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WiseDraco 01-19-2013 10:48 AM

videocard with low power consumption for server
 
Hello!
I preparing to swap my old home - server ( runs under slack, act as web \ mail \ ftp \ etc server for my own and family needs, hardware is Dell Optiplex 150 - pentium 3 - 800 mhz / 512 ram, onboard intel video) with newer one - i bought for that Asus P5B motherboard with core2due e4400 procesor ( P965 chipset). but this motherboard do not have integrated videocard, it have a 3 pci slots, one pci-express, and come with MSI r4350 (ATI chipset) based 512 mb video. as i research over net, it is very good energy efficient modern videocard - with approx 17 watts consumption under load. Also it have a relatively large radiator, without fan ( passive cooling), and in slackware 14 installation process videocard radiator becomes hor ( approx 55 - 59 degree of celsius, without any heavy graphic - in text mode only!), and that i do not like - it means a build up hot in case, and also sign a consume lot of power. I also find in my garbage a old PCI videocard like as S3 trio 64, S3 Virge, and Trident TGUI9440-3 - it has really old, from Pentium I times.
I think, it has consume a lot less energy, than any modern videocard ( and in server i actually not need powerful video - in another hand - it runs 24 \ 7 \ 365, as so every consumed watt significantly change bills for electricity in year ).
Only question - all old pci - videocards is fully compatible with never PCI standart ( PCI 2.2 ?) in modern motherboard? maybe any try of use old pci video in modern motherboard?

serafean 01-19-2013 03:25 PM

Quote:

Only question - all old pci - videocards is fully compatible with never PCI standart ( PCI 2.2 ?) in modern motherboard? maybe any try of use old pci video in modern motherboard?
Yes, PCI is backward compatible.

As for the power consumption, I'm assuming you're using the opensource radeon driver, then by default the card is in its highest power state. OSS radeon power management is profile based, and requires manual intervention :
Code:

echo low > /sys/class/drm/card0/device/power_profile
This has to be run at every start up, so adding it into an init script might be a good idea. Try that before going PCI :)

Serafean

whizje 01-19-2013 04:53 PM

If it is a really old card it could lower the pci bus frequency that's not so bad if there are no other devices that are influenced. I suggest you don't use a video card and manage your server remote over the network with ssh or if you prefer xdmcp or vnc.

cascade9 01-20-2013 12:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4873545)
in slackware 14 installation process videocard radiator becomes hor ( approx 55 - 59 degree of celsius, without any heavy graphic - in text mode only!), and that i do not like - it means a build up hot in case, and also sign a consume lot of power.

'Heatsink' not 'radiator'. Just because the heatsink is hot doesnt mean that you are consuming a lot of power (and vice versa).

The old 4350 should be using somewhere around 5-7 watts or less at idle (provided that you are using the right drivers and/or driver setup). That is very low power consumption. It would be possible to install a newer card (e.g. AMD 6450/7450) with slighly lower power consumption, but it wouldnt be worth it IMO.

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4873545)
I also find in my garbage a old PCI videocard like as S3 trio 64, S3 Virge, and Trident TGUI9440-3 - it has really old, from Pentium I times.

I would not assume that just becausde they are older, those video cards they will have lower power consumption. IIRC the S3 virges used about 5 watts at idle.

If you did change over to some ancient PCI video card you will probably have limited resolution and bitdepth as well, due to limited RAM on the old video cards. If you really want to run at 1024x768 @ 256bit colour on the chance that some video card from the dawn of time will use less power, go ahead. But IMO whizje is right, just manage your server over a network and use it headless.

WiseDraco 01-20-2013 02:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cascade9 (Post 4873891)
'Heatsink' not 'radiator'. Just because the heatsink is hot doesnt mean that you are consuming a lot of power (and vice versa).

very interesting idea. then from where come power for get heatsink hot? Heatsinks and radiators is used for dissipate excess power, consumed by device. If higher is device performance index, then less is percentage of consumed energy, to go to heat. In one tech-process and technology level chips, i think, performance index is very similar, as so large heatsink temperature may work good for evaluation of devices power consumption. Sorry for my bad english, my latvian and russian is far better ;)

Quote:

The old 4350 should be using somewhere around 5-7 watts or less at idle (provided that you are using the right drivers and/or driver setup). That is very low power consumption. It would be possible to install a newer card (e.g. AMD 6450/7450) with slighly lower power consumption, but it wouldnt be worth it IMO.



