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Opteron vs. EPYC Benchmarks & Performance-Per-Watt: How AMD Server Performance Evolved Over 10 Years

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  • Opteron vs. EPYC Benchmarks & Performance-Per-Watt: How AMD Server Performance Evolved Over 10 Years

    Phoronix: Opteron vs. EPYC Benchmarks & Performance-Per-Watt: How AMD Server Performance Evolved Over 10 Years

    By now you have likely seen our initial AMD EPYC 7601 Linux benchmarks. If you haven't, check them out, EPYC does really deliver on being competitive with current Intel hardware in the highly threaded space. If you have been curious to see some power numbers on EPYC, here they are from the Tyan Transport SX TN70A-B8026 2U server. Making things more interesting are some comparison benchmarks showing how the AMD EPYC performance compares to AMD Opteron processors from about ten years ago.

    Phoronix, Linux Hardware Reviews, Linux hardware benchmarks, Linux server benchmarks, Linux benchmarking, Desktop Linux, Linux performance, Open Source graphics, Linux How To, Ubuntu benchmarks, Ubuntu hardware, Phoronix Test Suite

  • #2
    A bit off topic but any chance of rerunning epyc vs xeon benches with av512 enabled on the xeons?

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    • #3
      I've got an idea: Intel shouldn't release anything new in the server space for 10 years. Then in 2027 we can be all shocked & amazed when their 2027 Xeon parts beat up on their 2017 parts and act like it's a big deal.

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      • #4
        embarrassingly parallel
        You got this one from mozilla's article on Quantum, didn't you Michael ? I don't recall this term being used on phoronix before.
        I am not sure it is a valid use in this case, though. Could someone comment on this? To me, it seems only embarrassing to the dev who has to program it.

        Now, on topic, it's great to see actual figures for these improvements. I will use these to point out that frequency != performance.
        Any word on the price point of the system tested here? Are they comparable?

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        • #5
          Originally posted by M@yeulC View Post

          You got this one from mozilla's article on Quantum, didn't you Michael ? I don't recall this term being used on phoronix before.
          I am not sure it is a valid use in this case, though. Could someone comment on this? To me, it seems only embarrassing to the dev who has to program it.

          Now, on topic, it's great to see actual figures for these improvements. I will use these to point out that frequency != performance.
          Any word on the price point of the system tested here? Are they comparable?
          Originally posted by M@yeulC View Post

          You got this one from mozilla's article on Quantum, didn't you Michael ? I don't recall this term being used on phoronix before.
          I am not sure it is a valid use in this case, though. Could someone comment on this? To me, it seems only embarrassing to the dev who has to program it.

          Now, on topic, it's great to see actual figures for these improvements. I will use these to point out that frequency != performance.
          Any word on the price point of the system tested here? Are they comparable?
          No. It's been used on Phoronix... That "EP.C" in NPB is short for embarrassingly parallel, C data set size.
          Michael Larabel
          https://www.michaellarabel.com/

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          • #6
            I was Waiting for the Article since it was announced .. but hell ? Why only 2 2300 Series CPU no 6100/6200/6300 ? I like most of the article but this one is nearly useless with the current count of CPU. IMHO thats not a evolving thats only how the performance was 10 years ago and now ... a real performance evolving article is like this one: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pa...ronix-13&num=1 or this one: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pa...ry-power&num=1 there we could see the evolving betwween the generations.

            Greeting

            Comment


            • #7
              Originally posted by Ground0 View Post
              I was Waiting for the Article since it was announced .. but hell ? Why only 2 2300 Series CPU no 6100/6200/6300 ? I like most of the article but this one is nearly useless with the current count of CPU. IMHO thats not a evolving thats only how the performance was 10 years ago and now ... a real performance evolving article is like this one: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pa...ronix-13&num=1 or this one: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pa...ry-power&num=1 there we could see the evolving betwween the generations.

              Greeting
              Because the 2300 is the only opterons I had, as I believe I said in the article. Obviously if I had some 6000 series Opterons, I would have included them but unfortunately I don't have any and never did.
              Michael Larabel
              https://www.michaellarabel.com/

              Comment


              • #8
                This is quite interesting to see.

                What strikes me the most is the evidence that single-threaded performance is not scaling as fast as it used to a decade ago. The only benchmark that explored single threaded performance saw the new Epyc roughly 2x as fast as the old Opteron. The frequency is about the same 10 years ago and now, but the memory bandwidth and latency was vastly inferior. Yet, 10 years later, the shiny new processor on a single threaded basis and with much better interconnects is only 2x the speed.

                Not being able to increase single threaded performance faster than the competition means Intel need an edge on process technology (manufacturing technology) more than it ever did. The problem is, Intel just lost its edge on manufacturing (to TSMC, with Samsung and GlobalFoundries not too far behind).

                So Intel is no longer the leader in process technology and its single threaded performance is not advancing as fast as it used to giving its competitors (Ryzen, Power 9, ARM) ample time to catch up. And Ryzen proved they mostly did.

                Intel now is increasing single-threaded performance on specific applications by deploying accelerators to its many SKUs. AVX-512 is one of them, but there is also QuickAssist in its many versions. AMD is not as rich as Intel and cannot have an SKU portfolio as wide, so it is focusing on cheaper packaging and is keeping their processors free of these new adons (although they already have many). x86 CPUs are general purpose processors afterall, there is a point in not adding bulk to it in the form of accelerators and instead let other system components do that (GPUs, NICs, etc).

                Very interesting times ahead. I believe AMD has a solid business model, and the news out there is that Ryzen 2 already taped out at GloFo 7nm, so the war is just starting.

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                • #9
                  Holy crap I didn't know Opterons sucked that hard. No wonder AMD wasn't making any money at all.

                  mbello Intel only lost that leadership on paper, their silicon still packs more transistors per sq mm than others'. But their leadership has eroded over time and yes, single threaded performance doesn't see as much improvement as it once did. Then again, x86 and x86_64 have been set in stone for decades, there's a limit of how much can be squeezed from any given architecture.

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                  • #10
                    Let's add some cringeworthy post, now that's an EPYC improvement .

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