This discussion focuses on the latest Dell™ 1U high-performance computing (HPC)–optimized PowerEdge™ R410 rack server. Dell experts in HPC provide an overview of this PowerEdge server release, including the memory architecture of the latest Intel® Xeon® processor and how it helps HPC workloads.


Technical Community - Background Reading


Dell PowerEdge R410 Rack Server Specifications page
Dell TechCenter HPC page
HPCC Blog: Nehalem and Memory Configurations
HPCC Blog: Introduction to Nahalem-EP

Chat Transcript

KongY-Dell Hi there Onur! Onur is the manager of the Dell HPCC team: www.dell.com/hpcc
Dell_OnurC I am not sure if Jeff will be joining
DELL-ScottH Let's go ahead and kick it off, and the latecomers can catch up as needed. Welcome, everyone, to this week’s installment of the TechCenter chat. Today's topic is Dell HPC and the new Dell PowerEdge R410 HPC–optimized node
DELL-ScottH A couple of housekeeping items: This chat is recorded, so be nice...or don't :-) Ask questions at any time; it's not rude. And right-click any URL links or the chat client will exit.
DELL-ScottH With that I'd like to welcome Onur and Garima from Dell's HPC team. Please introduce yourselves
Dell_OnurC I am Onur Celebioglu. I am the engineering manager for the HPC team. Our team is responsible for testing, development, and integration of Dell's HPC products
DELL_garima_kochhar Hi, I am an engineer with Dell's HPCC team. We have some R410s in the lab, and they look pretty exciting so far!
DELL-ScottH Here's the link to the product details on the new PowerEdge R410: www.dell.com/us/en/enterprise/enterprise/server-poweredge-r410/pd.aspx?refid=server-poweredge-r410&s=biz&cs=555
Dell_OnurC Just to get the conversation started, the PowerEdge R410 is the recently released 1U, dual-socket Nehalem–based server. It is targeted specifically for HPC environments
DELL-ScottH When customers are looking for HPC nodes, can you tell us some of the things that are important?
mrobbert What differentiates it from the PowerEdge R610 that makes it better for HPC?
Dell_OnurC It doesn't have all the default advanced systems management or redundancy features that the PowerEdge R610 offers
DELL-ScottH Meaning that HPC customers typically just swap nodes if they fail?
Dell_OnurC The PowerEdge R610 is targeted for a wider range of business applications and includes many features that the HPC users may not need, such as more PCI slots, more redundancy features…
DELL-ScottH Making this server more cost advantageous? Geez, I sound like the marketing guy
Dell_OnurC Scott, that's correct. In any HPC environment, where you may have hundreds of servers in your cluster, failure of one node is typically not catastrophic. You can treat each node as a replaceable unit
KongY-Dell The Dell HPC team has a solutions advisor that helps in sizing HPC solutions: http://advisors.dell.com/advisorweb/advisor.aspx?advisor=d6676576-1bfb-4ce1-b8ca-2e976b02575d&c=us&l=en&cs=555
Dell_OnurC Therefore, having cost-optimized servers with only the necessary features you need may be advantageous
KongY-Dell Welcome Sdowdy
mrobbert Speaking of cost is there anything special in this machine for keeping power and cooling costs down? We're hoping to make our next cluster as green as possible.
Dell_OnurC Thanks for pointing the advisor link out Kong. We are working on an update to the advisor right now and will incorporate the sizing logic for PowerEdge R410s soon
DELL-ScottH Hello Dennis
DELL_garima_kochhar Some of the power and cooling features are the same as in the rest of the new 11th-generation servers. Features in the BIOS, that is
Dennis_S Hi Scott
DELL_garima_kochhar Also, the PowerEdge R410 can provide the same systems management capabilities of the PowerEdge R610 if needed. The IPMI based on board controller is standard as always
DELL-ScottH Actually, by running one power supply instead of two you save some on some power draw. I did that test for a customer a while back; let me see if I can find the link
DELL_garima_kochhar The PowerEdge R410 has just one PCI slot too, fewer disk spindles. As Onur mentioned, by losing some redundancy you save power too
DELL-ScottH Yes, less things that draw power
VeeamMark So how much power savings would a rack's worth of servers be saving between an 11th-generation solution and say a 10th-generation solution?
mrobbert One PCI slot could be a real limiter. What if we want to have Infiniband and a Tesla attached?
