The Intel Xeon 5670: Six Improved Cores
by Johan De Gelas on March 16, 2010 3:39 PM EST- Posted in
- IT Computing
SAP Sales and Distribution 2-tier
The SAP SD (sales and distribution, 2-tier internet configuration) benchmark is an interesting benchmark as it is a real world client-server application. We decided to take a look at SAP's benchmark database. The results below all run on Windows 2003 Enterprise Edition and MS SQL Server 2005 database (both 64-bit). Every 2-tier Sales & Distribution benchmark was performed with SAP's latest ERP 6 enhancement package 4. These results are NOT comparable with any benchmark performed before 2009. The new 2009 version of the benchmark produces scores that are 25% lower. We analyzed the SAP Benchmark in-depth in one of our earlier articles. The profile of the benchmark has remained the same:
| SAP S&D 2-Tier | |
| Operating System | Windows 2008 Enterprise Edition |
| Software | SAP ERP 6.0 Enhancement package 4 |
| Benchmark software | Industry Standard benchmark version 2009 |
| Typical error margin | Very low |
No results were available for the Xeon X5670, so we estimated the expected performance of the Xeon X5670 based on the X5680 result that Fujitsu published and on some preliminary industry reports.
(*) Estimated result
The six-core Xeon is no less than twice (!) as fast as the six-core Opteron in a similar configuration. Pretty dramatic results, but not unexpected of course as the six-core Opteron could never come close to the quadcore Xeons in the first place, let alone an improved six-core version of the latter. The reasons are many-fold, but one of the important ones is the fact that Hyperthreading boosts performance by at least 30%.
Even worse, 12 Westmere cores are enough to come very close to the performance of a 24-core Opteron machine. This is does not bode well for the newest octal and twelve-core Opterons (Magny-cours). To be really frank, we think the SAP market is Intel owned until AMD launches the multi-threaded Bulldozer CPU. Most of the SAP server market is not very sensitive to pricing, let alone CPU pricing. SAP projects, which need expensive licenses and many consulting hours are typically in the $100K to $100M range and x86 hardware costs are most of the time only a small percentage of the total project costs. The final blow is the appearance of the Nehalem EX at the end of this month.
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Wireloop - Saturday, March 27, 2010 - link
After watching vApus' result for both Intel and AMD gear, the natural conclusion drawn is that Hyper-V is more optimized for the Opteron architecture than ESX since the latter achieves a lower Geometric Mean VM rate (on that platform).I guess it has something to do with maneuver of data into the L3 cache which is a critical condition for high multithreaded performance on the AMD platform. If so, my kudos to Microsoft.
mgbell - Friday, March 19, 2010 - link
Hey Anand,I think you should do set up a test pitting the Xeon line against their perspective i7 counterparts and run some workstation type tests. I would be very interested in any testing that had to do with video encoding/rendering. I am a video editor and would love to see a side by side comparison with a xeon sytem of the same speed against a core i7 system. Also just for fun turn off the second processor or turn it on so we can see what kinds of rendering benefits a second processor with 4/6 cores (8/12 threads) would gain.
Thanks
MB
lemonadesoda - Sunday, March 21, 2010 - link
I very much agree. It would be interesting to run a typical "enthusiast" or "workstation" application/benchmark just to see how it compares.I would like to see a Cinebench R10 comparison, a Everest PhotoWorxx, and a Fritz Chess Benchmark. Possibly a video encoding benchmark too.
A lot of enthusiasts run dual Xeons as workstations... you cant predict what software they will be running, but the above 3 tests are good general comparatives.
There are also servers providing other services like OCR or PDF generation. These Oracle database benchmarks are useful, but represent only one type of server/workstation use.
damianrobertjones - Thursday, March 18, 2010 - link
I'm sitting here at the end of and ADSL line with a fresh WIndows XP machine, all updates, new Kaspersky install.While waiting for an app to install I've visited this page....
Bang. Kaspersky popped up with a warning
Trojan downloader.java.agent.aw from www.googleadsenstats.ru/useralexey/files/gsb50.jar/Appletx.class
Do you have something against ie8 as this doesn't happen with Opera?
PLEASE MAKE YOUR SITE SAFE!
itsmeagain - Wednesday, March 17, 2010 - link
Any chance you could throw a couple of these in a mac pro and give us a preview?Shadowmaster625 - Wednesday, March 17, 2010 - link
The E5503 looks like the most reasonable and appealing server processor for those of us that live in the real world. Yet there are no benchmarks...Lukas - Thursday, March 18, 2010 - link
The 550x CPUs are crap. They don't have HyperThreading or TurboBoost. The only reason they exist is for a cheap entry price tag. If you don't need a lot of CPU (e.G. unvirtualized LOB software), better go with a 34xx series Xeon. A lot cheaper than the 55xx series.majortom1981 - Tuesday, March 23, 2010 - link
they also exist for government and public service contracts . We got a z600 with 4 gig ram ,1 5504 xeon, and an 80 gig 10k rpm enterprise sata drive (also nvida gpu) for $700. For just $239 i can add another 5504 .pvdw - Wednesday, March 17, 2010 - link
How come only Windows servers are being used. What about RHEL with a Tomcat or JBOSS bench (surely such exists).Lukas - Thursday, March 18, 2010 - link
Probably because the benchmarkers are not familiar with those platforms? Doing benchmarks on a platform about which you don't know enough will not give you any usable results.