From: Norman Geist (norman.geist_at_uni-greifswald.de)
Date: Wed Jun 25 2014 - 00:31:47 CDT
BTW. all modern RAM is SD, ECC enabled or not, that’s the history:
SRAM = Static RAM : +very fast -very expensive (used eg. in Caches)
DRAM = Dynamic RAM : -slower than SRAM (CPU must wait for refreshes) +much
cheaper
SDRAM = Synchronous DRAM +faster than DRAM (CPU don't need to wait for
refreshes, as synchronized) +still cheaper
DDR-SDRAM = Double Data Rate SDRAM ...
Regarding your question, Xeon is a workstation/server CPU while i7 is a
consumer CPU. Therefore Xeon is more expensive but also more reliable. The
ECC feature does improve that even more. A Xeon won't wonder about 24/7 use,
I wouldn't put my shirt on the i7 in this regards. In case of performance, I
think there's no major difference.
BUT, if you want to run NAMD and VMD on this machine, why not taking more
care about getting a strong Nvidia GPU?
Norman Geist.
> -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
> Von: owner-namd-l_at_ks.uiuc.edu [mailto:owner-namd-l_at_ks.uiuc.edu] Im
> Auftrag von Gianluca Interlandi
> Gesendet: Mittwoch, 25. Juni 2014 03:03
> An: NAMD list
> Betreff: namd-l: Xeon vs i7 and ECC vs SDRAM
>
> Dear NAMD users,
>
> I need to purchase a new workstation for trajectory analysis, i.e.,
> using
> VMD and NAMD. I am leaning towards Lenovo but I am undecided between a
> Thinkcentre and a Thinkstation. The former comes with i7-4770 and non-
> ECC
> memory, the latter with e.g., Xeon E5-1620 v2 and ECC memory.
>
> The first question is: does Xeon (in particular the larger cache) bring
> any advantage for running VMD or NAMD? Is it generally true that Xeon
> run
> cooler and thus more stable than i7?
>
> The second question is: is it worth to pay for ECC memory when I plan
> to
> have a maximum of 16 GB? I know that there is a lot of debate about
> this.
> Since I plan to run the server 24/7 my main concern is stability.
>
> The last question is: does it make sense to have a Xeon CPU with non-
> ECC
> memory or would it be a waste? I have read that for example SDRAM is
> the
> safest non-ECC memory and it would be a lot cheaper.
>
> I would appreciate any opinions on this.
>
> Thanks in advance!
>
> Gianluca
>
> -----------------------------------------------------
> Gianluca Interlandi, PhD gianluca_at_u.washington.edu
> +1 (206) 685 4435
> http://artemide.bioeng.washington.edu/
>
> Research Scientist at the Department of Bioengineering
> at the University of Washington, Seattle WA U.S.A.
> -----------------------------------------------------
--- Diese E-Mail ist frei von Viren und Malware, denn der avast! Antivirus Schutz ist aktiv. http://www.avast.com
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.6 : Wed Dec 31 2014 - 23:22:32 CST