THE beast 32 core HACKINTOSH is ready.....CS6 vs REDROCKET

[luigivaltulini]

the beast has been tamed ...
many hours and much suffering, it works now.
sandy SUPERMICRO mainboard X9DRi-LN4F+ with e2690 dual cpu xeon....

osx 10.7.3, 11.3.0 kernel with support for ivy bridge,
32 cores with steep speed enabled.
Support for 4 gpu tested. for now in testing fx1800 and 9800gx.
support should take 2 gtx 590. In the coming days we will test
4 port lan enabled.


Joe Safai is doing some testing over the next few days will keep you updated.
If anyone is interested in some tests with R3D files happy to oblige.

CS6 5k for now all in real time full frame at full resolution ..... without redrocket.
Geekbech above 30000 points.


Thanks to Joe for your patience.

[Kenny Mosher]

WHOAH! Can I buy one:)

[Joseph S.]

Luigi is very smart with this stuff. He worked hard on this for a long time.

The 5K playback has no issues with Windows 7, but a bit choppy in the OS X version. The 5 minute scene is a little weird in full res, but the 30 second scene is smooth. Gotta find out why.

1/2 res is smooth as silk.

I'll mess around a bit more to see. But all 32 threads do peak at max when playing back, so it seems to be working properly.

Joe

[raufzaza]

Luigi PM me the price of this beast, please.

[Jeff Kilgroe]

This configuration screams! I haven't attempted to Hackintosh mine, I don't see a need. Will have CS6 on it tomorrow or tuesday. :)

These systems are *finally* starting to show themselves in mainstream channels. Only a matter of time before everyone starts building them to tear through R3D files like they were nothing. I would like to say that the RED Rocket has been made obsolete... And these systems really don't NEED it. However, if you throw a Rocket in there, it only makes things go faster! hahahaaa....

[Joseph S.]

Jeff, so you built the X9DAi with the 3.1GHz CPU's right? Are you going straight OS X or Windows first? It would be cool to see your Geekbench 64-bit scores.

This OS X still doesn't do turbo properly, but it does hyper-threading properly.


As a sample encode, I did this:

4 min 23 sec clip, 5K WS, RC 5:1. 1/2 res playback is fine, but full res is choppy. I have to find out why because in windows it was fine in full res.

I exported to prores 4444, 1920x1080, render at maximum depth, and it took 12 minutes. If that's how long it takes on the latest actual 12 core MacPro then it's not that exciting.

Hopefully someone can chime in here with some sample encode times. (this is all without any effects, until I get some reasonable GPU's).

And I'm downloading the 1.1 version of CS6 that just came out a few minutes ago.

[Subhadip Sen]

Great, more benchmarks!

The 5K playback has no issues with Windows 7, but a bit choppy in the OS X version. The 5 minute scene is a little weird in full res, but the 30 second scene is smooth. Gotta find out why.

David has mentioned in the past that the Windows version is a bit faster than the OS X version, due to "OS limitations". I have seen the same results while testing thru Bootcamp - the Windows version works faster on the same system. It is normal. It has probably got to do with the much advanced state of graphics drivers and CPU scheduler on Windows. That said, the difference is not massive, usually about ~10% for encode times, so perhaps there's some other issue, after all you are running a Hackintosh.

[Joseph S.]

Hi Subhadip, right, it is a hackintosh. Nobody knows how the chipset is functioning with the kernel. But in this instance, I have done two identical tests, one WITH turbo boost and one without. The benchmark results are equal. See pics below. I think the main issue is this, because in Windows 7 it boosts all the way 3800MHz (3.8GHz), mostly peaking to 3500MHz consistently. I've done the same tests with 3 Linux flavors, including the 3.2 kernel, still NO boost. Maybe a fresh kernel needs to be compiled with all those options (not by me).

Only in Windows was there any turbo boost whatsoever. Multiply that by 16 cores and it makes quite a difference. Difference seems to be around 25%.

Turbo enabled:


Turbo Disabled:

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Jeff, so you built the X9DAi with the 3.1GHz CPU's right? Are you going straight OS X or Windows first? It would be cool to see your Geekbench 64-bit scores.

Yes. SuperMicro X9DAi with dual 2687W (3.1GHz) CPUs. 64GB RAM for the moment. All Windows... No real interest in making a hackintosh out of it. I've done enough of that in the past and it really doesn't pay off. There's always little issues and the continuous chance that the next OS or video card driver update or some other change is going to throw a wrench into your well-running hackinmac. There is actually better Sandy Bridge /C6xx chipset support within the latest OSX 10.8 beta seeds, but it's still incomplete. And until Apple lifts the 96GB limit in OSX, I'm kinda not that into it on these new boxes. ...Unless there's something I don't know and you're actually able to access 128GB or more RAM. One thing I've already determined with the system I have running here is that 64GB is not enough! With 64bit apps that can actually schedule well enough to occupy 32 threads, I'm seeing instances where I can run short on RAM and slow my system! I'm glad I have more coming so I can build this system out with 128GB and get the other system up and running with the same.

HP also shipped my Z820 today -- finally! I guess it really ships tomorrow (monday) because I have a tracking number that FedEx doesn't recognize yet. I'll have more info on that as I get it and set it up. Lots of people are asking about it since it's the most mainstream option at the moment for the new dual Xeons. Unfortunately, it's coming with 64GB as well. Will have to get more for that system too...

And I'm downloading the 1.1 version of CS6 that just came out a few minutes ago.

I'm looking at it right now, might download it too as this is probably the "launch" version for tomorrow.

[Joseph S.]

Jeff, I got up to 192GB "visible" in OS X, but I think only 96GB is usable as you are saying.

COOL that you're getting the HP so soon, lucky. I'm kinda over this hackintosh too. I'm considering just buying the Windows version of CS6. It's faster and utilizes all the RAM and other hardware benefits. I'm not a professional in the film arena anyway, so I don't have to do prores or anything else that requires mac. Just messing around mostly.

Also, you need more than 64GB RAM? I got CS6 to hit 86GB during a render. So it does go beyond 64GB, but only in windows. OS X version didn't use much RAM.

All this stuff is what it is, a hack. The things that are designed for the proper hardware seem to work as they should.

I need a vacation. I'm so sick of computers as of 2 minutes ago.