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Help with CPU upgrade for MCAM PC

dodgin

Hot Rolled
Joined
Mar 16, 2015
Location
MI, USA
Been thinking lately my work PC is slower than molasses. My benchmark times compared to others on the Mastercam forum are so embarrassing I don't even want to post the numbers on there.

Anyways, I'm running a Dell T7600 - with dual Intel Xeon E5-2620, that clock in at a whopping 2.00GHz. Motherboard has 2 sockets so right now I'm running 12 cores. I've also got 32GB RAM and outfitted with a 4GB Quadro K5000. Unfortunately I'm running an old fashioned HD and not a SSD.

Dell's website lists the Xeon E5-2643 as an available processor. These have 4 cores a piece and clock in a 3.3GHz. Not fast by any stretch of the imagination but I'm thinking it'll work wonders for me.

Basically, am I on the right track here? At 3.3GHz do I need to worry about thermal overhead or additional cooling features? I haven't looked too hard to find these new, but if possible to buy them refurbished is that generally a safe route to take? It doesn't seem difficult to open up the tower and do this myself either, but wouldn't mind someone telling me whether that's a foolish thought or not.
 
If you check these processors out at cpubenchmark.net you'll see the single thread performance of the 2643 is much better but your multi thread performance is worse. You'll have to check if your coolers/shroud/ducting will work on other processors.

There are some other better performing socket LGA2011 processors out there for cheap. When looking make sure you're not looking at processors for LGA2011, not LGA2011 v3; they are not interchangeable. Also, sometimes processors have version numbers so you have to look at the socket spec for every processor to make sure you get the right one.

Some other Xeon socket LGA2011 processors you might try to find new or used are:
E5-2673 v2
E5-2687W v2
E5-1680 v2
E5-2667 v2

You can check out the Wiki for socket LGA2011 to get an idea what's out there and Google the processor name and check it out on cpubenchmark.net for it's performance numbers. Be careful of the charts, some are for single socket setups.

If you look for used I would not order anything from China resellers, period. Also ditch the HD for a SSD if you can. You can find 500GB SSD's for $60-75 right now at NewEgg, possibly Microcenter or Amazon too. I just happen to be at Best Buy a little while ago and they had the same sale price as an online price so do some checking.

On a side note...I have an old T3600 which I have been refurbishing on the cheap for a friend; same socket as yours. It's actually turning out to be decently performing well on small to medium sized models. However for my next peresonal, high performance build I'm thinking at using an AMD Ryzen Threadripper although I'd like to see more data on how they stack up to Xeons and i9's. If they beat the the other guys the price vs. computing performance could be quite impressive. :)
 
If you check these processors out at cpubenchmark.net you'll see the single thread performance of the 2643 is much better but your multi thread performance is worse. You'll have to check if your coolers/shroud/ducting will work on other processors.

There are some other better performing socket LGA2011 processors out there for cheap. When looking make sure you're not looking at processors for LGA2011, not LGA2011 v3; they are not interchangeable. Also, sometimes processors have version numbers so you have to look at the socket spec for every processor to make sure you get the right one.

Some other Xeon socket LGA2011 processors you might try to find new or used are:
E5-2673 v2
E5-2687W v2
E5-1680 v2
E5-2667 v2

You can check out the Wiki for socket LGA2011 to get an idea what's out there and Google the processor name and check it out on cpubenchmark.net for it's performance numbers. Be careful of the charts, some are for single socket setups.

If you look for used I would not order anything from China resellers, period. Also ditch the HD for a SSD if you can. You can find 500GB SSD's for $60-75 right now at NewEgg, possibly Microcenter or Amazon too. I just happen to be at Best Buy a little while ago and they had the same sale price as an online price so do some checking.

