Performant Hyper-V Host with consumer CPU

[RandomG25]

Budget (including currency): 2500

Country: Germany

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Windows Server 2022 Hyper-V Host
 

Hello everyone,

We're currently in the process of replacing our old server with a new one, with the primary focus on desktop virtualization using Windows 10. The current setup involves a Dell Poweredge server with a 6 core Xeon E-2146G.

At present, the server experiences a maximum of 15% utilization with 12 Windows 10 clients. Despite this, the performance feels sluggish, and I suspect that the low single-threaded performance might be a contributing factor. Storage speed is not a bottleneck, as the vms are spread across multiple sas ssds and disk usage is quite low.

 

Given our limited budget and the sole requirement of desktop virtualization, I've been eyeing the Ryzen 9 7950X. When compared to our old processor, this option boasts three times the number of cores and significantly improved single-threaded performance. Based on a multicore cost comparison, regular server processors with similar performance levels are priced at ten times the cost.
 

Our needs don't call for extra PCIe lanes, and we find that 128GB of RAM will be more than sufficient we also do not need hot swap support or anything similar.

Thus, the plan is to pair the Ryzen 9 7950X with an Asus motherboard that supports ECC RAM and 4x32gb of DDR5 ECC UDIMMS.

CPU: Ryzen 9 7950x

RAM: https://www.kingston.com/de/memory/server-premier/ddr5-4800mts-ecc-unbuffered-dimm
Mainboard: ASUS X670E Board with ECC support and multiple high speed M2 slots. (Which one?)
Case, power supply, cpu cooler: Function over design, any recommendations?
NICs: We need 2 LAN Ports with at least 2.5Gbits and SR-IOV. Any suggestions?

 

 

I'm reaching out to inquire if there are any concerns or requirements for a server that this proposed build might not meet. Your insights and advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you in advance for your assistance.

Best regards, Lukas.

 

[mMontana]

26 minutes ago, RandomG25 said:

I'm reaching out to inquire if there are any concerns or requirements for a server that this proposed build might not meet.

Well... use a fast car as a truck might lead to unexpected results.

Maybe on low loads the performance will be good enough, but on increasing level... might run ot of steam.

 

Ryzen 9 you choose is a wonderful CPU, however his close TDP to a server CPU won't hide the substance... It's not designed like one.

[SorryBella]

1 hour ago, mMontana said:

Ryzen 9 you choose is a wonderful CPU, however his close TDP to a server CPU won't hide the substance... It's not designed like one.

I still remember back in the very very old days of dashflo, you can use Ryzen for server purpose. I mean the lack of ECC wasn't fun for critical workloads, but they work miracles especially in server applications that doesn't scale the amount of cores like in game server, they do donuts against the then recent Xeon Golds. But yeah on less fringe scenario? Spring for Epyc and Xeon, those sweet enterprise level support helps a lot.

1 hour ago, RandomG25 said:

Mainboard: ASUS X670E Board with ECC support and multiple high speed M2 slots. (Which one?)

Check with other server user forums (Level1Techs and ServeTheHome is the few atop my head) and you'll realize that you are pretty locked up in terms of Ryzen board with ECC RAM. Sooner or later your hands would be tied on it, don't overthink it. If you want something easy to procure and deploy, Asrock have updated their Rack line for the AM5 and those explicitly support ECC out of the box.

1 hour ago, RandomG25 said:

Case, power supply, cpu cooler: Function over design, any recommendations?

For cooling 7950X needs around 125-150W. Shop accordingly. For reference of cooling on the consumer side, there's Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 that have been pretty trustworthy for cooling them. 

[RandomG25]

Thanks for your response!

 

3 hours ago, mMontana said:

Well... use a fast car as a truck might lead to unexpected results.

Maybe on low loads the performance will be good enough, but on increasing level... might run ot of steam.

 

Ryzen 9 you choose is a wonderful CPU, however his close TDP to a server CPU won't hide the substance... It's not designed like one.

But we are not even hitting the 85w TDP limit of the old Xeon, so i dont completely get your point.
 

 

2 hours ago, SorryBella said:

I still remember back in the very very old days of dashflo, you can use Ryzen for server purpose. I mean the lack of ECC wasn't fun for critical workloads, but they work miracles especially in server applications that doesn't scale the amount of cores like in game server, they do donuts against the then recent Xeon Golds. But yeah on less fringe scenario? Spring for Epyc and Xeon, those sweet enterprise level support helps a lot.

Check with other server user forums (Level1Techs and ServeTheHome is the few atop my head) and you'll realize that you are pretty locked up in terms of Ryzen board with ECC RAM. Sooner or later your hands would be tied on it, don't overthink it. If you want something easy to procure and deploy, Asrock have updated their Rack line for the AM5 and those explicitly support ECC out of the box.

For cooling 7950X needs around 125-150W. Shop accordingly. For reference of cooling on the consumer side, there's Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 that have been pretty trustworthy for cooling them. 

Thank you! Im not quite satisfied with the motherboards offered by ASRock Rack, but found this one:
https://www.supermicro.com/en/products/motherboard/h13sae-mf

Any opinions?

[mMontana]

22 minutes ago, RandomG25 said:

But we are not even hitting the 85w TDP limit of the old Xeon, so i dont completely get your point.

Actually... your Ryzen 9 could ramp up to 170W...

 

https://www.amd.com/en/products/cpu/amd-ryzen-9-7950x

[RandomG25]

2 hours ago, mMontana said:

Actually... your Ryzen 9 could ramp up to 170W...

 

https://www.amd.com/en/products/cpu/amd-ryzen-9-7950x

I dont really get your point, since TDP is not an issue (maybe during short spikes < 10 seconds) and we are only running light workloads