It's all about the GPU and a CPU that can provide it. Either or many core Phenom or Sandy Bridge. Sandy Bridge is better in general, but there's nothing specific to mfakt* that any of the old processors has either as an advantage over the others. I'd recommend Sandy Bridge just because for everything it's shown remarkable computing ability. For reference one core of my 2600k is almost capable of keeping pace with a GTX 460 on its own. Not sure how nVidia cards compare though.

Edit: I was in the middle of typing this when my roommates told me I'd been trolled continuously for the past month. Sorry about the cross post.

Edit2: P-1 and LL are always appreciated.

Info and 11.12 drivers
 

Thanks for the inputs, so far. I know I don't have to spend a fortune, and my current system was doing very well. But, since I was thinking of upgrading anyway I figured I would go for a really good one (or so I thought). I had read a lot about the 8 Core AMDs, but I didn't see too much on the new Opterons, so I thought I would give it a shot -- whoops.

For the folks in the top 10, I would be curious to know what hardware you're using for my future upgrade considertions -- thanks.

BDOT - So, I upgraded to the 11.12 drivers a minute ago when I was reinstalling everything. I ran self test for vector sizes 1|2|4|8 and they all passed with the pre-release 2 v.10.

[QUOTE=flashjh;282123]Thanks for the inputs, so far. I know I don't have to spend a fortune, and my current system was doing very well. But, since I was thinking of upgrading anyway I figured I would go for a really good one (or so I thought). I had read a lot about the 8 Core AMDs, but I didn't see too much on the new Opterons, so I thought I would give it a shot -- whoops.

For the folks in the top 10, I would be curious to know what hardware you're using for my future upgrade considertions -- thanks.

BDOT - So, I upgraded to the 11.12 drivers a minute ago when I was reinstalling everything. I ran self test for vector sizes 1|2|4|8 and they all passed with the pre-release 2 v.10.[/QUOTE]

If you goto [URL]http://mersenneforum.org/showthread.php?t=16284[/URL] you can see the CPUs/GPUs I am running (they keep me in the top 5). The 560 is slightly OC (EVGA runs at 1701 MHz vs 1645 for nVidia. Still tinkering with the 2500, so not OC yet.

Nucleon and xyzzy both have 3-4 GPU powerhouses, mostly consisting of GTX 580s. I'm not sure if anybody either in PN top 10 or GPU272 top ten use AMD cards/mfakto... That's a worthwhile question.

Edit: Here's a link to their hardware lists. xyzzy is two posts after nucleon.
[url]http://mersenneforum.org/showthread.php?t=16050#post275729[/url]


Wow. I hit the edit button, and while I was editing the 1 hr limit expired. New post now. Check out the post times.

[QUOTE=Dubslow;282209]Nucleon and xyzzy both have 3-4 GPU powerhouses, mostly consisting of GTX 580s. I'm not sure if anybody either in PN top 10 or GPU272 top ten use AMD cards/mfakto... That's a worthwhile question.[/QUOTE]

I suspect I am the largerst AMD only person on the network (though I would absolutely love to be proved wrong).

I have 2x6970 and 1x5870. I finally got everything running at what I suspect is maximum efficiency (for me) a couple days ago.

btw, props to you on the breadth first thing. You have by far the most factors with much less work.

[QUOTE=flashjh;282123] I had read a lot about the 8 Core AMDs, but I didn't see too much on the new Opterons, so I thought I would give it a shot -- whoops.
[/QUOTE]
Did you try adding more instances? The "8 times slower" is certainly disturbing. I read that the first boards (among them the review ones!) really sucked with bulldozer. In the meantime some do a better job. However, RedHat 6.2 is the only OS so far to really make use of bulldozer. Windows 8 may add that, but it's not sure yet.

Also, I need to get a newer gcc that can issue the right instruction scheduling for bulldozer (would be a special mfakto edition :smile: ).

In other words, the software side may improve the picture quite a bit within the next couple of weeks. But I sincerely doubt it will improve 8 times.

[QUOTE=flashjh;282123]
BDOT - So, I upgraded to the 11.12 drivers a minute ago when I was reinstalling everything. I ran self test for vector sizes 1|2|4|8 and they all passed with the pre-release 2 v.10.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for this test! If you still have mfakto 0.09 around (with the later [URL="http://www.mersenneforum.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=7276&d=1320939297"]kernel[/URL] to fix the mul24/mad24 issues in 11.10), could you give that a try on 11.12 and run a selftest?

[QUOTE=Bdot;282236]Did you try adding more instances? The "8 times slower" is certainly disturbing. I read that the first boards (among them the review ones!) really sucked with bulldozer. In the meantime some do a better job. However, RedHat 6.2 is the only OS so far to really make use of bulldozer. Windows 8 may add that, but it's not sure yet.[/QUOTE]

I did try more instances - up to 8 (four per GPU). I also tried 6 on one GPU. I may not be the expert at maximum throughput, but all combinations were not good. Maybe I'll try a Redhad once I get my new power supply. I don't know much about Linux though... haven't used it in a while.

[QUOTE]
Also, I need to get a newer gcc that can issue the right instruction scheduling for bulldozer (would be a special mfakto edition :smile: ).

In other words, the software side may improve the picture quite a bit within the next couple of weeks. But I sincerely doubt it will improve 8 times.
[/QUOTE]

Do they have a newer compiler for bulldozer?

[QUOTE]Thanks for this test! If you still have mfakto 0.09 around (with the later [URL="http://www.mersenneforum.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=7276&d=1320939297"]kernel[/URL] to fix the mul24/mad24 issues in 11.10), could you give that a try on 11.12 and run a selftest?[/QUOTE]

I wasn't able to get the selt tests to work. I used the .09 mfakto with the kernal from your post to fix the 11.10 problems. Vector size 1 failed immediately. 2|4|8 finished, but they all failed. I emailed you a zip file with the outputs from all four runs so you can see them.


Also, do you have a 32 bit version that works with 11.12? I would like to test by 32 bit machine with 11.12 for throughput.

[QUOTE=KyleAskine;282231]I suspect I am the largerst AMD only person on the network (though I would absolutely love to be proved wrong).

I have 2x6970 and 1x5870. I finally got everything running at what I suspect is maximum efficiency (for me) a couple days ago.[/QUOTE]

I suspect I'm not far behind: 2x6870 and 1x6950 supported by a Phenom II X6 1075T... haven't been running it 24/7 but with winter here, I will likely do so. (I've also got a GTX460/Core i5... but I'm currently doing something else with that)

I've actually found that running 2 clients per card (my most efficient - maximises the 6 CPU cores as well as the GPUs) I appear to be hitting some bandwidth restriction, as feeding all three at the same time is causing a bottleneck somewhere (determined by experimentation of different configurations). I know my PCI slots are all running at x8 speed, but this should still be fast enough.

AMD Bulldozer Update
 

Good reading and hopefully good news for Bulldozer CPUs... now I just need to get my power supply in so I can test everything!

[URL]http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2592546[/URL]