Ultimate DIY Performance PC: EVGA & Intel Infused

Name: Ultimate DIY Performance PC: EVGA & Intel Infused - Page 8
Brand: Ultimate

by Marco Chiappetta — Wednesday, August 04, 2010, 02:29 PM EDT

Test System Configuration Notes: When configuring our test systems for this article, we first entered their respective system BIOSes and set each board to its "Optimized" or "High performance Defaults". We then saved the settings, re-entered the BIOS and set memory timings manually, enabled AHCI, and disabled any proprietary auto-overclocking features. The hard drives were then formatted, and Windows 7 Ultimate x64 was installed. When the Windows installation was complete, we updated the OS, and installed the drivers necessary for our components. Auto-Updating and Windows Defender were then disabled, finally, we installed all of our benchmarking software, performed a disk clean-up, defragged the hard drives, and ran all of the tests.

HotHardware's Test Systems

Intel and AMD - Head To Head

System 1:
Intel Xeon 5680
(3.33GHz Six-Core x 2)

EVGA Classified SR-2
(Intel 5520 Chipset)

6x2GB G.SKILL DDR3-2000
(@ 1333MHz, CAS 6)

GeForce GTX 280
On-Board Ethernet
On-board Audio

WD150 "Raptor" HD
10,000 RPM SATA

Windows 7 x64

System 2:
Core i7 980X
(3.33GHz - Six-Core)

Gigabyte EX58A-UD5
(X58 Express Chipset)

3x2GB OCZ DDR3-1333
(@ 1333MHz, CAS 8)

GeForce GTX 280
On-Board Ethernet
On-board Audio

WD150 "Raptor" HD
10,000 RPM SATA

Windows 7 x64

System 3:
Phenom II X6 1090T
(3.2GHz Six-Core)

MSI 890FXA-GD70
(890FX Chipset)

2x2GB OCZ DDR3-1333
(@ 1333MHz, CAS 8)

GeForce GTX 280
On-Board Ethernet
On-board Audio

WD150 "Raptor" HD
10,000 RPM SATA

Windows 7 x64

System 4:
Core 2 Extreme QX9775
(3.2GHz - Quad-Core x 2)

Intel D5400XS
(5400 Series Chipset)

4x2GB Kingston FBDIMM
CL 5-5-5 - DDR2-800

GeForce GTX 280
On-Board Ethernet
On-board Audio

WD150 "Raptor" HD
10,000 RPM SATA

Windows 7 x64

Preliminary Testing with SiSoft SANDRA 2010 SP1

Synthetic Benchmarks

We began our testing with SiSoftware's SANDRA 2010 SP1, the System ANalyzer, Diagnostic and Reporting Assistant. We ran three of the built-in subsystem tests that partially comprise the SANDRA suite with the SR-2 and a pair of Intel Xeon 5680s (CPU Arithmetic, Multimedia, and Memory Bandwidth). All of the scores reported below were taken with the processors running at their default clock speeds of 3.33GHz but with Turbo Mode enabled.

SiSoft SANDRA CPU Arithmetic > Multimedia > Memory Bandwidth

The numbers put up in SANDRA by the EVGA Classified SR-2 when paired to a duo of Intel's flagship Xeons are nothing short of spectacular. The dual-Xeon 5680s outpace even a quartet of Opterons in aggregate arithmetic performance, with a score of 258.37 GOPS. Aggregate multi-media performance for the platform exceeded 488MPix/s, and total memory bandwidth was just shy of 36GB/s.

Tags: Intel, Nehalem, evga, Power, Xeon, performance, Classified, SR2, 5680, ultimate

Marco Chiappetta

Marco's interest in computing and technology dates all the way back to his early childhood. Even before being exposed to the Commodore P.E.T. and later the Commodore 64 in the early ‘80s, he was interested in electricity and electronics, and he still has the modded AFX cars and shop-worn soldering irons to prove it. Once he got his hands on his own Commodore 64, however, computing became Marco's passion. Throughout his academic and professional lives, Marco has worked with virtually every major platform from the TRS-80 and Amiga, to today's high end, multi-core servers. Over the years, he has worked in many fields related to technology and computing, including system design, assembly and sales, professional quality assurance testing, and technical writing. In addition to being the Managing Editor here at HotHardware for close to 15 years, Marco is also a freelance writer whose work has been published in a number of PC and technology related print publications and he is a regular fixture on HotHardware’s own Two and a Half Geeks webcast. - Contact: marco(at)hothardware(dot)com