DELL-ScottH Here's the older study I did; different machines, but same concept: www.delltechcenter.com/page/cost+savings+through+removing+server+power+supplies
DELL_garima_kochhar Mrobbert, for that situation (ib+tesla), a PowerEdge R610 or PowerEdge R710 would probably be a better fit
Dell_OnurC Veeammark, it is very configuration dependant, but if you have certain configurations in mind, you can check the inline tool at DELL.COM/Calc to come up with an estimate
DELL_garima_kochhar You could size that down with only one power supply, fewer disks, etc.
KongY-Dell Speaking of BIOS, when can one expect Dell HPC engineering's guidance on the best BIOS settings?
VeeamMark Onur, that is a great link, thanks
mrobbert So if we have to move up in the line for expandability then what would be the advantage of the PowerEdge R410 over a blade solution?
Dell_OnurC Veeammark, in general, you may not see a big power savings if you keep the number of ninth-generation to 11th-generation servers equivalent, but if you consider performance/watt the savings will be greater
DELL_garima_kochhar Kongy, good question on the BIOS. We already provide our factory with HPC–specific BIOS settings. If you didn't order the servers with that particular SKU, we have these BIOS settings configured to be automated with our cluster software packages
Dell_OnurC So fewer servers for the same amount of performance and also better computational efficiency with the 11th-generation servers
HoosierCAB Scotth, interesting stats; I always suspected the dual versus single processors’ wattage numbers were little difference
DELL_garima_kochhar Also, in the near future we expect to have some white papers specifically talking about BIOS settings for different HPC applications
KongY-Dell Thanks, Garima
DELL-ScottH Yeah, I always wondered that too, and finally had time last year to check it on a power meter
DELL_garima_kochhar Mrobbert, with the PowerEdge R410 you can use any qualified PCI card. For the blades, you'd have to stick with Mellanox Ib, Emulex Fiber Channel, etc.
Dell_OnurC Mrobbert, the main advantage of the blade is density and power efficiency
DELL_garima_kochhar The blades also have a much richer systems management interface if that is important in your environment
DELL-ScottH Any exciting new deployments in HPC land with the PowerEdge R410s that you guys can spill?
Dell_OnurC Nothing we can talk about publicly yet, but watch out for some cool white papers on 11th-generation systems in general coming out soon
DELL-ScottH Awww come on... any clues or hints? :-) Now I sound like a customer begging for behind-the-scenes stuff :-)
Dell_OnurC As of now, all 11th-generation servers, including the PowerEdge R410, are fully supported by all of our cluster installation/monitoring/management middleware. Platform Cluster Manager and Clustercorp Rock+ with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 are both fully tested and qualified on the PowerEdge R410. We also support Windows HPC Server 2008 for customers interested in Windows applications
DELL-ScottH So Mrrobert, where are you building your cluster?
mrobbert What are you recommending for interconnects these days? 10GbE, Infiniband, etc.
DELL-ScottH Which company, if you care to share, or university?
mrobbert Our campus is in Golden, CO. Colorado School of Mines
DELL-ScottH I'd talk about mine, but it's in the garage and I use it to rip MP3s :-)
mrobbert We currently have a cluster of 256 PowerEdge1950s + 12 PowerEdge 6850s
DELL-ScottH Very cool; digging for gold!
VeeamMark Scott, that is illegal now
KongY-Dell Ah, Golden, CO. Home of Coors :)
DELL-ScottH PowerEdge 6850s for storage nodes?
VeeamMark I knew Ky would make that association
mrobbert I can see Coors out my window right now.
Dell_OnurC Mrobbert, that really depends on the application and the size of the cluster. We certainly support the latest Ib adapters from our partners like QLogic and Mellanox
DELL-ScottH Nice part of the country; I grew up in Longmont CO
DELL_garima_kochhar Mrobbert, so far Infiniband is still the fabric of choice for IPC. But for our iSCSI storage solution, 10GbE is a good choice
DELL-ScottH How large will the new cluster be?
