From chemistry-request $#at#$ server.ccl.net Wed Jun 12 01:41:30 2002 Received: from chuma.cas.usf.edu ([131.247.209.50]) by server.ccl.net (8.11.6/8.11.0) with ESMTP id g5C5fUj09817 for ; Wed, 12 Jun 2002 01:41:30 -0400 Received: from localhost (oleynik ^%at%^ localhost) by chuma.cas.usf.edu (8.9.3+Sun/8.9.3) with ESMTP id BAA26631 for ; Wed, 12 Jun 2002 01:41:29 -0400 (EDT) Date: Wed, 12 Jun 2002 01:41:29 -0400 (EDT) From: Ivan Oleynik To: chemistry _-at-_)ccl.net Subject: INTEL XEON vs AMD ATHLON Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I sent email a couple days ago asking for advice re linux cluster vendors and critical configuration issues (I am going to summarize my findings after getting all the responses). It turned out that the choice of the processor is the most critical one. I had an impression from literature that Athlon MPX goes head by head with Xeon in terms of CPU speed for heavy numerics, but it is considerably less expensive. Surprisingly, I received several responses that contradict to my view. In particular, Xeon is only 5-10% more expensive, but it is more powerful since it is currently running at 2.4 GHz, has 400 MHz front bus plus 512 Kb of secondary cash as compared to 1.76 GHz, 266 MHz and 384 Kb for Athlon. Also, the newest linux kernel will provide multithreading on Xeons that could also result in substantial boost for numerical calculations. I think this is old question, but I would like to know what experts say: Is it really true that the new Xeon is superior than Athlon as far as heavy numerical calculations in cluster environment are concerned? Ivan Oleynik ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Ivan I. Oleynik E-mail : oleynik #at# chuma.cas.usf.edu Department of Physics University of South Florida 4202 East Fowler Avenue Tel : (813) 974-8186 Tampa, Florida 33620-5700 Fax : (813) 974-5813 ------------------------------------------------------------------------