On a side note...I have an old T3600 which I have been refurbishing on the cheap for a friend; same socket as yours. It's actually turning out to be decently performing well on small to medium sized models. However for my next peresonal, high performance build I'm thinking at using an AMD Ryzen Threadripper although I'd like to see more data on how they stack up to Xeons and i9's. If they beat the the other guys the price vs. computing performance could be quite impressive. :)

Are the V2s compatible with my motherboard? I've got a Sandy Bridge motherboard and I didn't think the Ivy Bridge processors would be compatible with my current rig.

What's the easiest way to finding out whether the current setup in the tower will have the thermal overhead to support a different processor?

Thanks for the info Qwan.
 
Are the V2s compatible with my motherboard? I've got a Sandy Bridge motherboard and I didn't think the Ivy Bridge processors would be compatible with my current rig.

The main problem with going Dell is you don't know what parts they actually put into the computer, usually.
Do you know the exact make and model of the motherboard?
Also why Xeon?Are your files massive? Unless you buy the top tier Xeon, the i7 and i9 cpu's will blow them out of the water in Mastercam.
You definitely want an SSD, but if you don't have SATAIII compatible motherboard then I would consider getting a new mobo, ssd, ram and cpu.
The Quadro K 5000.. I don't know how that would compare to a P4000 which is a really good $800 card.
Having 32GB of RAM is perfect, but do you know what speed it's running at? Getting fast RAM is definitely noticeable.

If I were you, and have the budget, I would just build a whole new computer, keeping the Quadro.
 
The main problem with going Dell is you don't know what parts they actually put into the computer, usually.
Do you know the exact make and model of the motherboard?
Also why Xeon?Are your files massive? Unless you buy the top tier Xeon, the i7 and i9 cpu's will blow them out of the water in Mastercam.
You definitely want an SSD, but if you don't have SATAIII compatible motherboard then I would consider getting a new mobo, ssd, ram and cpu.
The Quadro K 5000.. I don't know how that would compare to a P4000 which is a really good $800 card.
Having 32GB of RAM is perfect, but do you know what speed it's running at? Getting fast RAM is definitely noticeable.

If I were you, and have the budget, I would just build a whole new computer, keeping the Quadro.

Xeon because that's what I was given. I'm pretty sure all the programmers in the shop have Xeon processors. I think our boxes were built by a third party and they stuck with Xeon because of the "reliability" (in quotes because that's what I was told and not necessarily what I think). File size varies - biggest I'd say would be somewhere around 600MB.

Make and model of motherboard - 0VHRW1, A01. Dell manufactured.

32GB of DDR3 RAM running at 1300MHz.

New computer not in the budget. Really looking to upgrade a few components to try to make it less miserable to worth with.
 
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Been thinking lately my work PC is slower than molasses. My benchmark times compared to others on the Mastercam forum are so embarrassing I don't even want to post the numbers on there.

Anyways, I'm running a Dell T7600 - with dual Intel Xeon E5-2620, that clock in at a whopping 2.00GHz. Motherboard has 2 sockets so right now I'm running 12 cores. I've also got 32GB RAM and outfitted with a 4GB Quadro K5000. Unfortunately I'm running an old fashioned HD and not a SSD.

Dell's website lists the Xeon E5-2643 as an available processor. These have 4 cores a piece and clock in a 3.3GHz. Not fast by any stretch of the imagination but I'm thinking it'll work wonders for me.

Basically, am I on the right track here? At 3.3GHz do I need to worry about thermal overhead or additional cooling features? I haven't looked too hard to find these new, but if possible to buy them refurbished is that generally a safe route to take? It doesn't seem difficult to open up the tower and do this myself either, but wouldn't mind someone telling me whether that's a foolish thought or not.

The CPUs you listed will be fine, the E5-2620 has a TDP (Thermal design power) of 95W and the E5-2643 is listed as 130W. Based on the E5-2600 series cpus, the one you picked has the highest clock speed, so you should be good. Typical applications are helped out more by a higher clock speed rather than more cores, and 8 cores at 3.3ghz should perform better than 12 cores at 2.0. A pair of E5-2643s should be cheap on ebay, again to reiterate what was posted before, do not purchase them from China.

