Reply to: Old multi core server for Visual Studio

[eek]

Sell it to CEX for £211. Doubt they check them beyond visual inspection so as long as it isn't charred from over enthusiastic overclocking it should be accepted.

Though I presume their stores are now closed so may have to post it to them where they may have a proper testing set-up, whereas walking into the store relies on the staff there having much of a clue and kit to check it with.

It's not that bad - it just doesn't play as nicely with the ddr memory I have than the 3800x I was using before I installed this chip.

It may be a moot point though as it seems Scan have screwed up my order as what I'm seeing on their website doesn't match what the email lists...

[Hobosapien]

That depends - in my case given that I have a slightly dodgy 3900X - the upgrade is worthwhile assuming my scan order actually gets despatched today.

Sell it to CEX for £211. Doubt they check them beyond visual inspection so as long as it isn't charred from over enthusiastic overclocking it should be accepted.

Though I presume their stores are now closed so may have to post it to them where they may have a proper testing set-up, whereas walking into the store relies on the staff there having much of a clue and kit to check it with.

[eek]

The AMD Ryzen 5000 series is available now in UK (was on embargo until 2pm today due to official launch worldwide). Cheapest I've seen for a 5900X is £510 and it doesn't even come with a cooler.

Nah, I'll pass, think I've done ok with my 3900 for £325 with a cooler. [smug mode at maximum]

Embargo also lifted on third party reviews and benchmarks so will see what all the fuss is about later. Doubt it's worth that price difference though.

Intel news on how they're going to challenge AMD when their yet to be released gen 11 'Rocket Lake' is already behind if leaks are to be believed:

That depends - in my case given that I have a slightly dodgy 3900X - the upgrade is worthwhile assuming my scan order actually gets despatched today.

[Hobosapien]

The AMD Ryzen 5000 series is available now in UK (was on embargo until 2pm today due to official launch worldwide). Cheapest I've seen for a 5900X is £510 and it doesn't even come with a cooler.

Nah, I'll pass, think I've done ok with my 3900 for £325 with a cooler. [smug mode at maximum]

Embargo also lifted on third party reviews and benchmarks so will see what all the fuss is about later. Doubt it's worth that price difference though.

Intel news on how they're going to challenge AMD when their yet to be released gen 11 'Rocket Lake' is already behind if leaks are to be believed:

First review from a decent source:

[Hobosapien]

Shame you didn't wait the 5000 series chips are out on Thursday so I will be replacing the 3900x I currently have with a 5950x as this is the end of the line for the socket.

And yes I could wait for prices to fall but Brexit means it's probably better to buy now rather than wait.

Nah, cost/benefit analysis concludes a £300 cpu is a better option now than a £400+ 'equivalent' when the prediction is it will be around 20% better. If the 5000 series was so good they wouldn't embargo testing and 3rd party reviews until the first wave of buyers are committed.

I also didn't fancy the wild goose chase if the demand outstrips supply and prices are high accordingly, through Black Friday, and stock of the bargain 3000 series start to dry up as they push the 5000 series so won't be banging out the better of the 3000 series chips.

Can always upgrade to a 3950X or 5000 series next year, though I'm hoping 12c/24t will be enough until the next gen (AM5 or whatever it will be) in 2021 and beyond seeing as I was using a quad core beforehand. I may have to re-encode my h264 stuff into h265 to stop it getting too bored.

[eek]

Shame you didn't wait the 5000 series chips are out on Thursday so I will be replacing the 3900x I currently have with a 5950x as this is the end of the line for the socket.

And yes I could wait for prices to fall but Brexit means it's probably better to buy now rather than wait.

[Hobosapien]

To round off my stint on this thread, I've built a new workstation PC using an AMD Ryzen 9 3900(non-X) which is 12 cores/24 threads at only 65w TDP.

That version of the 3900 is only available OEM (as detailed in the youtube video below) and I only found it currently available in the UK as a mobo+cpu bundle offer by AWD-IT (add the cpu to any compatible mobo to make your own bundle) for £325 for the cpu compared to around £385 for the X version. AMD make it easy to overclock if desired to get back to X level performance but I like the lower thermals at stock as it keeps the fans quieter.

Added 32gb ram and a 500gb NVME as a main drive and it (naturally) flies compared to my old faithful i5-2500k workstation. My old Thinkpad is also relegated to part-time use until I can upgrade to a Thinkpad X1 Extreme or P1 for a powerhouse mobile workstation, when prices for refurb ex-corporate stuff come back down after the WFH covid rush for bargain laptops, likely next year now.

Hard to beat bang for buck for productivity and I won't have to worry about the leccy bill like I would if I'd gone for one of those uber-cheap Dell R710 servers, they're cheap for a reason.

Should do me for a while.

[Hobosapien]

Connect four.

Sorry, old habits.

[Hobosapien]

DELL R710 dual xeon 6 core/12 thread with 32gb ram for around £150 before deciding on the hard drives, from that bargain hardware site I linked to earlier.

What puts me off is I can probably get similar performance from a newish multicore mini-pc for a few hundred quid more, that will take up much less space, be quieter, and more power efficient.