I would not assume that just becausde they are older, those video cards they will have lower power consumption. IIRC the S3 virges used about 5 watts at idle.
S3 virge have a relatively small videochip without radiators \ heatsinks \ coolers etc, and when work, it not very hot. 4350, as you say, too eat 5-7 watts, but have a large heatsink who become hot. As conclusion, old virge is very more energy efficient card? :D or you do not understand, who you say...;)

Quote:

If you did change over to some ancient PCI video card you will probably have limited resolution and bitdepth as well, due to limited RAM on the old video cards. If you really want to run at 1024x768 @ 256bit colour on the chance that some video card from the dawn of time will use less power, go ahead. But IMO whizje is right, just manage your server over a network and use it headless.
it is linux slackware server. it always work in textmode, not in 1024 [ 768, and even not 800x600, as so i cannot understand, about who you speak. Maybe you is "GUI" era children, who cannot imagine work on CLI? :)

2whizje: yes, it is possible way, but i dont want run server without videocard at all. Sometimes has situations, when need or it be more comfortable work direct with server, without ssh / telnet / etc. as so i want a videocard for my new server :)

Serafean: i dont think a slackware kernel at install stage automatically load right driver for radeon card, i think is more piossible, it works with universal fbdev devise or so on, but i check for this and try your command, when bought case, hdd, and get cooler for processor, who now is in messuage.
I have a etech PM300 watt-meter, and then i try to measure computer consumption with variuous PSU, various videocards, and 1 - 3 hdd drives, for get a valuable info about power consumptions. setup who i use now ( dell optiplex GX150 with Pentium III - 866 MHz, 512 mb ram, two additional pci NIC, and two HDD) is in range of 48 - 52 watts according PM300 meter.it do approx 36 kWh in month, as so i want server with no more than 70 - 75 watts consumption, better if less...;)

cascade9 01-23-2013 09:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4873930)
very interesting idea. then from where come power for get heatsink hot? Heatsinks and radiators is used for dissipate excess power, consumed by device. If higher is device performance index, then less is percentage of consumed energy, to go to heat. In one tech-process and technology level chips, i think, performance index is very similar, as so large heatsink temperature may work good for evaluation of devices power consumption. Sorry for my bad english, my latvian and russian is far better ;)

S3 virge have a relatively small videochip without radiators \ heatsinks \ coolers etc, and when work, it not very hot. 4350, as you say, too eat 5-7 watts, but have a large heatsink who become hot. As conclusion, old virge is very more energy efficient card? :D or you do not understand, who you say...;)

Have you even tried instaling the closed drivers, or what serafean linked you too?

If you havent got power managment going, your card _will_ be consuming more power and producing more heat than it would otherwise.

S3 virges can get hot.....

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4873930)
it is linux slackware server. it always work in textmode, not in 1024 [ 768, and even not 800x600, as so i cannot understand, about who you speak. Maybe you is "GUI" era children, who cannot imagine work on CLI? :)

:rolleyes:

WiseDraco 02-03-2013 09:52 AM

today i got a 109X9212PT0H536 heatsink for s775, and found over net, it is a P4 heatsink :-O
actually, it has smaller contact place diameter, than other my intel boxed heatsink, but it smaller power consumption too - 0.28A vs 0.6A ( writed on cooler), as so i try use that first one, and place my eye on CPU temperature.

today i test some videocards - two PCI-express, and three old PCI.
measurement device is ETECH PM300 energy meter.
voltage is around 215V, Amperage vary - measure it and write down.

hardware is sweex 350w PSU, asus p5b mother,intel core 2 duo e4400 processor with intel box 109X9212PT0H536 cooler, 4 x 1 Gb RAM, 7200 rpm SATA II WD 80 Gb and Samsung 250 Gb, two additional ethernet cards - realtek 8139d and 3com 3c905cx-tx-b

PCI- Express video:

MSI r4350 (ATI chipset) based 512 mb video with passive heatsink: 0.56A at LiLo prompt
0.48A at login prompt
and 0.46A after echo low > /sys/class/drm/card0/device/power_profile

Nvidia EN9400GT 512 Mb with active cooling: 0.48A at login prompt

PCI videocards:

Trident TGUI9440-3, 512 kb RAM? : 0.49A at LiLo prompt, 0.40A at login prompt

S3Virge 86c325 - no picture, possible a damaged videocard ?

