Test Setup

For our Dual-Core AMD Opteron test system, we had a system provided to us by Colfax International ( http://colfaxinternational.com ). Most of you have probably never heard of Colfax but they were the original AMD Opteron launch partner and a Tier 1 manufacturer. The first Opteron PC that AMD unveiled in New York two years ago? That was a Colfax machine. They are a Silicon Valley company that has been in business since 1987, and they made their mark on the industry as a high-end systems provider to customers such as all the semiconductor companies in Silicon Valley and research labs (both academic and private, such as aerospace).

Colfax are the guys you turn to when you want that Quad Opteron 852 with 32GB of System RAM and 16 terabytes of HDD space in a RAID 5 configuration with a 1.3kW PSU (about $40k). Not only can you buy that system, but you’ll have the comfort of knowing that they’ve built that type of system before. While I was there, they were building dozens of rackmounted systems for customers demanding the full 16GB of memory.

One of the odd things that has happened as a result of building high-end servers and workstations for close to 20 years is that they’ve never needed to have a huge on-site service team. Yet, if you think about it, it makes sense –people who buy super-servers fall into two categories. There are people who are simply throwing hardware at a problem and need all of the handholding they can get, and then there are the academic and defense guys who need these systems to run exotic custom software, or even run classified custom-built PCI cards where any computer problems won’t be helped by GeekSquad.

Anyhow, they build high-performance desktops too. They bridge the gap between the power users who would rather not pay for the handholding of the full-service guys, but don’t want to build a system due to time constraints or those who prefer the convenience of having a system ready to go.

Probably most importantly, they’re actually one of the few retailers who have a large allotment of Dual Core AMD Opterons at launch, so if you’re in the market for one, they’ll definitely be a good source to find such systems.

System Specs

The Opteron 252 (2.6GHz x 2) and 246’s (2.0 GHz x 2) were tested using the system described here. Basically a Tyan Thunder K8W (AMD-8000 series chipset) with the ultra high-speed Corsair Low-Latency RAM.

The Dual Opteron 875 (2.2 GHz x 2 x 2) machine was furnished by Colfax International. It features Tyan’s new flagship Thunder K8WE, an NVIDIA nForce Professional based motherboard. They use ThermalTake coolers, 4GB of ATP DDR400 RAM, and a Chenbro SR107 chassis with an Enhance 550W EPS12V power supply. Since they run at the same clock speed, the 875s should perform identically to the Opteron 275, only the 875 can be used in 8-way servers whereas 275s are limited to dual processor configurations only.

The Colfax system

Dual-core chips inside

We were actually surprised at how quiet the system was, although this is likely due to the high-end power supply and the fact that the Chenbro chassis uses a large 120mm rear exhaust fan and 80mm front fan, which produces less noise than multiple smaller fans.