General Intel HEDT Xeon/i7 Discussion

[Zando_]

Just now, GrockleTD said:

Yes... I used those... definitely somewhere probably

So long as the side panel fits on it's all good
 

I have to brute force mine on:

Got it as clean as I could before I said fuck it and just closed the thing up. Could reroute some stuff but that'll wait on the potential GPU upgrade. 

As for my other rigs, the good ones are usually just bunching everything together and zip tying it as flat to the case as possible:

 

 

[GrockleTD]

3 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

So long as the side panel fits on it's all good

Well, if I were using a normal case it’d be different. But the O11 dynamic imo is actually kind of hard to route cables cleanly in, because it’s a big empty space. Also making things difficult is the SSD mounting location. (Similar issue to side intake fans for GPUs, have to be careful when removing the mounting bar, with the added concern of SATA connector frailty)

[Zando_]

1 minute ago, GrockleTD said:

because it’s a big empty space.

Not if you use it for its intended purpose...

[GrockleTD]

Just now, Zando Bob said:

Not if you use it for its intended purpose...

UwU? and it has been a while since I spent much time on cable management (to scared to break my SSD, I loathe that mounting location) but as I remember it, there isn’t really any good place to tie down to

[Zando_]

3 minutes ago, GrockleTD said:

UwU? and it has been a while since I spent much time on cable management (to scared to break my SSD, I loathe that mounting location) but as I remember it, there isn’t really any good place to tie down to

Ooof. I haven't built in one, but @Den-Fi managed to do an okay job:

Tho yeah it doesn't look like super tight cable management is a strong feature of this case. Its a funkier formfactor built more around radiator capacity in a smaller space than some of the beefy full towers. 

[GrockleTD]

9 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

Tho yeah it doesn't look like super tight cable management is a strong feature of this case. Its a funkier formfactor built more around radiator capacity in a smaller space than some of the beefy full towers. 

Oof, I sometimes hate looking at his build, makes mine feel like a cheap Chinese knockoff. But fortunately for his build, he had the budget to not use any 2.5” drives

[Zando_]

1 minute ago, GrockleTD said:

Oof, I sometimes hate looking at his build, makes mine feel like a cheap Chinese knockoff. But fortunately for his build, he had the budget to not use any 2.5” drives

Yeee, I noted that. Lack of SATA cables certainly makes it easier in a chassis like that. Really depends on mount placement and such, many other cases are fine. Maybe it was an afterthought on this chassis? 

[GrockleTD]

3 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

Yeee, I noted that. Lack of SATA cables certainly makes it easier in a chassis like that. Really depends on mount placement and such, many other cases are fine. Maybe it was an afterthought on this chassis? 

Possible

[GrockleTD]

28 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

Yeee, I noted that. Lack of SATA cables certainly makes it easier in a chassis like that. Really depends on mount placement and such, many other cases are fine. Maybe it was an afterthought on this chassis? 

 About 8:50. Just thought about putting SSD in the drive cage instead

[Zando_]

1 minute ago, GrockleTD said:

-snip-

bout 8:50. Just thought about putting SSD in the drive cage instead

Eeeeesh yeah that looks really poorly done. 

time to get a full tower

[the pudding]

6 minutes ago, GrockleTD said:

 About 8:50. Just thought about putting SSD in the drive cage instead

to be fair when I had my O11D i just had my SSDs hanging on their cables, that was fine but then i couldn't run the drive bar thing due to my psu anyways, being a 1600 G2

 

here's a pic of that system for tax: 

[GrockleTD]

@Zando Bob i think im just going to cut the fan and RGB headers off the pump block, they are unnecessary and are making cable management harder

[Zando_]

9 minutes ago, GrockleTD said:

@Zando Bob i think im just going to cut the fan and RGB headers off the pump block, they are unnecessary and are making cable management harder

I would not advise that. Voids your warranty, so if you do have a (not at all uncommon) pump or other failure you're fucked and need a whole new cooler. Just route them alongside stuff like so:

[Crunchy Dragon]

3 hours ago, Zando Bob said:

Of needing one? 

Of getting one over a 1660Ti

[Zando_]

5 minutes ago, Crunchy Dragon said:

Of getting one over a 1660Ti

Well 1) no real difference, the 1660 Ti is about as fast at a lower power consumption. And 2) If it does ship and is legit, I have a Sapphire Vega 56 Nitro+ Limited Edition on the way, which when redlined uh... the 1070 won't compete at all, maxed out V56s compete with a 1080/RTX 2070. 

[bimmerman]

Been researching SAS/HBA and USB controller cards for the SR-2. Still not sure how I'll solve the single slot GPU issue, but am thinking I'll try Unraid first for an OS-- would prefer to use Linux-ish with training wheels over jumping in the deep end with other VM hypervisor solutions. If it's happy with the SR2, then full steam ahead!

[Zando_]

3 minutes ago, bimmerman said:

Still not sure how I'll solve the single slot GPU issue

AMD's workstation lineup has single slot cards, they're based off polaris usually, and perform about the same as the RX cards with the same CU/VRAM numbers. Also support some virtualization stuff IIRC, @Windows7ge would know that better than I though. 

Or you grab riser cables and turn your rig into an almost-octopus

[bimmerman]

10 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

AMD's workstation lineup has single slot cards, they're based off polaris usually, and perform about the same as the RX cards with the same CU/VRAM numbers. Also support some virtualization stuff IIRC, @Windows7ge would know that better than I though. 

Or you grab riser cables and turn your rig into an almost-octopus

Pretty much haha.

