Chemical Process Simulation Build

[Juan Riva]

Hi guys!!

 

This is my first post so I hope this topic isn´t somewhere in the forum already and if it is I´m sorry I didn´t read it or find it before.  

I am a scientist from Spain (excuse me for my English I do the best I can)  and I have some problems with a computer I have running certain application (it´s a chemical process simulator called AspenPlus; a single threaded application) and I would like to know if you have any advice or tips for me to make my performance better when using this software. First, a smal review of the system:

 

 

PC.Specs: Intented to run just one application (single threaded) and OS (Win Server 2008 R2):

 

Mother Board; Asus P8Z77-V

Processor: i7 3770K running as out of the box (only Turbo Boost OC)

SSD: Samsung 840 Pro Series 256 Gb SATA 3

CPU Vent: Stock (but in a server room at 17 ºC)

GPU: Nvidia GT210 (really stupid because I didn´t need it with the one integrated in the processor but I didn´t know that when I bought it)

 

What do you think I can do to improve the sigle threaded application performance (it´s kind of horrible nowadays). Ideas:

 

1.- Disable HyperThreading

2.- Overclock (how much??) (Will I need water refrigeration or an aftermarket CPU cooler??) (Worth it?)

3.- Any more Ideas????

 

Thak you very much in advance for your help and comments.

 

Juan

[azrituba]

get an aftermarket cooler and oc to 4.4-4.5ghz

[João Severino]

get an aftermarket cooler and oc to 4.4-4.5ghz

Yes this ^^^^

Try doing some light overclocking

[bcredeur97]

disable a couple of cores and you will be able to get a higher overclock one a single core, which is what you need. (im not 100% sure abou this but I always heard that disabling cores will yield a higher OC on a single core.)

[João Severino]

disable a couple of cores and you will be able to get a higher overclock one a single core, which is what you need. (im not 100% sure abou this but I always heard that disabling cores will yield a higher OC on a single core.)

Disabling cores helps with overclocking a bit because of the cores being turned off they do not produce heat and therefore you can push it a little bit more

[bcredeur97]

Disabling cores helps with overclocking a bit because of the cores being turned off they do not produce heat and therefore you can push it a little bit more

well I recommend he do that since he is using a single-threaded program anyway.

[Juan Riva]

disable a couple of cores and you will be able to get a higher overclock one a single core, which is what you need. (im not 100% sure abou this but I always heard that disabling cores will yield a higher OC on a single core.)

 

 

Disabling cores helps with overclocking a bit because of the cores being turned off they do not produce heat and therefore you can push it a little bit more

 

 

With disabling cores you mean disabling Threads or I can go further and disable more cores (like not threads but real cores)? If I should buy an aftermarket CPU cooler; would it be good to go for water cooling? H100i, for example? It´s running in a Server room at 17ºC and with humidity controlled too.

 

Thank you for the help

[bcredeur97]

With disabling cores you mean disabling Threads or I can go further and disable more cores (like not threads but real cores)? If I should buy an aftermarket CPU cooler; would it be good to go for water cooling? H100i, for example? It´s running in a Server room at 17ºC and with humidity controlled too.

 

Thank you for the help

H100i is good. I think there are some better coolers though, like the Swifttech H220 which i dont think is available in the US. And yes, you can legitimately disable cores in the BIOS of your motherboard. And if you go with water cooling, since you are in a server room, I would crank up the fans to the max on the radiator, will help a little with temps.

[João Severino]

With disabling cores you mean disabling Threads or I can go further and disable more cores (like not threads but real cores)? If I should buy an aftermarket CPU cooler; would it be good to go for water cooling? H100i, for example? It´s running in a Server room at 17ºC and with humidity controlled too.