S3Trio 64v2/DX 1 Mb RAM, 86c775: 0.48A at LiLo, 0.40A at login

TSeng ET4000, w32p-pci-d2-1m : 0.49A at Lilo, 0.41A at login.


looks like, old PCI card consume a ( 215 x.40 = 86w vs 215x0.46 = 98.9w) ~12 watts less than my radeon even in low consumption mode. i think, it is a quite large amount. try to get more old PCI cards and test too.

TobiSGD 02-03-2013 06:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4883609)
today i got a 109X9212PT0H536 heatsink for s775, and found over net, it is a P4 heatsink :-O
actually, it has smaller contact place diameter, than other my intel boxed heatsink, but it smaller power consumption too - 0.28A vs 0.6A ( writed on cooler), as so i try use that first one, and place my eye on CPU temperature.

today i test some videocards - two PCI-express, and three old PCI.
measurement device is ETECH PM300 energy meter.
voltage is around 215V, Amperage vary - measure it and write down.

hardware is sweex 350w PSU, asus p5b mother,intel core 2 duo e4400 processor with intel box 109X9212PT0H536 cooler, 4 x 1 Gb RAM, 7200 rpm SATA II WD 80 Gb and Samsung 250 Gb, two additional ethernet cards - realtek 8139d and 3com 3c905cx-tx-b

PCI- Express video:

MSI r4350 (ATI chipset) based 512 mb video with passive heatsink: 0.56A at LiLo prompt
0.48A at login prompt
and 0.46A after echo low > /sys/class/drm/card0/device/power_profile

Nvidia EN9400GT 512 Mb with active cooling: 0.48A at login prompt

PCI videocards:

Trident TGUI9440-3, 512 kb RAM? : 0.49A at LiLo prompt, 0.40A at login prompt

S3Virge 86c325 - no picture, possible a damaged videocard ?

S3Trio 64v2/DX 1 Mb RAM, 86c775: 0.48A at LiLo, 0.40A at login

TSeng ET4000, w32p-pci-d2-1m : 0.49A at Lilo, 0.41A at login.


looks like, old PCI card consume a ( 215 x.40 = 86w vs 215x0.46 = 98.9w) ~12 watts less than my radeon even in low consumption mode. i think, it is a quite large amount. try to get more old PCI cards and test too.

Do you use the proprietary or the open source driver for the AMD card? If it is the open source one, did you manually enable the low power profile or did you use the default (high power) setting?

WiseDraco 02-04-2013 01:35 AM

MSI r4350 (ATI chipset) based 512 mb video with passive heatsink: 0.56A at LiLo prompt
0.48A at login prompt
and

0.46A after echo low> /sys/class/drm/card0/device/power_profile

system give "radeon" driver ( module) for them out of the box. as i understand, that fact, as system power consumption drop 0.02A and card temperature too drops ( via sensors command) after echo low > command, i think, driver is ok, and switch card to low consumption mode.

TobiSGD 02-04-2013 05:26 AM

I asked just because I was a bit confused by your findings. According to AMD this card has a maximum power consumption under full load of 20W. Idle consumption should be far lower (I would estimate around 5-8W), so a drop of 12W when using a different card seems a bit high to me considering this data.

But anyways, since you aim at minimum power consumption, do you have more data on the PSU? I couldn't find something (besides some pictures) on the web. Is this PSU 80+ certified?

WiseDraco 02-04-2013 05:45 AM

http://www.sweex.com/en/assortiment/...upplies/ps020/

looks like that, but exactly i can write in evening, when i arrive to home.

previously this PSU serves my home desktop computer ( intel dg965ss mb and e4500 c2d 2.2 ghz cpu, and some another stuff), and then i purchase a 450 or 500 watt chieftec A80+ PSU ( also can write exactly in evening).
when i swap that PSU, i too try to view to consumption via powermeter, and be a surprise - this A80 psu consume a more power - around a 95 - 100 watt versus 78w or something like.


i think, it is because a powerful PSU on small demand cannot maintain good efficiency - like a large diesel truck with no trailer consumes lot of fuel to move herself ( a few tonns ), but when it pull trailer, then fuel consumption to move 1 tonn goods is very good - a lot better than light \ passenger vehicles...

