rx2660 & 1.6 GHz CPU with 24 MB Cache (Itanium 9050)

[Eberhard Heuser]

Hi,

for those who want to use the most powerful Itanium CPU in a rx2660 box
here's some info:
Though you'll find that only a 9040 CPU is supported (1.6 GHz 18MB
Cache), but the more powerful 9050 CPU
(1.6 GHz 24 MB Cache) runs OK, too (at least with the latest available
firmware):

PROCESSOR MODULE INFORMATION

# of L3 L4 Family/
CPU Logical Cache Cache Model Processor
Module CPUs Speed Size Size (hex.) Rev State
------ ------- -------- ------ ------ ------- --- ------------
0 2 1.6 GHz 12 MB None 20/00 C2 Active
1 2 1.6 GHz 12 MB None 20/00 C2 Active

FIRMWARE INFORMATION

System Firmware A Revision: 4.32 [5321]
*System Firmware B Revision: 4.32 [5321]

The OpenVMS boot went OK, too.
--
Eberhard Heuser

[fhs...@gmail.com]

Indeed the 2007 QuickSpecs of the rx2660 do not list the 9050 processor, the fastest "Montecito" processor.

It should be noted that the rx2660 can also have the more recent Itanium 9100 series "Montvale" processors, running at 1.66 GHz. We see the same thing here: the most recent rx2660 QuickSpecs I have (version 28, September 2009) list the 18 MB L3 cache processor (9140) as the "Maximum", while the 24 MB L3 cache processor (9150M, 9150N and 9152M) is not mentioned.

[Eberhard Heuser]

> _______________________________________________
> Info-vax mailing list
> Info...@rbnsn.com
> http://rbnsn.com/mailman/listinfo/info-vax_rbnsn.com
>
> .
>

Very interesting. The 9150 Itanium has the same clock rate and the same
cache size. Is the CPU faster than the 9050?

An upgrade to a 93xx would be nice but presumably impossible...

Eberhard

[MG]

Op 27-jun-2016 om 12:40 schreef Eberhard Heuser:

> for those who want to use the most powerful Itanium CPU in a rx2660 box
> here's some info:
> Though you'll find that only a 9040 CPU is supported (1.6 GHz 18MB
> Cache), but the more powerful 9050 CPU
> (1.6 GHz 24 MB Cache) runs OK, too (at least with the latest available
> firmware):

Looks good and glad to hear it worked out! (Especially if you
had to pay a fair amount for these officially 'unsupported'
processors.)

What actually surprised me more, especially because it wasn't
documented too well (apart from being listed as 'compatible'
in one or more upgrade guides), was the fact that the rather
dated rx2620 (then already, now needless to say even more so)
could take dual-core "Montecito" CPUs. I upgraded my rx2620s
of mine two be equipped with dual dual-core "Montecito" CPUs
which I found in a bargain, all the way in Australia, at the
other side of the world for me, at the time. (Years ago now.)
It was in fact so affordable, even with the fairly prohibiting
shipping costs it was still easily more than three times as
cheap as what sellers were offering in Europe and North America.
So, I couldn't resist.

I ended up with the same amount of logical CPUs as your
rx2660 has (plus with hyperthreading support), but naturally
with a slower bus and the maximum RAM limit of the zx6000/
rx2600/rx2620 systems (although you could, supposedly, with
rare and very expensive 4-Gbyte DIMMs go higher). I never
saw any rx2620s on auction sites or anywhere else 'in the
wild'. (I assume, but maybe wrongly, that it wasn't too
terribly common.)

The heat dissipation from a 'dual dual-core' "Montecito" is
not a laughing matter, however... especially during a warm
summer period. I also remember I needed a replacement airflow
baffle, different power connector cables and such for the
upgrade to "Montecito" processors. (Was the rx2660 upgrade
more 'plug-and-play' in that regard?)

