Dual Xeon GPU Bottleneck ?

[TestoKaiser]

Ok so i did this build : 

but i figured that the low clock speed of the CPUs used in the video wouldnt be sufficient for gaming, also the extra cores cant really be made use of while gaming atm.

So i went with 2 Xeon 5060s @3.2 GHz. These are dual cores so I thought bottom line Id end up with a higher clock quad core rather than a lower clock octa core.

I know you guys always want full system specs so here you go :

 

Motherboard: SuperMicro X7DVL-E

CPU : 2x Xeon 5060

GPU: GTX 750Ti

Memory : I dont even know the brand .. but 8GB FB ECC 

PSU : Thermaltake Hamburg 530 W 

 

So i got the rig to work after a couple issues but I'm getting pretty low FPS in games which drop even further the longer i stay in the game.

League of Legends: Starts with 80-95 FPS then drops all the way down to 40-50 FPS

Also my GPU usage maxes at 29% while CPU usage is at like 70-85%.

I already tested the GPU in my main rig where it performed perfectly( 400+ FPS in LoL).

 

Now I have a couple questions : 

1. I had to cut open the PCIe x8 slot to fit in the graphics card. Also its not PCIe gen 3 like in my main rig. I know this makes me lose some performance but shouldnt be this drastic right?

2. So what Im thinking is this is a CPU bottleneck problem right ? (btw Cinebench Score is 135 .. ik super fu**n low)

3. Maybe the CPU itself isnt the problem but something else about the CPU that Im not thinking about? Any Suggestions ?

4. If the CPUs are in fact too weak for gaming will getting something like an X5450 fix it entirely? 

 

Thanks in Advance 

I know its a long post but im sorry I dont have any Potatoes to spare ^^

 

[Julian5]

They are bretty slow cpu's

[Nord]

Well first of all, Xeons arent exactly ment for gaming. The video is mainly focusing on price to performance ratio, hence "budget" and IF all of these would be a proper, legitimate way, of gaming. Lots of people would do it, which they are not.

 

Secondly, you are using a really low end CPU from 2008 and a mid range GPU from 2013, obviously there is going to be a bottleneck.

Especially if you consider that many games fail to even utilitize more than 2 Cores, how do you think they react to 2 CPU sockets?

 

Also isnt that system running DDR2 memory?

 

 

For your questions:

1.) Pcie x8 vs x16 is usualy just a few FPS difference.

And what do you mean with had to cut it open? If your GPU does not exactly fit into the PCI slot, its not even ment to run a GPU. Especially if some pins of the GPU are now out in the open, thats not only dangerous for the system but also your first performance causing problem IMO.

 

2.) 135CB sounds about right for the CPU's, however here is a cinebench screen from a Q6600, which is a consumer dual core from 2007.

So basically an entire Xeon CPU in your system has like 75%~ the power as a single core on a Q6600.

You could try to overclock your Xeons though, I've seen a cinebench score where somebody got them to like 4GHZ. (exactly the ones you have) Not that it will do much, but more is always better, right?

 

3.) read 1 & 2.

 

4.) cant tell you, but I personaly would most certainly not invest any more money in this project.

[TestoKaiser]

First of all thanks for the reply. 

 

It is running DDR 2 Memory.

For the PCIe Slot : I just removed the plastic at the end of the slot so the card could physically fit in. I really dont think thats causing any issues since its basically the same as if i had used a x8 to x16 riser card . Also many mini-ITX boards have PCIe slots that are open on the end to fit in larger cards.

 

I got the to processors for 5 € each so, also this project is more like a just 4 fun thing to me rather than getting the best bang for the buck.

So i dont mind spending some more. All I want is to get the best out of this type of rig. 

 

You said this type of rig wasnt meant for gaming. Of course its not but Linus managed to get pretty decent framerates in pretty intensive titles.

Also he used a much higher end gpu than I do so he should have even more issues with cpu bottlenecking. 

 

I think I will just get a pair of x5460s  and see how it goes.

 

[zMeul]

1 hour ago, Nord said:

Pcie x8 vs x16 is usualy just a few FPS difference

think again

that PCIe 8x is gen1.1: http://ark.intel.com/products/27747/Intel-5000V-Memory-Controller

 

I'm sorry @TestoKaiser but gaming on that system is ... dumb

even my Q9950 with PCIe 16X gen2 did better

 

that system is more suited for workstation use

[TestoKaiser]

so you think its mostly the PCIe interfaces fault?
 

EDIT: I just checked Benchmarks of PCIe 1.1 vs PCIe 2 .. still shouldnt be this drastic.

 

[zMeul]

20 minutes ago, TestoKaiser said:

so you think its mostly the PCIe interfaces fault?
 

