How IBM Stacks Up Power8 Against Xeon Servers

http://www.theplatform.net/2015/10/13/how-ibm-stacks-up-power8-against-xeon-servers/

by baazaar • 11 years ago

73 55 11 years ago

ausjke• 11 years ago

Too late for the game. Power should do this way earlier. The Linux community was booming around PowerPC a few years back and now all the brains left to work on either ARM or x86. Without that community support(Power does not really run Windows), the chip is just a piece of cold hardware even though it can shine spotty in the spec.

One of Power's biggest user is probably a licensee in China, who replaced its crypto logic and use it for their own needs, but that's far from enough to compete against Xeon.

teepo• 11 years ago

It's all about Linux. IBM's running Power8 with RedHat in SoftLayer data centers. Hadoop and jboss are some of the target workloads.

bluedino2• 11 years ago

The ERP product we use has gone from an iSeries native product to a Linux version, it's so much faster it's not funny.

ctstover• 11 years ago

I remember the announcements back in May, but I still don't see an offering on their site. Can one really get a Linux instance on Power by the hour / month in SL? Even better in my case would be just a VPS, as a build node does need a monster server.

At the same time, if they are "using it behind the scenes", yet not offering it to customers, that would be very bad for brand image. Isn't the crux of the selling points server consolidation? Which of course is the same exact thing "cloud provider".

I still haven't tried it, but siteox.com has it though.

Shivetya• 11 years ago

Based on my work Power processors are simply the backbone of AIX and iSeries machines and perform very well in those applications. The interesting part is that either platform can move off the Power processor to another, the least impacted from a business perspective would be iSeries as the layer above the machine level is independent and would simply rebuild programs without customer intervention beyond upgrading the OS

alyandon• 11 years ago

So my question is - how much extra power does the IBM Power8 cpu need in order to get performance that is on par with Intel's Haswell?

kev009• 11 years ago

Look at the memory bandwidth numbers. These completely outclass the Xeon in certain types of workloads, apples to oranges.

ksec2• 11 years ago

I thought after all these years and improvement Intel is invisible in performance. Turns out i was wrong.

Although I would still buy Intel Chips for future prove. IBM is simply too incompetent to compete.

StillBored• 11 years ago

Yes if you need more memory bandwidth, POWER is where its at. OTHO, as I've been saying the base cores don't do as well on single threaded loopy or problems with a decent L1/L2 cache hit rate. The specint_rate numbers look good because of the x8 threading, the single core results probably don't look that good.

So for many workloads it won't be that great. For the one I was working on out of the box, the power was 1/2 as fast. But that wasn't fair because we had a couple highly optimized x86 code paths. Doing some basic POWER optimizations brought the performance in line with the x86. But on some benchmarks it would win, and lose on others. So while we utilized a _LOT_ of memory/IO bandwidth the fact that there was nearly 2.5x available in the power system over our E5 didn't give us enough of a boost to make it worth the higher price tag (nearly 3x in our case, cause we were comparing with a supermicro machine). Maybe this newer power machine changes that a little.

Sanddancer• 11 years ago

They use less power from what I can tell. The IBM's server has a TDP of 190 watts, and the equivalent Xeons are 135 watts a piece, or 270 watts total.

groupmonoid• 11 years ago

By looking at the IBM-provided benchmarks, it looks like the new Power8 is better. But are there any independent benchmarks out there already?

TheCondor• 11 years ago

It probably doesn't matter, they aren't better enough. Now if IBM sold these maybe 30% cheaper, it could be a different story

eliben2• 11 years ago

The almost $3K price tag on a "Linux OS" is disturbing

nabla9• 11 years ago

Why you find it disturbing that someone wants to pay for OS support?

eliben2• 11 years ago

That's a lot for supporting a free OS on a single server

jmnicolas• 11 years ago

My inner geek is longing for an affordable Power8 desktop machine ... do I NEED it ? Well ... you know ...

Quequau• 11 years ago

I hear you man! It's a shame that there's never been a reasonably priced ATX POWER mainboard available to individuals without a major service contract with IBM.

Even that barebones dev server offer through OpenPower was over priced.

graycat7• 11 years ago

Question: I looked up the price of an 18 core Xeon processor, with a clock speed under 3.0 GHz, and got $4000+.

So, why be willing to pay so much per core for such slow cores?

At first I guessed that having lots of cores per processor would reduce the number of processors needed and, then, maybe for some software reduce licensing costs, but the IBM Power processors likely are going to be running Linux. So, the goal is to reduce licensing costs for Oracle? Something else? Or licensing costs has nothing to do with it?

As I plan my server farm for my startup, what am I missing about the value of paying $4000+ for 18 relatively slow cores?

yshalabi• 11 years ago

These processors have a lot of advanced features for big-time computing users (warehouse scale, super computers, etc). You can't just look at frequency or cachesize or number of cores for this chip. There are reliability features, quality of service features, and overall capabilities that consumer grade processors don't have.

