Tyan Transport TA26
It has taken us a while, but we finally have a full blown Socket F server in the labs.
The Tyan TA26's front
The 2U rack-mountable barebone TA26 B2932 supports two Socket F Opterons and didn't have any trouble with our Opteron 3.2GHz parts. (The BIOS was flashed to version 2.0). The exact model in the lab is the B2932T26W8HR which supports eight hot swappable SAS disks and a (1+1) redundant 600W power supply.
The internals of our Tyan Server
The motherboard in the system is the TYAN Thunder n3600M S2932, which is based on the NVIDIA nForce Pro 3600. A total of sixteen DDR2 DIMM sockets support up to 64GB of registered DDR2-667 memory. Two PCI Express x16 slots (x8 electrical) allow interested sysops to turn this server into an SLI gaming machine, but you'll need 2U GeForce cards.... (We are kidding, of course.) It is good to see that there are still two PCI-X 133/100MHz, one PCI-X 100MHz, and one 32-bit PCI slot available as this will protect any previous investments in NICs and storage adapters.
Our experiences were very good with this server: removable components such as fans, heatsinks, disks, and PSUs are very user-friendly and easy to use. We saw only one minor disadvantage: the three fast fans are capable of cooling the 3.2GHz chips, but when one fails the cooling system hits its limits. We didn't experience any crashes, but the CPUs got very hot (70-75°C) with two fans. On the plus side, the automatic fan speed control does a very good job in adjusting fan speed to provide sufficient heat dissipation. There is very little latency: the fan speed almost immediately increases as the CPU throttles up from being idle at 1GHz to full load at 3.2GHz.
It has taken us a while, but we finally have a full blown Socket F server in the labs.
The Tyan TA26's front
The 2U rack-mountable barebone TA26 B2932 supports two Socket F Opterons and didn't have any trouble with our Opteron 3.2GHz parts. (The BIOS was flashed to version 2.0). The exact model in the lab is the B2932T26W8HR which supports eight hot swappable SAS disks and a (1+1) redundant 600W power supply.
The internals of our Tyan Server
The motherboard in the system is the TYAN Thunder n3600M S2932, which is based on the NVIDIA nForce Pro 3600. A total of sixteen DDR2 DIMM sockets support up to 64GB of registered DDR2-667 memory. Two PCI Express x16 slots (x8 electrical) allow interested sysops to turn this server into an SLI gaming machine, but you'll need 2U GeForce cards.... (We are kidding, of course.) It is good to see that there are still two PCI-X 133/100MHz, one PCI-X 100MHz, and one 32-bit PCI slot available as this will protect any previous investments in NICs and storage adapters.
Our experiences were very good with this server: removable components such as fans, heatsinks, disks, and PSUs are very user-friendly and easy to use. We saw only one minor disadvantage: the three fast fans are capable of cooling the 3.2GHz chips, but when one fails the cooling system hits its limits. We didn't experience any crashes, but the CPUs got very hot (70-75°C) with two fans. On the plus side, the automatic fan speed control does a very good job in adjusting fan speed to provide sufficient heat dissipation. There is very little latency: the fan speed almost immediately increases as the CPU throttles up from being idle at 1GHz to full load at 3.2GHz.
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Spoelie - Monday, August 6, 2007 - link
Thanks for the clarification, I was under the impression the only real states were idle (1ghz) and full tilt (3.2ghz). Never seen any other states but all I ever use are the desktop chips, I wasn't aware CnQ could be more dynamic than that.yuchai - Monday, August 6, 2007 - link
I believe all A64 chips including the desktop ones have the different power states. For example my X2 4200+ has 4 states. 1.0, 1.8, 2.0 and 2.2 Ghz.ButterFlyEffect78 - Monday, August 6, 2007 - link
Are they talking about the barcelona?If not, then this is old news.
I'm sure everyone by now knows that intels new cpu's are better then the current AMD opterons.
KingofFah - Monday, August 6, 2007 - link
It really isn't. The were demonstrating the new 3.2ghz opteron. Also, this was a dual socket setup, and anand said, and everyone who monitors the server world knows, that the opterons come out ahead overall in the 4S environment.The more sockets, the more performance advantage opterons have on intel in the server space. This is well known. The purpose of this was to show it in the dual socket environment.
duploxxx - Monday, August 6, 2007 - link
confused, no it is the stupidity of people like you that think that all Intel offerings are better then the ones for AMD.@anand, you're conclusion of the database world that the quadcore still rules..... where are the benchmarks?
now it is nice to see all these benches next to each other, when are you going to combine benches, no longer servers are used for one application, they are more combined these days with more apps. Maybe its time you also have a look at vmware esx etc.... will probably give you a different look at the offerings of AMD these days.
clairvoyant129 - Monday, August 6, 2007 - link
You don't have to get hostile because he does have a point. In the desktop market, Intel is clearly better unless we're talking about low end. Server market, it's still a toss up but Intel still has a lead.yyrkoon - Monday, August 6, 2007 - link
Um, you guys obviously have not been paying much attention have you ?1) AMD CPUs=cheaper
2) AMD CPUs of comparrible speed perform nearly as good if not as good or better than their Intel counterparts. ie: I think you better check the last benchmarks anandtech post 'homie', because I saw a lot of AMD on top of the game benches. (6000+ vs e6600).
3) Yes, a C2D *may* overclock better, and if it is you intention to overclock, it makes perfect sense to buy one, just be prepared to pay more for the CPU.
4) Up until recently, or possibly still happening into the near future, AMD system boards availible often offered more features for less cost. It does seem however with the P35 Chipset, vendors are starting to come around.
5) last, but not least, THIS article IS NOT about desktop hardware now IS IT ?! why bring some stupid lame ass coment into some place that it does not even fit ? GOd, and I thought I needed a new life . . .
Final Hamlet - Monday, August 6, 2007 - link
It is these "but"s, that make the difference.If they exist, you can't state "all Intel CPUs" anymore, because there are exceptions.
ButterFlyEffect78 - Monday, August 6, 2007 - link
I'm sorry everybody.English is my 2nd language so I sometimes can't always express what I want to say.
What i meant to say is that Intel's new line of cpu's based on Core 2 duo tech. are better-(more advanced) then those based on K8 technology. If this is not true then there should not be a reason to introduce the K10 later this year to counterattack core 2 duo/quad.
But again, I could be wrong.
Calin - Monday, August 6, 2007 - link
Core2Duo technology from Intel is better overall than the K8 technology from AMD - this includes basic architecture, current improvements on the initial architecture (K8 is older and has more of those small improvements), and process/production technology.However, Intel lagged in introduction of Core2 based server processors, and even now their FBDIMM technology is slower and hotter (power hungry) than AMD's Opteron/DDR. Until this changes, AMD still has a market in servers, albeit not as good as before the Core2Duo Xeon processors.