Performance-wise, though, in my recollection a faster CPU did
not always make too huge of a difference for me, when running
VMS. I didn't notice too much of a significant difference in
boot times between my DS10s, rx2600s w/"Madison" or even
rx2620s w/"Montecito" (dual-core)... I began to notice a more
significant performance boost when I began booting off RAID-0/
striped volumes, like from my DS10s with a hardware RAID SCSI
HBA, 'ironically' also with VMS as a HPIVM guest hosted on a
large VxVM/OnlineJFS striped volume under HP-UX. That was
when VMS truly began to fly. (I guess VMS benefits greatly
from both large sequential and maybe also random performance.
But possibly the former, because so much is record/database-
structured.)

- MG

[Eberhard Heuser]

The rx2660 upgrade was a 'plug-and-play' procedure.

>
> Performance-wise, though, in my recollection a faster CPU did
> not always make too huge of a difference for me, when running
> VMS. I didn't notice too much of a significant difference in
> boot times between my DS10s, rx2600s w/"Madison" or even
> rx2620s w/"Montecito" (dual-core)... I began to notice a more
> significant performance boost when I began booting off RAID-0/
> striped volumes, like from my DS10s with a hardware RAID SCSI
> HBA, 'ironically' also with VMS as a HPIVM guest hosted on a
> large VxVM/OnlineJFS striped volume under HP-UX. That was
> when VMS truly began to fly. (I guess VMS benefits greatly
> from both large sequential and maybe also random performance.
> But possibly the former, because so much is record/database-
> structured.)
>

If you want I/O-performamance you'll need fibre channel.

My equipment:
Qlogic Fibre Channel adaptor<=> Brocade Switch<=> MSA1500<=>MSA20 with
SATA-drives (partially SSD Crucial MX100 512 GB).

Eberhard

[MG]

Op 28-jun-2016 om 15:32 schreef Eberhard Heuser:

> If you want I/O-performamance you'll need fibre channel.

It will come with serious heat dissipation and electricity
bill performance, too, unfortunately...

> My equipment:
> Qlogic Fibre Channel adaptor<=> Brocade Switch<=> MSA1500<=>MSA20
> with SATA-drives (partially SSD Crucial MX100 512 GB).

Pricey endeavor, especially in combination with SSDs, to put
it rather gently...

What kind of speeds are you getting, won't the older FC
hardware be a bottleneck in combination with these SSDs?

Too bad VMS isn't so flexible as a file serving platform,
I imagine you ran into the ~2-Tbyte max. volume limit
rather quickly. Or is that no problem for you?

- MG

[Craig A. Berry]

On 6/28/16 8:32 AM, Eberhard Heuser wrote:

> If you want I/O-performamance you'll need fibre channel.

Depending on the speed of your FC hardware, an upgraded RAID controller
might be as good or better. The built-in RAID is pathologically slow on
the rx2660.

[Eberhard Heuser]

> _______________________________________________
> Info-vax mailing list
> Info...@rbnsn.com
> http://rbnsn.com/mailman/listinfo/info-vax_rbnsn.com
>
> .
>

If you want to have a clustered VMS, Fibre is a good choice.

You can boot several and different OSes (Linux, VMS) via Fibre.

Eberhard

[MG]

Op 29-jun-2016 om 04:18 schreef Craig A. Berry:

> The built-in RAID is pathologically slow on the rx2660.

Sounds great...

- MG

[Eberhard Heuser]

Am 29.06.2016 um 04:18 schrieb Craig A. Berry via Info-vax:

You are speaking of the P400-SAS-controller, do you?

Eberhard

[Craig A. Berry]

Yes, this one:

<http://h20565.www2.hpe.com/hpsc/doc/public/display?docId=emr_na-c01885355-1&lang=en-us&cc=us&docLocale=>

[David Turner]

You can also use the P812 controller (6G) with a PCI-e /PCI-X riser card
We have cables made that work with the front LEDS.
We also sell a 64GB Memory kit for the rx2660. It works perfectly

The P812 has 1GB of cache and works at 6g


David Turner

[David Turner]

Same goes for the rx2800 i2
We have the 9350 1.73Ghz 24MB Cache Quad Cores running and they run cool
Cheaper too than the 9340 1.6Ghz Quad Core 20mb as we got hold of a
bunch of blade servers loaded down with these cpus
Change out the heatsink and Bob est ton Oncle !