Also I don't recommend you try to outfit your startups server farm. I dont know your needs, but you should find someone who can figure out what you really need.

graycat7• 11 years ago

Thanks!

Initially all I "need" is a relatively high end of a consumer grade mid-tower case, e.g., an AMD 8 core processor, 32 GB of ECC main memory, several hard disks, on a current motherboard for less than $150 or so running Windows Server or maybe, initially, just Windows 7 Pro.

Keep that on average half busy 24 x 7 for a month, and I will be able to afford more.

If I get, say, two wire rack shelf units 18 x 48 x 72", fill them with a good router and mid tower cases, and keep all that on average half busy 24 x 7, then I will consider a colocation facility or the cloud.

A few miles from me is a nicely big, fully serious colocation facility that offers dual 10 GbE Internet connections, etc.

No joke: One of those shelf units has room for about 12 mid tower cases. Keep two such shelf units busy, and that will max out what I'm willing to pursue without a lot more server farm expertise than I have (or want to get) and also make cash not a problem.

So, one hope is that I will be able to pay some experts, two or three days at a time, to hold my hand into more -- reliable electrical power, HVAC, floor space, cabling, racks, servers for the racks, internals of the servers for the racks, e.g., maybe Xeon, automation for software installation, system management, system monitoring, farm performance analysis, fail-over, virtual machine exploitation, security, test systems, development systems, organized code repository and testing, all relevant documentation, training, recruiting, HR, legal, real estate leasing, janitorial, physical security, etc. Or, right, just use a cloud!

But for the high end Xeon processors, I'm looking ahead. E.g., a motherboard with two Xeons with 18 cores each, all in just one full tower case, or two for failover, or three considering testing, might provide enough computing for my startup all the way to exit so that I could avoid taking seriously what I'd have to do with 100 people and 50,000 square feet of server farm, dual optical fiber connections to an Internet backbone point of presence, etc. So, that's why looking into high end Xeons now is not totally wasted time.

Thanks for the help!

vessenes5• 11 years ago

Those cores are going to be sold to you largely on their memory bandwidth benefits for the top end of the Xeon range.

If you need memory bandwidth, you will gladly pay for them, and look seriously at IBM (something we just did).

If you don't know that you need memory bandwidth, just skip them. Also, I would suggest you check out OVH or Hetzner for a new startup -- it's (sadly) very unlikely that you will need enough servers for long enough to make buying your own a good plan.

graycat7• 11 years ago

Thanks!

Those cores are going to be sold to you largely on their memory bandwidth benefits for the top end of the Xeon range.

That is, (A) bandwidth, bytes moved per second or (B) total permitted memory size, say, 1/2 TB?

My guess is that memory sizes of 1/2 TB require registered memory, that is, a register in the memory to simplify timing which can be challenging for such large memories, but the use of the register is an intermediate stop on the way to/from the processor and its cache(s) so, really, reduces bytes per second that might be achieved with, say, the simpler, consumer 1600 MHz, DDR3?

Of course, other issues could include number of electronically independent channels to/from memory, address interleaved memory, etc.?

look seriously at IBM

I looked at the article; IBM seems to be trying to sell hardware (again!). Okay.

So far my software is all written for Windows, and my guess is that Windows (7 Pro or Server) doesn't run on IBM's Power processors? And even if Windows does run, lots of other software that runs on Windows and Intel x86 likely won't run on IBM Power?

wmf• 11 years ago

I found a 14-core Xeon to give optimal price/performance for my usage. But I guess if that's simply not fast enough to run your app there's always the 18-core; the cores may be slow but the total "MIPS" is still higher.

graycat7• 11 years ago

Thanks!

Initially and no doubt for a long time, 14 cores will be plenty for my startup.

I've done my software development on one core at 1.8 GHz. Going live, I'm considering 4 cores at about 3.2 GHz or 8 cores at 4.0 GHz -- for total cost down in the very low rent district.

Or, the month my startup keeps 14 cores, or 8 cores, or even 4 cores, busy will be when I order a new, high end Corvette and go shopping for a really nice house!

My question was not really about being "fast enough" but just what the heck is the cost per core per clock Hz? E.g., $160 buys an 8 core AMD processor at 4.0 GHz, and a high end Xeon costs much, much more per core per clock Hz.

I can see that an Intel processor would save on electrical power, but at least initially that will be, all other things considered, small potatoes.

i336_3• 11 years ago

Your questions prompted a bit of curious research on what you're pursuing.

Your post history is very rewarding to pour over, and I'm glad I did. You definitely should publish a book and set the record straight once and for all. I think it would bring you a lot of closure. And you should make more noise about the mathematical models you've developed so you get more recognition.

I really hope this search/probability venture of yours pans out, and I'm quite interested to learn more about it. In fact, I'd feel very privileged if I could hitchhike along for a while as a curious passerby - not directly involved, more just observing and learning.