Further research shows the AMD Ryzen 9 3900X, available for under £400, with the same statistic of 12 cores and 24 threads (at a 105w TDP) wipes the floor with those old dual core Xeons from 2010. Ain't progress great.

The Ryzens even have an 'eco mode' that drops the TDP to 65w. The eco mode on the old Xeons is the power off switch.

[Hobosapien]

Death of the Dev Machine

Not yet pulled the trigger on an old server but have my eye on a DELL R710 dual xeon 6 core/12 thread with 32gb ram for around £150 before deciding on the hard drives, from that bargain hardware site I linked to earlier.

What puts me off is I can probably get similar performance from a newish multicore mini-pc for a few hundred quid more, that will take up much less space, be quieter, and more power efficient.

Then I saw the following where it appears M$ are going to offer virtual dev machines via GitHub Codespaces and Azure, where you can either code in the browser or via a local lightweight installation of VSCode or Visual Studio, for 'access anywhere by any device'. No more lumping a beast of a laptop around or trying to sync multiple dev environments between office(s) and home(s).

Death of the Dev Machine?

The above also links to the following which has some interesting comments on various PC/Mac setups and how long they took to compile a certain large VS solution, for reference:

Building the Ultimate Developer PC 3.0 - The Parts List for my new computer, IronHeart

So still not sure what way forward is best for non-exteme situations like the OP has, and will continue plugging away on my ancient Thinkpad for now. Frustratingly all the online comparisons of the latest Intel and AMD cpus tend to focus on bloody games, so not sure if the takeaway for productivity uses is the more cores the better but beyond 6/8/12 it's diminishing returns that doesn't outway the cost of the kit. i.e. a £200 6/8 core cpu is more cost effective than a £3k 64 core Threadripper, unless charging by the minute.

[Hobosapien]

The reddit homelab wiki is a good place to start for which generations of older hardware to consider and what to avoid. I need to spend more time digging into the info to see whether brands such as DELL are a reasonably safe alternative to HP.

Current thinking is set up a mini rack in the garage using homeplugs to get network access from the house then remote desktop in from my 4k PC setup. Apart from the tinkering potential of setting up all sorts of VMs and services I can also use it for local automated backup and sync with Azure storage and data that I'm using for a plan B properly hosted web app.

To stay on thread topic I'll also try VSCode in a Linux VM to see if it does enough of what I need (e.g. git integration, azure function development and debugging, ...) to move away from Visual Studio and Windows 10.

[minestrone]

I was reading this article a while ago about getting old xeon processors from data centres and the motherboards that run them...

This extraordinary motherboard is being used by server CPU scavengers | TechRadar

[courtg9000]

I stumbled across bargainhardware.co.uk (a legit reseller of refurb corporate kit)

Thank you for that, kind Sir

[Hobosapien]

Alternatively, get a cheapo old rackserver to try it out before splashing out on more expensive modern alternatives.

I stumbled across bargainhardware.co.uk (a legit reseller of refurb corporate kit) and have had some fun looking for the best bang/buck server for a home lab to run some VMs, and could have a dev VM set up and remote desktop in from a laptop that isn't a massive spec.

Not finished looking (by a long way, this could take weeks ) but currently on a HP Proliant DL380 G7 2U with 2 x quad core xeon and 48gb ram for £150 inc vat and delivery.

Did have a 1U specced with 2 hex cores and 32gb ram for £130 but that was with 2.5" drive caddies and think 3.5" would be more flexible for my needs.

Also specced up a Dell Precision workstation that initially seemed very cheap but then found the cpu heatsinks are 40 quid each as they are a custom design and therefore now rare. Bloody Dell.

Seems now many enterprises are moving to the cloud and giving their workforce laptops there are loads of previous generation kit going for peanuts. So tempting to get a rack of the stuff for some home meddling, if I can stomach the leccy bill. Would make for an interesting electric heater in winter though.

[Hobosapien]

So has mine, and all the RAM in the world, but still that solution I work on kills it.

And to the person wanting to comment on the solution: nope I can't do anything about it, just need more metal

Surely you're not changing things that require all projects in a solution to be live unit tested, so maybe could create local alternative solutions to split it up outside the official one.

If using VS2019 I'd see if VS2017 or even VS2015 give a better experience. Can install side-by-side so no impact on current installation while trying alternatives.

If your hands are tied and looking for best hardware then get Ryzen Threadripper based system and let us know how it goes.

A quick look on reddit for reference of the threadripper and visual studio performance finds:

Workstation PC, Visual Studio 2019, which CPU? : Amd

I compile a fairly large project on my 3900x in Visual Studio. Half C code, half C#. It's a couple hundred thousand lines of code.

My worknlaptpp, 4 cores 8 threads 15W intel CPU takes 1min 45sec to build.

The 3900X takes 12 seconds and loads all the cores nicely.

I do have a fast SSD and 32GB of RAM but 16GB would work just as well.

This thing is a beast. I can't see needing anything faster for a good long time.

You can offset the cost of one of these beauties by all the leccy you'll save on not using a thirsty old xeon based server.