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Hardware advice appreciated - buying new workstation

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Message 1 of 26
maxmarautodesk
3145 Views, 25 Replies

Hardware advice appreciated - buying new workstation

Dear community,

 

I am currently looking for a new workstation for Moldflow. I would appreciate some comments and advice on the setup I have in mind, my questions regarding it and hardware in general.

Some background information:

 

OS: Windows 7

Moldflow: Insight 2015

Analysis: mainly Cool(FEM/CFD)+Fill+Pack+Warp

Model type: 3D

Number of elements: 1-10 millions

 

 

 

Main part of the setup I am having in mind:

 

Base: Dell Precision T7610

 

CPU: Intel Xeon E5 four to eight cores, > 3 GHz, e.g. E5-1660 v2, E5-2643 v2, or E5-2687W v2

Is there a large performance gain for more than six cores? Is it worth to go up to eight? I am asking this, because in the Autodesk benchmark a six core CPU has given better results that an eight core with equal hardware setup. Hence, it seems like the frequency of the CPU or the cache per core is more important for shortening computation time than the number of cores?! (assuming perhaps >4 cores)

The benchmark can be found here (I am talking about the Dell Precision T3600 and T7600):

http://knowledge.autodesk.com/search-result/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/Hardware-Certification-fo...

 

RAM: 32 GB (4x 8 GB)

Is it worth to invest in more memory? No setup of the Autodesk benchmark seems to exceed 16 GB, for whatever reason...

 

HDD: 2x 2TB 10,000 rpm configured as RAID 1 (=main drive + backup drive)

How important is the speed of the HDD? Can it be the bottleneck for the data delivered by the computations?

 

GPU option 1: Nvidia Quadro K5000 4GB

GPU option 2: Nvidia Quadro K2000 2GB + Nvidia Tesla K20 5GB

How beneficial is a powerful GPU for Moldflow exactly? Has anyone tested an Nvidia Tesla with Moldflow? Or has somebody tested an Nvidia Quadro K6000 12 GB? Perhaps the huge amount of RAM is beneficial for treating and loading the complete model by GPU, especially because we are talking about large models...

25 REPLIES 25
Message 21 of 26

Wow, thanks Max, for the extensive answer!

 

Just a comment, I will update when I have an answer from Moldflow: I was told by MF Software that Cuda is being dropped in next version as it creates some problems.

 

Otherwise I also talked to MF before buying but unfortunately they haven't mentioned the issue about the frequency which would be very helpful in selecting CPUs.

 

One thing we haven't really answered - is 2x CPU > 1x CPU? Or better - when is dual CPU setup better than single?

Message 22 of 26

I am not entirely certain, but if you think about it, I believe the answer about 2x CPU or 1x CPU is going the same direction as the considerations about the number of cores. I believe 2x CPU just adds more cores and does not give you any major advantage, because 1x CPU with 4 cores can already be enough as I have outlined before.
Message 23 of 26
maxmarautodesk
in reply to: Idea_Mel

Dear g.cappella,

regarding your hardware proposal in post 12, I think you could keep the K5000 and spend the money for another new part of the hardware. I am very statisfied with the K5000 and I think the K4200 will not give you any advantage. According to their specs, the K5000 is a little faster, the amount of RAM is the same, but the K5000 has ECC secure RAM. The money you save you can spend on the CPU and replace the i7 by a faster CPU. As I have outlined in my recent post, I think 2.4 GHz will not give you any boost. I would rather go for a new and faster version of the i7. Perhaps you can keep the rest of your hardware with that configuration. Or you invest in a new E5, but rather one with more GHz, e.g. the Xeon E5-1650 v3 or if you can efford it (which I think you could if you keep the K5000) the Xeon E5-2637 v3. If you don't really need 6 cores and don't do much parallel work, you can also go for 4 cores only, e.g. the Xeon E5-1630 v3 to save some money. Finally, I think Moldflow does not benefit from the use of an SSD. However, it will of course speed up your entire system. Since SSDs with large capacity are usually quite expensive, I would recommend an additional HDD for storing the accruing data.

 

Best regards,
Max

Message 24 of 26
Idea_Mel
in reply to: CaeTecos2021

Many thanks Max, your post is very helpful.
Since my license doesn't allow me running multiple parallel jobs, I would go for a single CPU with more GHz, like the E3-1650v3 at 3.5GHz (15Mb Cache as the previous mentioned E5)

64Gb DDR4 and K4200 are fixed point for me, even if I'm a little scared about what  SamoGazvoda said about CUDA

The K5000M I mentioned in my post was about my actual laptop, for my new desktop I can't afford that GPU, too expensive (full desktop above 4000€)

Message 25 of 26
CaeTecos2021
in reply to: Idea_Mel

To further comment - I've run a benchmark with different settings, will post a summary of results. It was a DD and 3D calculation of core shift. Interesting results. It confirmed the obvious - frequency is extremely important, but not always. We will try to sell over eBay the old CPUs and acquire new ones. We are still considering whether to go with E5-2637v3 (15M, 4C, 3.5GHz) or E5-2643v3 (20M, 6C, 3.4 GHz). I guess 4 cores per CPU, 8 in total should be enough, so my favourite is 2637 as it's also 50% cheaper.

 

Any thoughts on this?

Message 26 of 26

Hi all,

I also will invest in a new workstation (HP Z8 G4) and would be interested whether the recommendations in post 20 are still valid. In the meantime 3 years have passed. Especially I am interested in informations for the cpu. Is it more effective to have more clock speed or more physical cores? Is there a limit of cores Moldflow Insight is using? Are there any new benchmarks made by Autodesk? Does anyone have made new experiences?

Thanks in advance for your answers.

Regards Bernd

 

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