly, I wish Intel just did away with the Xeon E3 versus Core i5/ i7 designation and just allowed Core i5 and i7 series CPUs support ECC. AMD’s efforts here are commendable. Now, here is the issue, Windows Home Server 2011, Windows 7, and Windows 2008 Server R2 all seem to have the scheduler that keeps more Bulldozer nodes active than one would want. Microsoft has said that the Windows 8 generation kernel will support the Bulldozer architecture, but Windows 8 generation products are probably a year away. Read the full story

For those that did not see the article this morning, my Intel vPro article looking at the last three generations of Intel vPro technology went live on Tom’s Hardware this morning. See Intel vPro: Three Generations of Remote Management! One of the big reasons I did this piece was to learn the ins and outs of working with vPro as opposed to IPMI 2.0-based solutions. I have a ton of users that consistently ask whether or not a Q57 or Q67 based board, with its KVM-over-IP is worthwhile for a home user or to use as a home server platform. Read the full story

One of the most popular motherboard reviews on STH of the Xeon 3400 series generation was the Supermicro X8SIL-F. It was a micro ATX (mATX) motherboard with some of the mainstay server board features such as dual Intel 82574L Gigabit NICs and IPMI 2.0. Looking forward to this generation, Supermicro has a spiritual successor in the X9SCM-F which has been a popular board. Tyan has responded to the X9SCM-F with a similar board, the S5510 series S5510GM3NR, that has one key advantage, three Intel 82574L NICs. Read the full story

For those that are accustomed to IPMI 2.0 for their servers, with KVM-over-IP and the ability to remotely reboot a PC, Intel’s vPro platform provides some similar functionality. I have been working with vPro components quite a bit over the past few weeks and decided to try using my Apple iPad to reboot the machine. Read the full story

As some readers know, a big reason for the slow content on the site is that I am busy writing a big piece on Intel vPro technology for a very big technology review site. As part of this, one thing I realized is that Intel’s current model of offering it only with specific chip sets and its mid to high end CPUs is quickly becoming obsolete. Read the full story

One project that inspired some of my own work has been the Backblaze storage pod v1 which held 67TB in a custom 45 drive 4U chassis. It was essentially a lower cost and lower performance Sun Thumper that utilized commodity parts to achieve high storage densities at a very low cost per TB (or PB since that is the scale the company is looking at.) For those not familiar, Backblaze is a cloud storage provider offering $5 for unlimited storage. Backblaze recently revealed its updated v2 platform with 3.0gbps drives providing 135TB of capacity for under $8000. Better yet, they are freely distributing how they did this. It puts my DIY DAS to shame, but does look fairly similar with the dual PSUs and X8SIL-F to my DIY SAS Expander Enclosure V2 from last summer. Read the full story

One of the most popular mATX server motherboards reviewed on this site was the Supermicro X8SIL-F. It provided a small form-factor, relatively inexpensive platform with features one would want from a low-cost server motherboard. With the new Sandy Bridge Xeon’s Supermicro has an updated platform, the Supermicro X9SCM-F, that takes advantage of the new PCIe lanes from the Intel C204 chipset to provide an interesting alternative to the previous generation X8SIL-F. Read the full story