 

Thank you for the help

Since you are using mainly single threaded applications you can disable hyper-threading and also some of the physical cores

On the aspect of cooling you can go with an air cooler or water cooler it depends on what kind of overclocking you are planning to do

If you really want to squeeze the performance out of the CPU go with a high end air cooler or an AIO water cooler

 

 

Air cooler:

• Noctua NH-D14: link
• Thermalright Silver Arrow: link

 

Water cooler:

• Corsair H100i: link
• Swiftech H220: link

[Juan Riva]

ok... Well I will update with news as soon as I can convince my boss to spend al little (more) money in my systems... I will first disable the HyperThreading and stay with 3.9 GHz like it is right now and the change the CPU cooler and disable 2 more cores (that would let me with 2) and push it maybe as far as I can with all the fans to the max (I don´t pay the electric bill...) I have a kind of "Benchmarking simulation" which, for the record, lasts NOW 5 minutes and 32 seconds. I´ll update you with new results.. Tomorrow morning I´ll disable the Hypre Threading going from 8 threads to 4 cores... and will see new results for the exact same sim

[João Severino]

ok... Well I will update with news as soon as I can convince my boss to spend al little (more) money in my systems... I will first disable the HyperThreading and stay with 3.9 GHz like it is right now and the change the CPU cooler and disable 2 more cores (that would let me with 2) and push it maybe as far as I can with all the fans to the max (I don´t pay the electric bill...) I have a kind of "Benchmarking simulation" which, for the record, lasts NOW 5 minutes and 32 seconds. I´ll update you with new results.. Tomorrow morning I´ll disable the Hypre Threading going from 8 threads to 4 cores... and will see new results for the exact same sim

When overclocking keep a close  eye on the temperatures don't let the CPU go over 75ºC

[Juan Riva]

When overclocking keep a close  eye on the temperatures don't let the CPU go over 75ºC

 

Ok, so... The results of this small investigation were:

 

1.- Disabling Hyper Threading went from 5:32 to 4 minutes 45 sec (Improve: 14.16% !!! just doing that)

 

2.- Overclocking a little (from the 3.9 GHz Turbo to 4.2 GHz) went from 4:45 to 4:32 (improve: another 4% leading to an 18.08% total improvement!!!) [This is 13 seconds OCing 0.3 GHZ which is 43 seconds faster per GHz]

 

3.- Overclocking a little more (4.4 GHz) went from 4:32 to 4:25 (A 20.19% OVERALL IMPROVEMENT) [This is 7 seconds better OCing 0.2 GHz which is 35 seconds faster per GHz]

 

I think they are excellent results but the weirdest thing is the navigation in the program (it´s just amazing how did it improve). So, thank you very much for your comments and if I finally go for water cooling I will update this post with more info. I think I have a pretty good processor since its achieving 4.4 at 1.14 to 1.18 V. I don´t know... what do you think?

 

Thank you again

 

Juan

[João Severino]

Ok, so... The results of this small investigation were:

 

1.- Disabling Hyper Threading went from 5:32 to 4 minutes 45 sec (Improve: 14.16% !!! just doing that)

 

2.- Overclocking a little (from the 3.9 GHz Turbo to 4.2 GHz) went from 4:45 to 4:32 (improve: another 4% leading to an 18.08% total improvement!!!) [This is 13 seconds OCing 0.3 GHZ which is 43 seconds faster per GHz]

 

3.- Overclocking a little more (4.4 GHz) went from 4:32 to 4:25 (A 20.19% OVERALL IMPROVEMENT) [This is 7 seconds better OCing 0.2 GHz which is 35 seconds faster per GHz]

 

I think they are excellent results but the weirdest thing is the navigation in the program (it´s just amazing how did it improve). So, thank you very much for your comments and if I finally go for water cooling I will update this post with more info. I think I have a pretty good processor since its achieving 4.4 at 1.14 to 1.18 V. I don´t know... what do you think?

 

Thank you again

 

Juan

 

Always check if the overclock is stable with Prime95 and use HWMonitor to monitor the temperatures (keep them bellow 75ºC)

4.4GHz at 1.14V to 1.18V is good, you don't want to put to much voltage as it will raise your temperatures

[Leonard]

If i were you i would not disable anything and at the ambient temperature you have, even something like a hyper EVO 212 would give you great cooling on an overclock but if you want to go water that is fine too.