Yes, "smaller" PSU is Sweex BA000040 350w, and larger one is Chieftec CTG-500-80P, 500w.

today try another 4 pci cards (ATI-264VT2 (mach64), ATI 3D Rage2-DVD with 2 Mb FP EDO, ATI 264vt with 512 kb and 1 Mb videoram - results after boot, at login screen again be 0.41 - 0.42 A ( 0.42 is 3D Rage 2).

about "According to AMD this card has a maximum power consumption under full load of 20W. Idle consumption should be far lower (I would estimate around 5-8W), so a drop of 12W when using a different card seems a bit high to me considering this data. "

i dont know, who amd says , but even in "low consumption" mode cards big heatsink is hot. and hot that big piece of metal requires a lot of energy.

WiseDraco 02-05-2013 02:17 PM

http://www.hardware.fr/articles/781-...mation-2d.html

according to that, r4350 in 2d eats approx 8 watts. dont know, what is measuring procedure, and how correct this is, but in my opinion, it is not sufficient power for warm up big heatsink to about 65 celsius. tommorow try again set up r4350 and write down temperature after 10 minutes after login in slack cli on default mode, and in low consume mode...

jlinkels 02-05-2013 05:20 PM

If power dissipation is that all important for you, I think you don't have selected the right mainboard.

I run my home server on an Atom mainboard with integrated Intel VGA. Total power dissipation under 20 Watts. You'd better put the powerful mainboard in a client.

jlinkels

WiseDraco 02-06-2013 01:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlinkels (Post 4885083)
If power dissipation is that all important for you, I think you don't have selected the right mainboard.

I run my home server on an Atom mainboard with integrated Intel VGA. Total power dissipation under 20 Watts. You'd better put the powerful mainboard in a client.

jlinkels

i want optimal value of power consumption \ performance. i purchase atom 1.6 ( asus eeeoc 1000h) for my wife years ago. yes, it is energy friendly and not comes hot, but its performance is similar to my eeepc 900 with 900 mhz celeron. my set for server with core 2 duo 2 ghz e4400 outperforms any atom-based solution in many times, i think. i want to go with that hardware another 6 - 10 years.

jlinkels 02-06-2013 06:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4885295)
i want optimal value of power consumption \ performance. i purchase atom 1.6 ( asus eeeoc 1000h) for my wife years ago. yes, it is energy friendly and not comes hot, but its performance is similar to my eeepc 900 with 900 mhz celeron. my set for server with core 2 duo 2 ghz e4400 outperforms any atom-based solution in many times, i think. i want to go with that hardware another 6 - 10 years.

That is of course a valid reason to choose or not for an Atom based server. However, since you want to use your server primarily headless and only in case of problems connect a monitor, I can confirm that the power of an Atom for a home server is more than adequate. Even for the next 10 years I foresee to remain that low in processing power. As you undoubtedly know, Linux does not get more and more bloated if used without X.

The only disadvantage I see with my own server is that I cannot host Virtual Machines. That is beyond the capabilities. For the few virtual machines that I have I either host them in the cloud, or on a super power hungry AMD multicore something which I only switch on for a few hours per week.

jlinkels

WiseDraco 02-06-2013 08:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlinkels (Post 4885430)
I can confirm that the power of an Atom for a home server is more than adequate. Even for the next 10 years I foresee to remain that low in processing power. As you undoubtedly know, Linux does not get more and more bloated if used without X.

you simply do not know my situation. really, my "old server", who work now - pentium 3 - 866 mhz ( i think, in real performance it was close 1.6 ghz atom's)
is sometimes small too short for me. as time goeas, it get more and more worse. spam filtering is cpu eating task, as so as web servers on joomla and so on. in another case i not struggling, and live with my old server. a time ago i thinking to replace it with hardware who consumes less power - like as atom, itx all-in-one boards, etc. i even purchase gigabyte GA-6VLE thin client with C3-800 procesor and see, what we have with that solution, and in final i come to think, a old core 2 duo solution is best for me. then i have minimize its power consumption as far, as it acceptable for me, and put it to work...
i believe, your situation is different, and for your "home server" tasks is sufficient atom 1.6, pentium 166MMX or another low power ( and also low power consumption!) solutions...

