-Post pics of your computer-

[Roadhog]

This will do.

[MangaSpawn64]

[IMG][/IMG]

Beautiful !!!

Not for my personal computer, it's an upgrade for 15 teachers where I work, plus my work computer... Still around 3.8 TB of SSDs is pretty good looking

[AdamK47]

Very nice.

My RAID-0 of eight 512GB Vertex 4 drives is still running strong. No issues with the array in the year since building it. It's crazy fast. Currently have 3,233GB used of 4096GB.

Kinda getting bored with my system though. Wish Haswell-E or big Maxwell was just around the corner.

[shadow001]

Finally figured out why the Asus dual socket 2011 board wouldn't boot properly....Having 8 channels of ram is a pain in the ass when they all have to work together, without causing interference to their neighbours as the frequencies of the ram get ever higher, and since the corsair dominator GT's run at 2133 with CAS 9 timings and there's 32 GB split across 8 modules, it's simply too much ram running too fast and at too low timings for everyone to get along nicely.


So I got regular unregistered non ECC DDR 1600 from Kingston and the local shop only had 8 GB modules on hand, so I took a chance and bought 8 of them, for a total of 64 GB and they run perfectly stable, and I won't need a memory upgrade anytime soon, but they are running slower than the corsairs, though the impact should be mitigated some by all 8 memory channels working together.

Guess I was running too close to the ragged edge.....

[Roadhog]

Guess I was running too close to the ragged edge.....

Nah, your CPUs just have weak memory controllers.

[shadow001]

Nah, your CPUs just have weak memory controllers.

Well it's easier to run just a pair of memory modules at high clocks and low timings like on socket 1150 or 1155 boards, since they only have those 2 channels.


Complicate it with 8 channels having to do the same, and it's gets nasty, hence why even full server boards go easy with memory speeds given the high amount, and these use CPU's costing up to 5000$$ a piece.


If I go the full registered and ECC route, this board I'm currently using can go up to 256 GB...

[t0adp1p3]

Well it's easier to run just a pair of memory modules at high clocks and low timings like on socket 1150 or 1155 boards, since they only have those 2 channels.


Complicate it with 8 channels having to do the same, and it's gets nasty, hence why even full server boards go easy with memory speeds given the high amount, and these use CPU's costing up to 5000$$ a piece.


If I go the full registered and ECC route, this board I'm currently using can go up to 256 GB...

Does the board you bought use PLX PEX to get the PCIe lanes to 72? If so why bother if it ends up introducing latency which makes it less fast than other mobo's with the 40 lanes shared @ pci 3.0? Is there something i am missing? The review i have seen has x16x8x8x8 outperforming full x16x16x16x16 because of that. One thing I do like is the ability to have that many lanes though as the performance hit is negligible. Hey I just answered my own question lol. 7 lanes is sweet that is a lot of space for "stuff".

[shadow001]

Does the board you bought use PLX PEX to get the PCIe lanes to 72? If so why bother if it ends up introducing latency which makes it less fast than other mobo's with the 40 lanes shared @ pci 3.0? Is there something i am missing? The review i have seen has x16x8x8x8 outperforming full x16x16x16x16 because of that. One thing I do like is the ability to have that many lanes though as the performance hit is negligible. Hey I just answered my own question lol. 7 lanes is sweet that is a lot of space for "stuff".

The PCI-e controller in each CPU is leveraged directly, so it's 40 lanes from one xeon and another 40 lanes from the other, each directly controls 2 cards with no PLX or bridge chip of any kind....It's full speed X16 PCI-e for each video card which not only increases the available bandwith, but also results in less latency from not having anything like a PLX chip in the way to communicate to the CPU directly...

It's the expensive way to fix a problem....

[Roadhog]

The PCI-e controller in each CPU is leveraged directly, so it's 40 lanes from one xeon and another 40 lanes from the other, each directly controls 2 cards with no PLX or bridge chip of any kind....It's full speed X16 PCI-e for each video card which not only increases the available bandwith, but also results in less latency from not having anything like a PLX chip in the way to communicate to the CPU directly...

It's the expensive way to fix a problem....

No. With 4 you only get x8. This is your board right?

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Z9PED8_WS/#specifications

4 x PCIe 3.0/2.0 x16 (dual x16 or quad x8)

[shadow001]

No. With 4 you only get x8. This is your board right?

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Z9PED8_WS/#specifications

4 x PCIe 3.0/2.0 x16 (dual x16 or quad x8)

Indeed it is, but that applies when you only have 1 CPU installed, which is the minimum needed to build the system, hence why there's only 40 lanes to distribute across the PCI-e slots.


Add a second CPU and the gloves come off, as the other 40 PCI-e lanes in that second CPU are leveraged and the CPU's talk to each other by means of a second QPI bus, which on desktop 2011's processors, are disabled on purpose at the factory, but are left enabled on Xeon's.....Sleazy method to ensure that only Xeons are used in dual socket setups, but that's life.

