Behold! The Dual E5-25670 stuffed in a Corsair 780T. Did you fall for the meme and build one?
Converting an old server into a desktop computer isn't ever a perfect process -- and in fact in this case a Skylake i7 machine will have better performance for many things, and be about the same price or just a little more expensive unless you find a deal.
I love this thing. 16 cores, 32 threads, what’s not to love? Let’s be clear here – you’re buying server hardware that is 4 generations back.
We’ve got a 4-way shootout video and this thing is one of our contenders because it is a LOT of compute horsepower for not a lot of $$. However, for most normal tasks, more than 4-6 cores is just not useful even for the extreme gamer/enthusiast.
So you should also know that not a lot of software can really use a rig like this.
The Adobe suite, for example, has poor support even for rendering much past 4 to 6 cores so the added benefit of 8, 10, 12 cores is minimal.
However some tasks, such as video transcoding with Handbrake, parallelize almost perfectly so there is linear scaling. For a home server, this platform is prettymuch unbeatable. This particular motherboard, the Asus Z9PE, has a built-in SAS controller and works great with a platform such as FreeNAS. Sixteen ram slots also means that 128gb of memory is easily possible with inexpensive 8gb Registered DIMMs.
From the testing on our other video, a Skylake cpu @ 4.5ghz has the same raw computational horsepower as one of these E5-2670s but tasks (like rendering in Adobe Premiere) that does not scale well runs 2-3x as fast. We’ll cover more of that in the next video, though.
So why even do a build like this? It is a lot of horsepower and is inexpensive. Of our 4 test systems, the market value of the main parts for this system (motherboard, cpus, ram) were valued at around $500-$550 .
If you want a home server/workstation, the ultimate Linux box (the hardware is extremely well-supported on Linux and FreeBSD, as it is older) or to compile the Linux Kernel fast enough to melt your face without breaking the bank, then this build is for you.
What about gaming?
I knew that question would come up so I installed Windows on the Intel NVMe. More of this will be covered in our shootout, but for most games the GPU is the limiting factor so I have not yet observed any performance issues in games. The FPS differences between this system with a 980Ti and the Broadwell-E Xeon system with the same graphics card are 2-3 FPS at most. Often the difference is +/- 1 FPS.
A note on the CPUs:
There are actually two versions of the original E5-2670 CPUs – what is important is the C2 stepping. The C2 stepping solves certain hardware bugs around virtualization/virtualization passthrough. The CPUs I picked up for around $125 were the C2 stepping. I have seen them as cheap as $60 for a pair of older non-c2 stepping Xeons.
Note about ebay CPUs: Avoid Engineering Sample (ES) CPUs unless you really, really know what you are doing.
Full Partslist:
Corsair 780T https://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Graphite-780T-Full-Tower/dp/B00LA6POK4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1469758329&sr=8-1&keywords=corsair+780t
PCPower&Cooling PSU Use any PSU of 800W or more that has TWO 8-pin 12v connectors for the CPU if you plan to go Dual CPU.
64gb Registered ECC DDR3-1333 or DDR3-1600 recommended http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=ddr3+ecc+reg&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l1313.TR0.TRC0.H0.Xddr3+ecc+reg+64gb.TRS1&_nkw=ddr3+ecc+reg+64gb&_sacat=0
Asus Z9PE Motherboard: http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=ddr3+ecc+reg+64gb&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l1313.TR4.TRC1.A0.H0.XAsus+Z9PE.TRS0&_nkw=Asus+Z9PE&_sacat=0
Notes for would-be builders:
Don’t buy the motherboard on ebay? The prices there are super inflated because the E5-2670 CPUs have been available forever. You should be able to pick up a dual socket motherboard for $300-$400. ASRock, ASUS, Tyan and SuperMicro are good brands. You may have better luck with UEFI and “Turbo All The Time” with the ASRock and ASUS boards, though.
On the board I am using I have had no problems keeping the CPUs at 3ghz with 24/7 usage.
Your best bet is to try to locate a “full” server that has had its drives pulled, especically a built system with one of the above motherboards. It will likely be much cheaper than the individual parts and you will likely get CPU Coolers, RAM, etc. You could also retrofit a DELL or HP server, but you will be unlikely to be able to use a gaming/modern GPU in such a platform. You could go that route if you just want a powerful home server, though.
Do note that if i hadn't had the chance to "recycle" a retired server acquired very inexpensively I would not have done this build. If you can get your hands on an old server with slow socket 2011 CPUs, though, this build can be worth it.
Anyone have any questions? I’ll do my best to answer. Anyone want to show off your home computer?
There is also even older kit out there like Xeon X5650+ CPUs with loads of DDR3 ram that still make perfectly reasonable desktop systems.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://teksyndicate.com/videos/server-gaming-workstation-retrofit-16-cores-64gb-ram