Dell_OnurC We also have options for 10GbE from different vendors qualified on the 11th-generation platforms
mrobbert We are looking at 100 teraflops for our next machine. When will we have 10GbE onboard?
Dell_OnurC Mrobbert, what are some of the applications you use on your cluster?
KongY-Dell @mrobbert, what's your storage backend?
VeeamMark Has anyone heard of Solar Flare for 10GbE?
mrobbert We're doing primarily energy research, and right now it is mostly molecular dynamics and electronic structure codes: CHARMM, VASP, DMol, etc.
DELL-ScottH Likely 12th-generation will be all 10GbE down on the planar, but don't quote me
mrobbert Our current storage back end is Lustre running on DDN hardware
DELL-ScottH There may be some refreshes between now and then, but nothing I can give specifics on
DELL_garima_kochhar The nice thing about the PowerEdge R410 (and PowerEdge R610) is that Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 supports it fully
mrobbert We probably want/need the density of blades for our next machine, but we're playing with a Tesla right now, and if that works out well for us then we may want a hybrid CPU/GPU cluster. I'm guessing we can't do that with a blade architecture?
Dell__OnurC Mrobbert, since the GPUs require a lot of power (and cooling) the blade environment is too dense for plugging those cards
VeeamMark Whoever thought to name an HPC function after a one-hit wonder band like Tesla?
Dell__OnurC Best architecture would be to have your blades for general-purpose computation
VeeamMark Signs, Signs, everywhere are signs…
Dell__OnurC Then have some PowerEdge R710s interconnected to your blades through Ib. You can use the x16 slot in the PowerEdge R710 to lug in a Tesla HIC connecting to an external Tesla box
mrobbert That may be an option; we'll have to see how many of our applications can be effectively ported to see how much of a need we'll have
Dell__OnurC Sure, that makes sense. Do you have a feel for how much effort it will take for you to port your applications to GPU?
mrobbert Not yet, we just got the box running last week. We're just starting to play with it. Most of our scientists aren't programmers, so we need to get our programmers up to speed on the science. It would be nice if we could get our CHARMM users to switch to Gromacs, since I hear that is pretty much already ported
Dell__OnurC Since you have a large mix of researchers and applications, what would be best for your case is to have a small test bed of GPU-enabled nodes as part of your cluster, and then grow either the CPU portion or GPU portion of your cluster as your needs change. Mrobbert, any interest in connecting your new nodes to the existing cluster, or are you planning to treat them as two isolated clusters?
mrobbert Two isolated clusters, probably phasing out the old cluster when the new one comes online. The new one is planned to be about two years out. The new cluster will need a new room as well, so they might not even be in the same building.
Dell__OnurC I see
DELL-ScottH We seem to be winding down, any other questions for the HPC team?
mrobbert I think that I'm all set
DELL-ScottH I appreciate Onur and Garima taking the time today, and thanks to everyone for joining
mrobbert Thanks guys!
DELL-ScottH If you have further questions, you can simply start a thread at the bottom of the chat page, or anywhere on the site
Dell__OnurC If you have any other questions, feel free to route them to us through your account team. Also, if you happen to visit Austin, we would be happy to host you in our HPC labs where you can get to see us on the job, see the environment we do all our tests, and interact with the team directly
Dell__OnurC Thanks, everyone, for joining
DELL-ScottH Reminder that we have an additional chat this Thursday on the new Dell EqualLogic PS4000 Series
DELL-ScottH Thanks, everyone!
DELL-ScottH Ceri, sorry you just missed it :-)
Dell__OnurC Bye
ceri Ack ;-(
KongY-Dell Thank you, everyone
DELL-ScottH You can use Action, Recent Room History to see the discussion
ceri Ah well, will catch the transcript
DELL-ScottH Or there will be a transcript posted tomorrow
DELL-ScottH Oh yeah, you know the drill ;-)
ceri Heh :)
Dell-d_glynn Nice teaser on the EqualLogic PS4000, Scott