WiseDraco 02-06-2013 09:18 AM

r4350 temperatures:
i remove one PCI NIC card (3com 3c95cx), because it is close to r4350 heatsink, and may cause bad cooling for r4350.
after that i turn on computer, and measure temp via sensors command.
approx after 35 minutes it looks becomes stable, without grown - stops at 71.5 - 72.5 celsium, mostrlu show 71.5 and 72.0
peocessor temp is 36.5 celsium. when computer power up and login, videocard shows 38 celsium ( and had stabile growth), and processor has 32 celsium. now computer is turned off for about a half an hour, to cool off all things, then i turn it on again, and send low to power profile, and then measure temperature.

oh yes, power consumption ( without 3com NIC) be again 0.48A at login, voltage shows 222V.

WiseDraco 02-06-2013 09:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlinkels (Post 4885430)
As you undoubtedly know, Linux does not get more and more bloated if used without X.

jlinkels

afraid, but i see another tendency - linux, even kernel, and even without X get more and more resources hungry. if you set 2.4.x ( or even 2.2.x) kernel, and run it apache, and then see, what memory it uses, uou found, it for the same task use a lot less memory, than 2.6 or even 3.2 kernels. this looks a general problem - you can have pentium 166 mhz, win 98 SE, and office 97 - and all in that works really faster with even 32 megabytes of RAM, than fresh linux with KDE and fresh openoffice on powerful hardware ( say 1 Gb!! RAM, 2 GHz processor,and so on). i also collect old hardware,and some time ago turn on 200 mhz MMX pentium qwith w98 - and be a really surprised, how fast it turn on, and shutdown! my core 2 processor with 3 Gb ram and so on on desktop, and fresh, new linux with kde really sucks...:D

WiseDraco 02-06-2013 10:38 AM

and now, "low consume mode" results.
after logged in system,
echo low > /sys/class/drm/card0/device/power_profile
amperage immidiatly drops from 0.48A to 0.46A, as always
temperatures are 40 degree celsius on radeon card, based on "sensors" command
after a 15 minutes we have 57 celsius on radeon card.
after 40 minutes we have 59-60 celsius on radeon, and 36 celsius on CPU.

heatsink is hot, but can keep hand on it. without "echo low", when card reaches 71 celsius, cannot keep hand longer than 2 - 3 seconds -very hot, burning...

cascade9 02-07-2013 02:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4885521)
you simply do not know my situation. really, my "old server", who work now - pentium 3 - 866 mhz ( i think, in real performance it was close 1.6 ghz atom's)
is sometimes small too short for me. as time goeas, it get more and more worse. spam filtering is cpu eating task, as so as web servers on joomla and so on. in another case i not struggling, and live with my old server. a time ago i thinking to replace it with hardware who consumes less power - like as atom, itx all-in-one boards, etc. i even purchase gigabyte GA-6VLE thin client with C3-800 procesor and see, what we have with that solution, and in final i come to think, a old core 2 duo solution is best for me. then i have minimize its power consumption as far, as it acceptable for me, and put it to work...
i believe, your situation is different, and for your "home server" tasks is sufficient atom 1.6, pentium 166MMX or another low power ( and also low power consumption!) solutions...

A P3-866 is going to be slower than any atom, even the single core versions from release. C3-800 is slow, Slow, SLOW! They can be slower than intel celecrons with half the clockspeed. Difficult to find benchmarks comparing such ancient CPUs, but here a few rough comparisons-

1.6GHz single core atom beating a P3-1.13 Tulatin (and the old P3-866 isa fair bit slower than that)-
http://www.techpinas.com/2009/05/ben...eron-m-vs.html

VIA C3-800 compared to slower celerons-
http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/C3/VIA...281.6V%29.html

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4885573)
my core 2 processor with 3 Gb ram and so on on desktop, and fresh, new linux with kde really sucks...:D

3GB wont be helping, you'll be running your memory in single channel mode. If you feel the need for sped, and/or have an older system, KDE is not a good choice IMO.