I didn't see anything conclusive as to whether or not E5-2600 V2 cpus would work with that system.

It looks like MasterCAM has a multi threading option, do you have that turned on?
 
The CPUs you listed will be fine, the E5-2620 has a TDP (Thermal design power) of 95W and the E5-2643 is listed as 130W. Based on the E5-2600 series cpus, the one you picked has the highest clock speed, so you should be good. Typical applications are helped out more by a higher clock speed rather than more cores, and 8 cores at 3.3ghz should perform better than 12 cores at 2.0. A pair of E5-2643s should be cheap on ebay, again to reiterate what was posted before, do not purchase them from China.

I didn't see anything conclusive as to whether or not E5-2600 V2 cpus would work with that system.

It looks like MasterCAM has a multi threading option, do you have that turned on?

Yes, set to high priority. Thanks.
 
Swapping the CPU will get you a meager improvement. You can build a whole new system for $2600 to $3600, and it will run rings around what you have. I'd choose the CPU based on this list:
PassMark CPU Benchmarks - Single Thread Performance

What's meager? The only PC in the shop older than mine is benchmarking in half the time. Only difference I can see is the clock speed - that PC has a processor with a base of 3.2GHz.

I'm not trying to be argumentative or anything, but the likelihood of building a whole new PC from scratch is pretty much nil. I think I could pretty easily talk the boss into shelling out a few hundred bucks though if it's going to make things easier for me to work on.
 
Xeon because that's what I was given. I'm pretty sure all the programmers in the shop have Xeon processors. I think our boxes were built by a third party and they stuck with Xeon because of the "reliability" (in quotes because that's what I was told and not necessarily what I think). File size varies - biggest I'd say would be somewhere around 600MB.

Make and model of motherboard - 0VHRW1, A01. Dell manufactured.

32GB of DDR3 RAM running at 1300MHz.

New computer not in the budget. Really looking to upgrade a few components to try to make it less miserable to worth with.

Ok 600mb is a pretty hefty file size. A lot larger than what I usually work with.
Mastercam loves clock speed, so if you're shopping new Xeon's to fit your mobo, then get the fastest one they will let you buy. But that's why Xeon's really can't benchmark as fast as the i7's and i9's,although i think if you but the uber expensive xeon it might be a wash :confused:
That RAM is triple channel RAM? oooof. I had my battles with that. Wasn't fun.

Unfortunately if they won't spring for a new build, there isn't much you can do to get it a lot faster.
 
What's meager? The only PC in the shop older than mine is benchmarking in half the time. Only difference I can see is the clock speed - that PC has a processor with a base of 3.2GHz.

I'm not trying to be argumentative or anything, but the likelihood of building a whole new PC from scratch is pretty much nil. I think I could pretty easily talk the boss into shelling out a few hundred bucks though if it's going to make things easier for me to work on.

Let me check. Ok, according to Passmark the E5-2620 at 2.0GHz scores 1236, while the E5-2643 can score around 2000 depending on setup. My 4+ year old i7-6700K would score 2500 at 4.0GHz, but I run it at 4.5GHz. The top of the line chips are running scores around 3000, and cost about $500.

The key thing to figure out is how many dollars worth of time per year you spend waiting for your computer, and how many you'd save by upgrading how much. I think if you run the numbers the cheapest option is a top of the line new build.
 
Ok 600mb is a pretty hefty file size. A lot larger than what I usually work with.
Mastercam loves clock speed, so if you're shopping new Xeon's to fit your mobo, then get the fastest one they will let you buy. But that's why Xeon's really can't benchmark as fast as the i7's and i9's,although i think if you but the uber expensive xeon it might be a wash :confused:
That RAM is triple channel RAM? oooof. I had my battles with that. Wasn't fun.

