[gmx-users] benchmark: buying a new cluster

[Yang Ye]

There two CPUs differing not only in frequency but also in FSB speed. 
But the differences in FSB shall be ignorable for Gromacs.

You have two dimensions to think.
1. power of all nodes = number of cores * frequency
2. power of a single node.

If you intend to have one simulation running just on one node, more 
cores are better. This happens to be my case.
If 32-core or more parallel running is planned, 2.8GHz helps.

Regards,
Yang Ye

andrea spitaleri wrote:
> Hi all,
> we are going to buy a new cluster and we are in doubt about the frequency to consider.
> Basically, we have the possibility to buy either 18 nodes dual quad-core (18x8 cores) bearing
> Intel-Xeon E5430 2.66 MHz and FSB 1333 MHz or 15 nodes dual quad-core (15x8 cores) bearing
> Intel-Xeon E5462 2.8 MHz and FSB 1600 MHz. The latest seems to be **only** 10% faster then the first.
> However, thinking to the new gromacs4, we are in doubt about the best solution. Is it better to have
> a **nominal** 10% cpu faster or to have 24 further cores?
>
> Thanks in advance for any welcome suggestion,
>
> Regards
>
> andrea
>
>
>