 

If I go WC, the build gets absurdly expensive-- single slot water cards that are still supported with blocks are....uncommon and/or pricey. Upside, can still use the 900D. Downside....4x 1080ti is just unnecessarily expensive. Cool, but makes zero sense.

 

If I stay air cooled, either I find TheRightCard.jpg or go risers for bitcoin miner cosplay. Then need some 80/20 or to buy an expensive miner case.

 

or, don't use the SR2 but that's lame.

[Zando_]

1 minute ago, bimmerman said:

Pretty much haha.

 

If I go WC, the build gets absurdly expensive-- single slot water cards that are still supported with blocks are....uncommon and/or pricey. Upside, can still use the 900D. Downside....4x 1080ti is just unnecessarily expensive. Cool, but makes zero sense.

 

If I stay air cooled, either I find TheRightCard.jpg or go risers for bitcoin miner cosplay. Then need some 80/20 or to buy an expensive miner case.

 

or, don't use the SR2 but that's lame.

 miner cosplay also ruins the aesthetics unless you put in even more work and get proper length risers and everything. And you can't use an SR-2 and not make it look nice... 

What all do you need the GPUs to be doing? The workstation cards that support virtualization stuff can be used across multiple VMs I think, if they just need GPU acceleration. If it's gaming and such then you'd need a beefier card, but only for the VMs that are doing that. 

[bimmerman]

15 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

 miner cosplay also ruins the aesthetics unless you put in even more work and get proper length risers and everything. And you can't use an SR-2 and not make it look nice... 

What all do you need the GPUs to be doing? The workstation cards that support virtualization stuff can be used across multiple VMs I think, if they just need GPU acceleration. If it's gaming and such then you'd need a beefier card, but only for the VMs that are doing that. 

Yea, gaming.

 

Plan is to have it be a simultaneous-use 4 gamer rig for LANs with friends. Plan is to have 4x VMs, each with a gaming GPU, 6 HT threads, and 10-12gb ram depending on how much needs to be reserved for hypervisor. Not looking to 144hz all the Ultras, just play games.

 

But....to make that work there are some considerations.

1. First is that the SR-2, and all X58/5520 to a lesser extent, can easily bottleneck storage through the chipset. The chipset link is O(PCIe 2.0 x4) with the equivalent of a single x1 link for both SATA 3 ports-- easy to bottleneck by hammering >1 devices (i.e., 4x 2.5" SSDs). Using an HBA to get around the I/O bottleneck is the easy button, but takes a PCIe slot. Will this matter, I don't really know. Low down the priority list.
2. Second is that each VM ideally needs its own USB controller, and the SR-2 has very very few USB ports available, and I don't know whether they have different controllers either. Add in cards with 4x ports, each of which has its own controller, are the easy button for the VM passthrough (since you can then plug in a basic hub to those and be golden for keyboard/mouse)....but again, takes a PCIe card. Alternative solution is that you have different mice and keyboards plugged into and passed through to each VM, but keeping track of that is going to be a royal pain in the genitals. This is the highest priority of the bunch.
3. Issue the 3rd is the SR-2 doesn't do a great job with PCIe in the first place, using NF200 multiplexers instead of taking each CPU's PCIe and allocating slots by CPU. Upside is you only need one CPU to run all 7 slots, downside is the NF200s are allegedly horribad with virtualization, or at least were when the board was new. This is priority YOLO

When not-gaming though, plan is to use it for AI ML/DL work. Having relatively new CUDA cards for the single-slot solution is a major plus, but I have another rig for that right now so am more concerned with any GPU solution that isn't $$$$$$$. X58 era stuff lacking AVX is kinda a shit sandwich for that work anyway.

[GrockleTD]

1 hour ago, Zando Bob said:

I would not advise that. Voids your warranty, so if you do have a (not at all uncommon) pump or other failure you're fucked and need a whole new cooler. Just route them alongside stuff like so:

warranties are gay anyways

[Windows7ge]

47 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

AMD's workstation lineup has single slot cards, they're based off polaris usually, and perform about the same as the RX cards with the same CU/VRAM numbers. Also support some virtualization stuff IIRC, @Windows7ge would know that better than I though. 

Or you grab riser cables and turn your rig into an almost-octopus

Yeah I tried helping him with that. I still suggest BTC miner chassis with PCI_e riser cards. That'll give him every slot on the board.

[Zando_]

12 minutes ago, GrockleTD said:

-snip-

warranties are gay anyways

Eeeeeeeeeeeeehhhh if you don't have the disposable income to just laugh off a $100+ cooler then mebbe embracing the gay is a good idea. I'd argue it always is

 

If you're confident the pump and coolant will not fail/clog in the timespan of whatever remaining warranty you have, then go yeehaw on it. 

[GrockleTD]

4 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

Eeeeeeeeeeeeehhhh if you don't have the disposable income to just laugh off a $100+ cooler then mebbe embracing the gay is a good idea. I'd argue it always is

 

If you're confident the pump and coolant will not fail/clog in the timespan of whatever remaining warranty you have, then go yeehaw on it. 

 

 

 

i almost didn't do it, then i decided that it was a fairly minor modification for IMO getting rid of a big pointless pain in the neck and also eyesore

[Zando_]

Just now, GrockleTD said:

i almost didn't do it, then i decided that it was a fairly minor modification for IMO getting a big pointless pain in the neck and also eyesore

oof. You did just chop 'em off? What cables exactly did you remove? They're usually not hard to just route along the RAM or something, if you have a black/grey board they're not visible unless you look for them. Hell they aren't an eyesore on white mobos either, Corsair's own page has that cooler on a white MSI board:

 

They did the between the RAM/VRM heatsink thing too.