WiseDraco 02-07-2013 03:59 AM

if i have 2x 512 Mb on channel A, and 2x1 Gb on channel B, i go in "single channel mode" ?
for P3 866 vs Atom 1.6: it not have a big difference in my opinion. C2D have a lot of difference, atom - not, imho.

TobiSGD 02-07-2013 05:19 AM

FWIW, I run a home server on an Atom 330 (2 cores with Hyperthreading, 1.6 GHz, 1GB of RAM), currently with Debian without X. The server runs Apache, vsftpd, transmission-daemon, rsyncd, nfsd, Samba, a Squid caching proxy, a dnsmasq caching proxy, the Dovecot IMAP server and a few minor services like ntpd.
12 clients are connecting to that server, htop reports load averages that are rarely above 0.1, free reports 221 MB memory used.
I think that for a home-server that is not a desktop system or doing heavy tasks, like compiling software or Folding@Home or something similar, a dual-core Atom is more than you will need ever and light on the electricity bill (this CPU has a maximum power consumption of 8W).
From my point of view, if those few Watts are really important for you you have begun building the whole system wrong. You should have gone for a even newer system with socket LGA1155 and an power-saving Core i3 (the T versions), a slow but "green" HDD and so on. Now trying to save a few Watts with choosing different video cards is not the way I would have gone, but of course that is up to you.

WiseDraco 02-07-2013 05:52 AM

what is power consumption of your whole system, not processor only?
newer system with i3 is too pricey for me.
i also plan a ST500DM005 hdd ( both - in seagate, and samsung branding -looks consume small power amounts, and stay cool, not heat up) every few watts in result make a significantly changes.
today try determine, how much eat my current hdd's, and how much "eat" dvd drive without using, but powering. in my current, old servers, i have disconnected power to dvd drive, and removed fdd.

TobiSGD 02-07-2013 05:58 AM

I don't have the measurement equipment for checking power usage, but the PSU is 90W and I think it is over-dimensioned, The system is basically motherboard with CPU, not used onboard-video, RAM and a harddisk, no optical drive or floppy drive (no need for that in a server), so I doubt that total power consumption is higher than 30-35W and I didn't even look for extra power-saving devices.

jlinkels 02-07-2013 05:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4873545)
Hello!
I preparing to swap my old home - server ( runs under slack, act as web \ mail \ ftp \ etc server for my own and family needs,

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4873545)
you simply do not know my situation. really, my "old server", who work now - pentium 3 - 866 mhz ( i think, in real performance it was close 1.6 ghz atom's)
is sometimes small too short for me. as time goeas, it get more and more worse. spam filtering is cpu eating task, as so as web servers on joomla and so on.

Well, the information you provided is all we know about your situation. A home server for your own needs. And being overloaded by spam filtering and Joomla?

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlinkels (Post 4885430)
As you undoubtedly know, Linux does not get more and more bloated if used without X.

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4873545)
my core 2 processor with 3 Gb ram and so on on desktop, and fresh, new linux with kde really sucks.

I said without X, that means no KDE. KDE is bloated.

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4873545)
oh yes, power consumption ( without 3com NIC) be again 0.48A at login, voltage shows 222V.

So its consumption will be 900 kWh a year.

jlinkels

cascade9 02-08-2013 04:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4886103)
if i have 2x 512 Mb on channel A, and 2x1 Gb on channel B, i go in "single channel mode" ?

Probably not singlem channel mode then, depending on the sticks, chipset and motherboard. BTW, you are going to increase power consumption from running 4 sticks vs 2......

Quote:

Originally Posted by WiseDraco (Post 4886103)
for P3 866 vs Atom 1.6: it not have a big difference in my opinion. C2D have a lot of difference, atom - not, imho.

P3-866 will be slower than _any_ atom. The oldest, single core versions will be about 10-25% faster than a P3-866. The newer dual core atom CPUs will trash any of the old P3s.

Dummy-in-Linux 02-11-2013 12:33 PM

I was in the same situation, in my case the old PCI-E graphic card stopped working and I needed to look for something else. My mainboard was a Asus P5B and I finally bought not a new graphic card but a new mainboard....

