[geeks] Cluster in a box? Interesting item on offer at eBay

[Lionel Peterson]

Just ran some tests on the server:

Power consumption tests:

One node, running STHbench.sh benchmark: 130 watts

Two nodes, one STHbench.sh, the other installing Ubuntu Server: 190-210
watts

Three nodes, one STHbench.sh, one installing Ubuntu Server, one running
Windows Server 2012 R2 with 12 SETI at home threads running: 340 watts

These tests were run on a three node DCS C6005 server with 48 Gigs RAM per
node, one 250 Gig SATA HD (non-Green) and dual Opteron 2419 EE CPUs.

STHbench.sh is a tool developed by the folks at servethehome.com, I was
asked to run it, installing Ubuntu Server seemed like a good test pushing
on the HD, and the 12 SETI at home threads under Windows a Server was a great
test of CPU.

All-in-all, just under 350 watts for the three nodes running seems
reasonable, given the specs of the nodes...

Had an issue installing Ubuntu Server 13.10 (from USB flash drive or USB
CD-ROM), it would freeze on Language selection menu. Ubuntu Server 12.4.4
LTS installed fine from USB CD-ROM.

Lionel

On Friday, February 7, 2014, Patrick Finnegan <pat at computer-refuge.org>
wrote:

> The down side of course, is that it runs really hot (with all 4 servers,
> that'd be probably 1200W+ in 2U) and, since it's hot, also probably pretty
> loud.  Not ideal for a home situation.  I played with one for a bit at work
> as a demo unit.  It wasn't too bad as far as dense (2 systems in 1U)
> systems go in an HPC datacenter though, at least on par with the HP SL6500
> stuff that we have a lot of at work.
>
> Of course, the BladeCenter H in my basement is currently off partly because
> it runs too loud as well. :(
>
> I'll be interested to see what you think of running it "deskside" at home
> is like.
>
> Pat
>
>
> On Fri, Feb 7, 2014 at 11:07 AM, Lionel Peterson <lionel4287 at gmail.com<javascript:;>
> >wrote:
>
> > Yes, exactly.
> >
> > Each blade has an iKVM port, allowing you to remote into each blade, or
> you
> > can hard wire a conventional KVM to each blade.
> >
> > It is a blade chassis - it's 2U chassis holds 4 blades, each blade has a
> > hard
> > wire access to three hot-swap trays.
> >
> > What makes this nice (IMHO) is it is a 'home lab-friendly' size/scale,
> and
> > can
> > be run off conventional 110V, most blade chassis I've seen (not that
> many)
> > typically require 220V and are scaled for a dozen or two blades.
> >
> > Mine should be arriving today... Should be fun to play with...
> >
> > Lionel
> >
> > > On Feb 7, 2014, at 10:49 AM, Patrick Finnegan <pat at computer-refuge.org<javascript:;>
> >
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > This is basically the equivalent of a blade chassis, only made to be
> > > cheaper (no shared kvm, no ethernet or other switch, etc).  It's the
> same
> > > density as eg, IBM's BladeCenter H (14 @ 2 socket servers in 7U).
> > _______________________________________________
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>


-- 
Lionel Peterson
lionel4287 at gmail.com