Unfortunately if they won't spring for a new build, there isn't much you can do to get it a lot faster.

The Xeon E5 is a quad channel platform, but you have to be careful with how the modules are configured to get all four channels active. For 32GB on one CPU, then the only valid configuration for quad channel operation is 4 8GB modules, one per channel on node 0. Anything else means reduced memory bandwidth.

The E5-2xxx V2 processors aren't supported on the T7600. The 2643 is the fastest base clock cpu you can put in there - I suspect the 1620 might work in a single cpu configuration (it does on HP Zx20 machines which are the same platform), but cannot find official statement to back this up.

Edit: I misread your original post, now I see you are running dual cpus. In that case the only valid configuration for 32GB total ram is 8 4GB modules, four per node, populated in slots 1,2,3,4 per cpu node.
 
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Right now it's only using 4/16 slots for memory - dual channel, yes?

That is running in dual channel and your CPUs support 4 channels per cpu. You will get double the memory speed per CPU with more populated (assuming you fill 8 or 16 slots). Since it uses DDR3 ECC Registered memory, an upgrade for 4 additional 8GB dimms should be very cheap.
 
Let me check. Ok, according to Passmark the E5-2620 at 2.0GHz scores 1236, while the E5-2643 can score around 2000 depending on setup. My 4+ year old i7-6700K would score 2500 at 4.0GHz, but I run it at 4.5GHz. The top of the line chips are running scores around 3000, and cost about $500.

The key thing to figure out is how many dollars worth of time per year you spend waiting for your computer, and how many you'd save by upgrading how much. I think if you run the numbers the cheapest option is a top of the line new build.

You're comparing apples to oranges. Yes, for single core performance your newer CPU does outperform his older dual CPUs, but go figure, it has double the clock speed. The average CPU passmark for the i7-6700k at 4ghz is 9137, whereas the average for his current Dual E5-2620 shows 12191 and the Dual E5-2643 average is 13662. Sure he could throw thousands at a new build, but he has already stated it isn't in the budget. A pair of E5-2643s should run him $20 each on eBay and an additional 4 sticks of DDR3 ECC Registered should be about $40 more. $80 for doubling his memory bandwidth and increasing his clock speed will be easy to sell as the ROI should only be a few hours.
 
My question is, are you really waiting for the CPU?

I thought graphics processing was the big thing for CAD, and having an aftermarket graphics card was the big upgrade.

I only use Fusion, but I just bought a new computer black friday[250 bucks] then upgraded to an SSD.

Now that is a difference.

By the benchmarking my new computer is maybe 30 percent faster than my 10 year old one, but the SSD makes it fly.

So,to me,that is the question, when are you waiting? Pull up task manager and if CPU time is maxxed, then ok, but I do wonder if it is disk access.
OR if it is CPU, is it rendering the video
 
My question is, are you really waiting for the CPU?

I thought graphics processing was the big thing for CAD, and having an aftermarket graphics card was the big upgrade.

I only use Fusion, but I just bought a new computer black friday[250 bucks] then upgraded to an SSD.

Now that is a difference.

By the benchmarking my new computer is maybe 30 percent faster than my 10 year old one, but the SSD makes it fly.

So,to me,that is the question, when are you waiting? Pull up task manager and if CPU time is maxxed, then ok, but I do wonder if it is disk access.
OR if it is CPU, is it rendering the video

If I figure out some sort of well defined plan or outline of what I want to do I'm going to throw at my boss that as SSD would be a good idea also. Too cheap not to.
 
Ah ok. I had a very bad experience with DDR3 triple channel ram so I've blocked out all DDR3 modules from my mind :D
Triple Channel RAM was possibly the biggest computer fail ever, and I fell for it.

Curious what problems you had with triple channel?

There are about a billion triple channel systems out there chugging along, I had them for a number of years including several HP Z workstations and a couple of Mac Pros, and they never gave me any trouble...
 








 
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