EDIT: I just checked Benchmarks of PCIe 1.1 vs PCIe 2 .. still shouldnt be this drastic.

the 750Ti is a PCIe gen3 card and you're at gen 1.1 ...

 

a PCIe 16x gen1.x connection provides 4GB/s bandwith

16X gen2.x provides 8GB/s

16X gen3.x provides 15.754GB/s

 

so, your PCIe 8X gen1.x connection is equivalent to a PCIe 2X gen3.x

[TestoKaiser]

yeah but that doesnt mean that PCIe x16 gen 3 would give me 8 times the performance of my current configuration does it?

[Nord]

50 minutes ago, zMeul said:

think again

that PCIe 8x is gen1.1: http://ark.intel.com/products/27747/Intel-5000V-Memory-Controller

 

I'm sorry @TestoKaiser but gaming on that system is ... dumb

even my Q9950 with PCIe 16X gen2 did better

 

that system is more suited for workstation use

I stand corrected, I actually did not take into account its only a x8 PCIE slot.

 

So yea, that could indeed be a bottleneck.

I just know that generally x16 slots - 1.1 vs 2.0 are, if at all, just a few FPS difference. However even those comparesions are rather old since they have all been done with like 5xx series GPU's.

 

 

Anyhow, why the build in the video performs better than yours is

1.) they did not only test LoL, just because LoL does not run properly, does not mean other stuff would not.

2.) the CPU's used in the video are around twice as powerfull as the ones you picked. F/E they score around 330 in cinebench.

3.) by the looks of it, the mobo in the video has a normal PCI-E x16 slot, that is just laking the additional, entirely not necessarey, holding point for the GPU.

[TestoKaiser]

ok thanks everybody for the additional info 
 

I just got 2 x5460s  and i guess i will see how these perform once they arrive 

will keep you updated in case you care ^^

[Nord]

16 minutes ago, TestoKaiser said:

yeah but that doesnt mean that PCIe x16 gen 3 would give me 8 times the performance of my current configuration does it?

No.

 

     PCI-e 1.0     PCI-e 2.x     PCI-e 3.0     PCI-e 4.x
x1     250MB/s     500MB/s         985MB/s     1969MB/s
x4     1000MB/s     2000MB/s     3940MB/s     7876MB/s
x8     2000MB/s     4000MB/s     7880MB/s     15752MB/s
x16   4000MB/s    8000MB/s    15760MB/s     31504MB/s

 

These are the available bandwiths for the slots.

 

Now there is no one single, simple answer to this, but generally if we look at the GPU you want to put in, it tells us its made for PCI-E 3.0 on the nvidia page.

 

Now if we look at normal consumer grade motherboards, the only PCI-E slots we will find on them where we could fit in an GPU anyway, w/o sawing something off or doing other stuff that would void the warranty immediatly, are x16 and x8.

 

So its safe to assume that the 750 Ti, should, at least have the bandwith of a 3.0 x8 port available to run at its full potentional. Which according to the list is 7880MB/s

You put that same card into a port which provides 2000MB/s of bandwith. Which is almost 4 times less.

Even if we go back a bit and compare it to a PCI 2.0 x8, its still twice as fast as what you have available on the board.

 

How much of a gain you would get by having a x16 port I do not know and I wish you good luck finding anything for that on the internet since you will need it

 

[Julian5]

does it have usb 3.0?

[TestoKaiser]

 

as you can see in this graph the slot shouldnt be this much of a problem 

[Nord]

 

 

You dont play "all resolutions" now do you?

So:

its not 1080p, because they are apperantly only testing odd resolutions, but the closest there is.

 

So you are getting 87% of its power as I assume a 680 and 750 Ti should approx be the same outcome here. So you are gimping your GPU by, lets just round it up to 15%, while also bottlenecking it with the CPU(s).

 

As you stated the GPU never goes above 30% usage, the problem could originate in either or even both of the mentioned problems. Maybe its the CPU, maybe the pci-e, maybe both.

Basically you just have to try, as you allready did order the otehr CPU's, just wait, install them and see if there is a difference. If not, its also the PCI-E.

 

 

BUT here is something that nobody did even think of yet;

When you get FPS drops after some time of gaming, that usualy means something is overheating or in the case of this system gets maxed out.

So check temps of the CPU / GPU aswell as the temperature and read/write usage of the SSD/HDD you are using. (Msi afterburner for GPU monitoring and HWInfo for the rest, both are free)

 

[zMeul]

28% out of 60 (theoretical) avg FPS is 43avg FPS

you say it's not much, but it hits hard on the minimums!

[TestoKaiser]

Yeah i also thought the CPUs might be overheating since GPU definitely isnt.