[shadow001]

This isn't the picture I was looking for, but gives a clue:





Still looking for the functional picture....Look at the slots, there's 4 X16 slots electrically, and three X8 slots electrically.

[demo]

That's a much better board than that Gigabyte pos you were looking at shadow, shame you have to run 1600mhz RAM though..

[shadow001]

That's a much better board than that Gigabyte pos you were looking at shadow, shame you have to run 1600mhz RAM though..

In both cases the boards are identical specs wise save for one thing for the gigabyte one.....The inclusion of an LSI SAS processor right on the board with 8 ports and still keeping the intel Raid functional too....Asus settles with a marvel raid one, so not exactly high end.


True it kind of sucks I couldn't use the corsair dominators, but like I said earlier, there's 8 memory channels so it's not exactly low on memory bandwith no matter what.....It's 4x more than with socket 1150 or 1155 boards so when having this many working together, they don't need to work at the absolute maximum speed as their ability comes from sheer quantity of them.

[demo]

Functionality /= specs.

And, bandwidth isn't the only reason to have fast, low latency memory.

[shadow001]

Functionality /= specs.

And, bandwidth isn't the only reason to have fast, low latency memory.

That particular controller on the Gigabyte board is also sold on dedicated raid cards costing upwards of 300$....It's even got it's own 512MB of cache memory.

So Gigabyte are serious about making a professional workstation board.

[demo]

Yep, it certainly has good functionality for a workstation board. Specs however are another matter.

[shadow001]

Yep, it certainly has good functionality for a workstation board. Specs however are another matter.

What's missing in your view?

[demo]

Well among other things power delivery is poor, and components tied to oc stability and power delivery. I wouldn't be surprised if 4 x oc'd 290's killed that Gigabyte board before long. Your ASUS is better in this regard.

In short its great for work station duties at default clocks and settings, but is not designed to handle moving outside default specs well. It is basically the equivalent of a UD3 but houses 2 CPU's.

Look at the components and power delivery of the 2011 R4E for example, it's a monster in comparison.

[shadow001]

Well among other things power delivery is poor, and components tied to oc stability and power delivery. I wouldn't be surprised if 4 x oc'd 290's killed that Gigabyte board before long. Your ASUS is better in this regard.

In short its great for work station duties at default clocks and settings, but is not designed to handle moving outside default specs well. It is basically the equivalent of a UD3 but houses 2 CPU's.

Look at the components and power delivery of the 2011 R4E for example, it's a monster in comparison.

Overclock is locked in these chips anyhow, and each PCI-e card only receives 75 watts by way of the motherboard slot, so when overclocking those the main amount of power comes from the additional power connectors on the PSU, which has nothing to do with the motherboard itself.


The board can still overclock it's memory to 1866Mhz, while the Asus can push it to 2133, but as we see with my dominators which are rated at that speed, it doesn't work with all types of memory, or maybe it can only support those higher speeds when using less memory, say 16GB(8X2GB module configuration) as it won't fly with an 8x4GB one.


ECC and registered memory, both boards can go to 256 GB, but apart from being expensive memory, those modules max out at 1333Mhz, the original DDR 3 speeds when this standard was launched years ago.

[demo]

That doesn't change anything that was said about the board. Look at some high end 2011 boards like the R4E or MSi Xpower for example, sure they don't hold dual CPU's but specs are through the roof compared to that Gigabyte board.

More power can be drawn through the pcie slots when overvolting and oc'ing too. There's a good chance you'd melt the 24 pin on that board with 4 x oc'd 290's.

Your ASUS is better, forget about the Gigabyte board - its too workstation for the type of monster build you want imo.

[shadow001]

That doesn't change anything that was said about the board. Look at some high end 2011 boards like the R4E or MSi Xpower for example, sure they don't hold dual CPU's but specs are through the roof compared to that Gigabyte board.

That extra is to overclock the CPU and memory for those, something that I don't need to worry about....

More power can be drawn through the pcie slots when overvolting and oc'ing too. There's a good chance you'd melt the 24 pin on that board with 4 x oc'd 290's.

Your ASUS is better, forget about the Gigabyte board - its too workstation for the type of monster build you want imo.

So 3/4 of all the power fed to each card comes directly from the power supply PCI-e power connectors, and I should be worried about the 24 pin ATX motherboard should I, especially when with either board, there's an additional 8 pin power connector for each CPU.


Seriously?....

[demo]

The 8-pin for CPU has nothing to do with the pcie slots. Yes, plenty of cases of lower end boards dying from 3-way and 4-way by melting the 24 pin. The board is a pos, your ASUS is better.

[shadow001]

The 8-pin for CPU has nothing to do with the pcie slots. Yes, plenty of cases of lower end boards dying from 3-way and 4-way by melting the 24 pin. The board is a pos, your ASUS is better.

This is a board released only 4 months ago and costing over 700$....Lower end isn't that price and you knowing it's a POS when it's that recent, doesn't compute.