Now I have a ASRock G41C-GS which has Intel X4500 graphics onboard and the chipset is much more energy efficient than the old P965. Also I upgraded the memory from the standard 4GB DDR2 to 8 GB DDR3... currently the little server with an Intel E4300 (1.8 Ghz) and 1TB hard drive runs smooth... with a 350Watt powersupply ....

WiseDraco 02-12-2013 05:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dummy-in-Linux (Post 4889273)
I was in the same situation, in my case the old PCI-E graphic card stopped working and I needed to look for something else. My mainboard was a Asus P5B and I finally bought not a new graphic card but a new mainboard....

Now I have a ASRock G41C-GS which has Intel X4500 graphics onboard and the chipset is much more energy efficient than the old P965. Also I upgraded the memory from the standard 4GB DDR2 to 8 GB DDR3... currently the little server with an Intel E4300 (1.8 Ghz) and 1TB hard drive runs smooth... with a 350Watt powersupply ....

on what conditions you sort out, a "chipset is more energy efficient than old P965"?
what is your setup actual power consumption at awerage working mode /at idle ?
i think, i can run my p965 system with 150watt quality PSU, because max current from 220v for my system is 0.58A ( who do us ~128 watts).
at iddle with two sata disks it show about 0.4 - 0.41A (88 - 90.2 w), and on files copying and processor loading it gets approx 0.44 - .52A (97 - 115 w)
will be interested to get your actual stats ( measured, not "i think,it...") :)

Dummy-in-Linux 02-13-2013 04:12 AM

Sorry I have no actual measurements, but if you dig a bit into the information provided by Intel regarding the chipsets, you will find that the P965 worked at a higher voltage than the G41 chipset.

Also because the graphic chipset is integrated into the chipset my system develops less heat, especially when the screen is powersafe mode.

With my previous setup, Asus P5B, Intel E4300, 4MB DDR2, Asus Nvidia GT9500 graphics, and 1TB HDD I was forced to use at least a 450Watt powersupply. With my new setup I have now ASRock G41C-GS, which cost about the same as a low end graphics card, 8GB DDR3 and 1TB HDD I use a slimline case which has a 350Watt powersupply....

WiseDraco 02-13-2013 08:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dummy-in-Linux (Post 4890554)
Sorry I have no actual measurements, but if you dig a bit into the information provided by Intel regarding the chipsets, you will find that the P965 worked at a higher voltage than the G41 chipset.

looks like we speak completely different languages - i about a real life, you - about your fantasions based on your imaginations. i think, it makes no sense to continue...:)
PS Pentium 1 ( P54C and P55c) had a lot higher voltage than novadays core2duo. but it is really lower power consumption. that is one fact from real world....

WiseDraco 02-15-2013 10:39 AM

new results! today i want to enter bios, and found, after i entering the bios settings, computer completely lock up. think, PSU is not good, switch to another - liteon PS-5311-tm, 310w
but nothing changes. then i swap trident pci video to s3, and then i can get into bios without problem.
but i see, with that PSU power consumption is smaller - on a login prompt only 0.33A versus old 0.40A!
not bad...

agentsteel 02-22-2013 03:55 PM

Interesting topic :)

It's hard to obtain the best performance/Watt with older hardware!

My home server is currently a P3-933 with 2 old IDE drives, and integrated graphics on the motherboard. Approx. ~50W idle, ~70W under load.

For a more powerful server at low cost : Pentium-M cpu's are nice (you can find cheap cpu+industrial motherboard on ebay).

WiseDraco 03-19-2014 12:55 PM

about two months ago i replaced choosed PCI videocard to ATI 4350, for use it for seti@home data crunching. got computer power consumption about 86w on idle ( no work on videocard) and 95 - 98 w ( videocard crunching data). after about month of usage swap it to ASUS GT630 rev 2 ( gk208) PCIe videocard with 1 Gb RAM.
looks like it a bit less energy consumption, and about 4 - 5 times better performance. on new videocard computer consume about 81 - 82w when no tasks for GPU, and about 91 - 93w when crunching data. very good, even apart of that, with nvidia i not need to running X server to use GPU in boinc, and better stability - with ati i get some issues, when screen freeze and cannot awake....


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