I recommend the Kraken x60 water cooler if it can fit in your case if not any of the other recommended coolers from the other posts would work nicely too. I also recommend just running the AI Suite II auto tuning utility if you don't know or want to spend the time to learn how to overclock your system from stock UEFI configuration and see what you get and use that if it is good, you should get about 4.6ghz if the CPU has good overclocking capabilities.

[Juan Riva]

Always check if the overclock is stable with Prime95 and use HWMonitor to monitor the temperatures (keep them bellow 75ºC)

4.4GHz at 1.14V to 1.18V is good, you don't want to put to much voltage as it will raise your temperatures

 

 

If i were you i would not disable anything and at the ambient temperature you have, even something like a hyper EVO 212 would give you great cooling on an overclock but if you want to go water that is fine too.

I recommend the Kraken x60 water cooler if it can fit in your case if not any of the other recommended coolers from the other posts would work nicely too. I also recommend just running the AI Suite II auto tuning utility if you don't know or want to spend the time to learn how to overclock your system from stock UEFI configuration and see what you get and use that if it is good, you should get about 4.6ghz if the CPU has good overclocking capabilities.

 

Thank you for the suggestions... Well, the OC I´ve already done is really stable with Prime95 and using CoreTemp I had a max temp of 67ºC which is kind of surprising but, again, the cooling we have there is really "active" if you know what I mean. However I founf AIDA64 more stressfull for the system and it´s not very stable in this test (starts throttling at minute 5 or 6 in AIDA64). The case is like the typical really cheap case (or it looks like that) they do for servers but I think it will be a lot of space for a 212 or even for a 412s... don´t know yet, I´m very happy with the results and don´t know if pushing it more would worth it.

[Leonard]

Thank you for the suggestions... Well, the OC I´ve already done is really stable with Prime95 and using CoreTemp I had a max temp of 67ºC which is kind of surprising but, again, the cooling we have there is really "active" if you know what I mean. However I founf AIDA64 more stressfull for the system and it´s not very stable in this test (starts throttling at minute 5 or 6 in AIDA64). The case is like the typical really cheap case (or it looks like that) they do for servers but I think it will be a lot of space for a 212 or even for a 412s... don´t know yet, I´m very happy with the results and don´t know if pushing it more would worth it.

If AIDA64 is causing throttling you need more voltage. I have found AIDA64 to be very accurate in determining if the OC is stable both for CPU and RAM and 67C is ok for a stock cooler at 4.4ghz but you should address that first to ensure better stability. It doesn't matter if the case is cheap or expensive, the main issue is if the kraken x60 could fit or other coolers like the hyper 212 or the ND-h14 that someone else suggested. Also, if there is plenty of dust in the room and the case hasn't got filters then you may want to go for the water cooling as it is easier to clean that air coolers as i have found. My experience is that air coolers, depending on the room's characteristics tends to accumulate dust and grease while radiators tend to accumulate just dust. The reason why i recommended the kraken x60 is because the radiator is thin but wide and if you have the space for it it will be a great addition for stability, you may even get to 4.6ghz with it but how much would that really help your needs would only be determined by you.  

[bcredeur97]

To me if the case is just sitting in a server room, I would just "ghetto" mount the best water-cooling thing you can find. And dont forget that disabling cores will give you better temps, I noticed that you only said that you disabled hyper-threading. If I was in that situation, I would leave just 2 cores on, just so its stable enough that you can actually use the system if needed while doing your calculations in your program. And with 2 out of 4 cores disabled you will still get great temps which means a higher overclock for you! Being that your chip is at 4.4 GHz at 1.18 volts, it sounds like you got a pretty good chip there. I would definetly get a watercooler, with cores disabled you may just be able to 5 GHz on that thing.(just a guess, don't take seriously)