Beware of these bargain XEON CPUs
Greymom
Posts: 1,104
in The Commons
Intel XEON I7-series 10-15 core server chips are now very cheap, both new and used. I am looking at 10-core chips (E7-2850) on EBAY for $12.99. BEWARE there are no motherboards for these chips that are usable by hobbyists, even the ones that are for LGA 2011 (most are for LGA 1567)! Even if there were, they would not run Win7, 8, or 10. Looks like people are buying them up and then looking for motherboards.
However, if anyone does find a usable board, PLEASE let me know. The standard sever board for these holds 4 CPU's. Imagine a single board with 60 cores for rendering!
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Comments
Would Linux + WINE let you use all cores for rendering?
I have a computer with two 8 core xeons but I bought the whole system already made by HP. I've got to admit I've never seen separate xeon procs for sale.
Laurie
Maybe a blade server with a peripheral to enable a user interface
I did look into it once ...
Go to Linus Tech Tips on YouTube. He has a good vid about this.
IF you can find a good mobo, they're expensive.
Maybe, trying to figure that out. But supposedly the boards will not run without the proprietary backplace system, etc. I will update if I get more info. Could not find a reasonably-priced MB anyway. These chips apparently will not work in a standard LGA 2011 v1/v2 MB, and it turns out they are actually Westmere family (?).
Got caught by this before. Bought a 4-CPU Supermicro server board, LGA 2011, for less than $50. I knew it was one of the newer boards that relied on the specialized backplane, and that it had proprietary connectors, etc. I have been using Supermicro X8DTT-F blade server boards, and was able to adapt power supplies for those. But this connector system was really unique. I still believed that I could still get the basic functions to work if Supemicro would give me a pin-out diagram, but they declined to do so. Dang.
I discovered a few years ago that there is a whole hobby "subculture" based around used, surplus, or just old/discounted server parts. Some of this old stuff is still very powerful and suitable for rendering. Of course, it is truly "caveat emptor" here. But I picked up some surplus/used Supermicro dual-cpu X8 blade server boards and processors for literally pennies on the dollar ($50-$100 for the server boards, $25-$50 for X5660 6-core Westmere CPUs). Picked up a surplus 1U rack frame server module with two X8DTT-F blades and the power supply and heat sinks and basic CPUs (originally $12,000 with ram and hard drives) for $300 delivered. Adding another $300-$400 upgrades the CPU's to X5660s and 48 GB new Samsung server ram per blade. The blades run LuxMark 3.1 almost as fast as some current workstations. Now I just have to get it all put together....
And now you can get new E5-2680V2 10-core LGA-2011r1 CPU's for about $250....ack! You can still buy Supermicro and Asrock Rack server boards for these, and they take standard power supplies and even, in some cases, standard DDR3 UDIMM ram.
Sadly, the newer-generation blade server boards seem designed to shut out the hobbyist.
Yeah, that is a very cool project video! Unfortunately, the MBs are scarce, and you get more bang for your buck from an X8 blade with two X5660's. The X8's run fine under Win 7 Pro, and seem to be ok with WIn 10 so far.
Search for BL620c motherboard. The problem is that is a blade server. That's only good if you want to mount a blade system at home
Quick result from ebay https://www.ebay.com/itm/Genuine-HP-644496-001-643398-001-BL620c-G7-Motherboard-2x-LGA1567-With-Warranty/382331957347?epid=1340389853&hash=item5904c2b063:g:9c8AAOSwkV5aVj39
And Newegg
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIABKU6N77816&cm_re=bl620c-_-9SIABKU6N77816-_-Product
The BL620 should run at least under Win 2003 Server. The problem will be to find appropriate drivers
I am not sure that these processors are a good buy. They're very old and even with 2x8 core I don't think they are that much powerfull and will consume a lot of power. I personnaly wouldn't go under Sandy Bridge Processors
In the long run, I'd say a X370 Motherboard + Ryzen 1600 would be a better choice
I agree. While I would love to be able to use these if I could get a cheap MB that would work, there are really much better deals in terms of rendering power and ease of use. The X8 blades I have are way easier and cheaper to use. If I had to do it all over again, I would save up for a threadripper.
I mainly wanted to warn folks that these CPU's may not be what they think they are. A lot have been sold on ebay, and I am afraid that the people who bought them are in for a dissapointment.