I did a little digging, but I can't be certain since you're rather good at the anonymity thing - is this your current email address? Obfuscated for privacy:

  put list ('73'x||'69'x||'67'x||'6d'x||'61'x||'77'x||'61'x||'69'x||
            '74'x||'65'x||'40'x||'6f'x||'70'x||'74'x||'6f'x||'6e'x||
            '6c'x||'69'x||'6e'x||'65'x||'2e'x||'6e'x||'65'x||'74'x);

I think the best thing that would answer your questions would be direct testing, both for the experience of trying out a bunch of different hardware, and also to work out how to get the best bang for your buck with the workload you're using. Throwing your existing code on various different S3 configurations would probably be your best bet to start with.

On hardware, though, Xeon processors incorporate extra instructions appropriate to high-performance computing, whereas desktop/consumer-class CPUs include hardware acceleration and chipset support for theft prevention, basic media acceleration, wireless projector connectivity, etc.

In a server environment, workloads tend to need scalability more than processor power - it's generally significantly faster to run 100 tasks in parallel on slow hardware than in sequence on fast hardware. A desktop context is usually the opposite though - running a small number of applications, each of which generally needs to run as quickly as possible so the system feels snappy.

It also generally boils down to manufacturing. You don't get 24-core desktop-oriented i7 chips yet, because you can't yet pack 24 4GHz+ cores into a CPU die.

Oh, and that datacenter you mentioned, with dual 10GbE - is that $30k a month, or more?

graycat7• 11 years ago

Oh, and that datacenter you mentioned, with dual 10GbE - is that $30k a month, or more?

I don't recall the details of their pricing. The colocation facility is at the old IBM Wappingers Falls, Myers Corners lab complex. There were several nice buildings, one with a lot of well done raised floor. IIRC, they were getting revenue from having a fiber roughly down the Hudson River for the 70 miles or so to Wall Street.

I don't plan to go for a $4000+ Xeon processor soon, but I wanted to understand what the value is and see what I was missing.

Or can get an eight core AMD processor at 4.0 GHz for about $160. And, say, an 18 core Xeon at 3.3 GHz for $4000.

So, the AMD has price per core per GH of

160 / ( 8 * 4.0 ) = 5

and the Xeon has

4000 / ( 18 * 3.2 ) = 69.44

for a ratio of

69.44 / 5 = 13.89

That's 1389%, and that's a biggie.

For my startup, the software for at least early production appears to be ready. Now I'm loading some initial data and generally, e.g., for my server farm, doing some planning.

Then I will do some testing, alpha, beta and possibly some revisions.

Then I will go live and go for publicity, users, ads, revenue, earnings, and growth.

The basic core applied math and software really should work as I intend. The main question is, will lots of users like the site? If so, then the project should become a big thing.

From my software and server farm architecture and software timings, one 8 core AMD processor at 4.0 GHz should be able to support on average, 24 x 7, one new user a second. Then I should be able to get, ballpark,

$207,360

dollars a month in revenue.

In that case, growth should be fast, and I should consider Xeon processors if they have some significant advantages.

E.g., some builders offer two Xeon processors, 18 cores each, on a motherboard in a full tower case with lots of room for hard disks. So, that would be 36 cores, and four of the 8 core AMD processors would be 32 cores in four cases.

Then, sure, for more, get some standard racks and put in servers designed for racks.

I have a lot of flexibility in how many processors and motherboards I use because the software and server farm architecture is highly scalable just via simple sharding.

The architecture has just five boxes, Web server, Web session state server, SQL Server, and two specialized servers full of applied math. Each of these five can run in their own server(s), or, for a good start, all five can run in one server.

mtanski4• 11 years ago

The spark workflow is 10% cheaper (24.36 vs 21.88) over 3 years. Is that really worth having to support a non-mainstream architecture? I doubt it.

RankingMember• 11 years ago

That was my thought too. The "pain in the ass" factor associated with supporting a non-mainstream architecture is missing from the charts, and moves the dial away from IBM. That's not to say things couldn't change, but Xeons are proven, and unless you've got a surplus of money to throw at trying a new architecture (e.g. Google), you're better off sticking with the known good unless the predicted gains are sizable.

vessenes5• 11 years ago

I just did this math for our company a couple months ago.

Power8 memory bandwidth is VERY appealing. And, it's not always just about cost per benchmark unit -- if you have some realtime requirements for your analysis tools, then scale-up speed can be really valuable as compared to dev time and management time.

In the end, we made the call for Intel because golang runs some key parts of our tools, and the golang power8 story isn't there. But, as I gaze at our servers where we paid what feels like thousands for extra megabytes of L3 cache, I wouldn't say I'm happy about the decision. A good go story from IBM would have likely tipped things the other way.

mtanski4• 11 years ago

I think you just kind of proved my point that real work load benchmarks would have to be much more attractive to offset the cost of supporting an architecture that's not tier one in many languages / software libraries / projects.

How IBM Stacks Up Power8 Against Xeon Servers

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