[demo]

It costs that much because it houses 2 CPU's.

[shadow001]

It costs that much because it houses 2 CPU's.

Costs more than my Asus board did, which I admit doesn't have a built in SAS controller and is a model that's nearly 2 years old now, but the point remains, the Gigabyte doesn't seem cheap at all, heck it even has a 3rd gigabit network controller onboard, the Asus one only has 2.....


Seriously, just stop....You know a ton about a lot of stuff for single socket boards and video cards and displays, but workstation boards with multiple CPU's and all their features, not your strong point....

[Deaderinred]

i am more likely to believe demo here due to his post count and large set of balls.

[shadow001]

i am more likely to believe demo here due to his post count and large set of balls.

Go for it, but I've been building dual socket motherboards since the Pentium 3 days when they were inserted into vertical slots using the 440BX chipset and running at just 500Mhz, and in the past 15 years since then, and having built all those dual systems since then for both myself and others, I still don't have it all figured out anyways...

[Nunz]

The Gigabyte board pales in quality to the ASUS. Price has very little to do with it, and only a hardware noob would bring that up in an argument.

Regardless, you got the better board. What are we arguing again?

More pics of the setup. Do you have it running yet?

[Deaderinred]

Go for it, but I've been building dual socket motherboards since the Pentium 3 days when they were inserted into vertical slots using the 440BX chipset and running at just 500Mhz, and in the past 15 years since then, and having built all those dual systems since then for both myself and others, I still don't have it all figured out anyways...

that's okay, i don't even know what thread im in.

[Redeemed]

that's okay, i don't even know what thread im in.

I don't even know what website I'm at, let alone whose house I'm in.

Think I just heard a shotgun being loaded...

[shadow001]

The Gigabyte board pales in quality to the ASUS. Price has very little to do with it, and only a hardware noob would bring that up in an argument.

Regardless, you got the better board. What are we arguing again?

More pics of the setup. Do you have it running yet?

It is a much older board, and has a crappier marvel raid controller and one less network controller compared to the Gigabyte board, which also comes with a BIOS recognizing the V2 edition of Xeon's( they use ivy bridge cores)...,


Anyhow you're right pictures incoming..... Right side first.




Left side now....



Just finished bleeding it and putting on a massive amount of tie raps, created the raid arrays as well, so it's on to the software install process, which no doubt will be a pain in the balls.

that's okay, i don't even know what thread im in.

I don't even know what website I'm at, let alone whose house I'm in.

Think I just heard a shotgun being loaded...

[Roadhog]

Defiantly a unique build, but couldn't you have chosen a chase where it doesn't look like you tried to cram 10 lbs of **** into a 5 lb bag?

[shadow001]

Defiantly a unique build, but couldn't you have chosen a chase where it doesn't look like you tried to cram 10 lbs of **** into a 5 lb bag?

Indeed...Pretty much every ounce of space is being used up, with no more room for 5 1/4 drives, or 3 1/2 drives for HDD or SSD's( all 10 bays are used up), packed 2 power supplies and 5 radiators too...

Only thing bigger and in the same style is a mountain mods extended ascension, and even then it adds only more vertical room with 2 extra 5 1/4 bays and more room for radiators....Depth and wide is the same as this one.

[Roadhog]

Indeed...Pretty much every ounce of space is being used up, with no more room for 5 1/4 drives, or 3 1/2 drives for HDD or SSD's( all 10 bays are used up), packed 2 power supplies and 5 radiators too...

Only thing bigger and in the same style is a mountain mods extended ascension, and even then it adds only more vertical room with 2 extra 5 1/4 bays and more room for radiators....Depth and wide is the same as this one.

That's true, the dual psu requirement takes 99% of the cases out of the game. Come on though, you've spent $$$$ on this, get a huge case.

[demo]

Seriously, just stop....You know a ton about a lot of stuff for single socket boards and video cards and displays, but workstation boards with multiple CPU's and all their features, not your strong point....

Fine suit yourself, but I'm looking at the specs and the ASUS is better than the Gigabyte board, despite the Gigabyte having some extra functionality.

[shadow001]

That's true, the dual psu requirement takes 99% of the cases out of the game. Come on though, you've spent $$$$ on this, get a huge case.

This is the only one at about 800$ the way I want it finished...

[Roadhog]

Do it, $800 is nothing compared to what you have into that.

[shadow001]

Fine suit yourself, but I'm looking at the specs and the ASUS is better than the Gigabyte board, despite the Gigabyte having some extra functionality. You don't understand the difference between high end and functionality.

It includes an 8 port SAS controller that sells on 250 to 300$ in stand alone raid cards, while Asus still screws around with a marvel 4 port raid controller that's over 2 years old...


I don't know where your argument between functionality and high end comes from when something as high end as that is built into a motherboard....

[Roadhog]

I wouldn't touch a marvel raid controller with a 10ft stick.

[shadow001]

Do it, $800 is nothing compared to what you have into that.

Would be as tall as my desk...