But i checked with hwmonitor and they are well within the specified safe temps of 78 C. So that doesnt make too much sense. However the New CPUs have a little lower tdp  and im gonna install more Fans as well so that should decrease temps a little

 

[TestoKaiser]

But also if you look at the performance of the GPU in my Main rig im getting less  than 20% of that in this one 

So pcie definitely cant be the only problem

[Nord]

39 minutes ago, TestoKaiser said:

Yeah i also thought the CPUs might be overheating since GPU definitely isnt.

But i checked with hwmonitor and they are well within the specified safe temps of 78 C. So that doesnt make too much sense. However the New CPUs have a little lower tdp  and im gonna install more Fans as well so that should decrease temps a little

 

The Xeons you currently have installed dont have a TJunction listed on intels HP, only a TCase. These are two different things.

 

Generally, on how high they are rated TCase wise, I would also say that temps of 80°C~ are perfectly fine, however that is entirely based only on knowledge and comparesion of the I7 2xxx to 6xxx series on my part. So maybe Xeons are different here, like generate more heat in that aspect or the IHS is placed differently compared to the ones I know... literaly no idea but could be.

 

HWmonitor does not list TCase temps, only TJunction but it does list the CPU-Speed.

So maybe keep an eye on the coreclocks aka CPU-speed instead to rule out trotteling or such. In combination with RiverTuner you can create an overlay including the CPU MHZ Speed for each core or you just doubleclick each core and expand the afterwards popping graphs to maximum size and check them periodically.

 

 

 

[Nord]

1 hour ago, TestoKaiser said:

But also if you look at the performance of the GPU in my Main rig im getting less  than 20% of that in this one 

So pcie definitely cant be the only problem

Well yes and no.

Given as I actually did check the entire review now on that site we pulled the graphs from, I'm almost certain its just the CPU holding you back. Since I've also red up on cutting open ports and fitting bigger cards into them, and they usualy state that they apperantly work w/o issues, so thats most likely not it either. (though personaly I still think its nothing anybody should do :D)

 

Aaaanyway, thinking about the CPU bottleneck a bit, I'm currently writing this from my notebook, which runs a I7 4510U and a GTX850m.

The CPU, a the U allready gives away, is not very strong, it scores around 240 on cinebench, which is almost twice what your current Xeons score. Obviously cinebench is not the whole story, ever, but given that I actually see my CPU bottlenecking the 850M in games like BF3 or AoW III sometimes, (the 850M is I'd say 50% as powerfull as a 660), its would be really odd that a, theroetically, half as strong CPU does not get gimped to hell by a 750 ti. Especially with DDR2.

 

So yea, with lots of research, which turned out to be rather interesting. I end up agreeing with you that the problem most likely will not the PCIE port. Even cut open and 1.1 x8.

Anyway, once you get those other Xeons do some testing and let me know if that fixed it, by now im rather curious aswell

 

[TestoKaiser]

yeah im also pretty sure its the CPUs by now .. also this gives me hope for a comparatively easy fix 

I wasnt really aware they were that low end when i purchased em but on the other hand i got the 2 for only 10 € so not that big of a deal

 

new CPUs should be coming tomorrow 

2x front intake , 1 top exhaust and another CPU fan for my custom cooling solution came today 

i mounted 3 on 2 heatsinks now with one on each end and one inbetween the two heatsinks for double push/pull config 

 

while were at it :

is it actually normal for the memory to go up to 90°C?

i cant imagine it is since my ddr4 hardly ever hits 35°C

i mounted another fan onto the ram which lowered temps to about 45°C (which should be an ok operating temp i guess)

but still this seems weird af to me 

i dont know anything about server parts specifically but i cant imagine its normal for memory to be this hot

 

[TestoKaiser]

k nevermind about the ram 
as i understand it is indeed normal for FB ECC DIMMs to get this hot 

it is supposed to be aircooled apparently 

 

[pochie45566]

are they in?

[TestoKaiser]

ye after some struggle (BIOS Update ftw)

i managed to get the system up and running with the new processors in

will do some testing now and will be back with the results 

[TestoKaiser]

first off i should say i ended up getting e5450 instead of x5460s cause i got a pretty good deal on them and also i was kinda worried about thermals a bit so the lower tdp is an plus. 

so i did another cinebench scoring 645 which is a huge improvement considering they dont have hyperthreading 

also i started up LoL and ... IT WORKS !!

i got 170+ FPS with everything maxed out at 1080p , curiously fps didnt really go up much by lowering settings 

so i assume im still kind of being limited by the CPUs but maybe i can get even better performance once overclocked

 

overall im super happy with the results tho 

very nice rig for about 200€

[TestoKaiser]

so ive been trying to overclock the CPUs but i dont have any options to do so in my bios 

i also cant BSEL mod my CPUs since theyre already at the max supported FSB (1333 MHz) 

im assuming thats also the reason why my system insta crashes when i use setFSB

 

is there any other option ?