DDR5 with inline ECC?

[stand]

Thanks.

What do you mean by this:

T Models are only helpful at full load

Otherwise, the reason I am considering Raptor lake is mainly due to the extra e-cores, although the performance per watt improvement is nice too. In any case it's not because of the socket as like you said it's the last gen with the 1700.

If I can find somewhere that the averaged power draw of a T CPU is not lower than a K variant in a NAS and 13700K is around the price of a 12900T I will consider it.

X13SAE-F looks great (2x2.5GBit would have been nice)

True. At least it has lots of PCI-e and the one coming from the CPU is even Gen5.

 

[Etorix]

Interesting theory. I suppose that is assuming T and non T versions idle at the same power draw levels and that performance increases non linearly with power consumption?

Do you have empirical data to confirm this? I would be very interested to see an averaged power draw comparison between a T and non T version of the same CPU.

@jgreco had collected data some time ago. Maybe it would be worth to revisit and update the figures now that Intel offers "35 W TDP" T parts which actually draw 125 W under full load but the principle should stand.
'T' and "regular" CPUs should have similar idle power draw since they just different bins from the same architecture on the same process.

Regarding the i3 CPUs - to be honest, I am trying to stay away from budget level CPUs. I prefer to spend a bit more money and know that I would not need to upgrade for at least 4-5 years, rather than saving a hundred bucks and then upgrade every 2-3 years.

Beside taking advantage of cheaper second-hand RAM along the way, I do not see the need to upgrade anything in a NAS for the next 5-10 years. My Atom and Xeon-D come soldered anyway.

Nice find: first DDR5 UDIMM with ECC listed.

Nice find indeed: A first sighting. But the price…
For the same amount of money, one could get at least twice the amount of RAM with DDR4 and there's no question what ZFS would prefer.

Supermicro X13, or the new AM5 boards, like Gigabyte LC13
get interesting for server builds

I saw a piece on these Gigabyte MC13 boards on ServeTheHome, followed up, found there is a MC12-LE0 using B550, but then could not find the MC12 anywhere at retail, contrary to AsRockRack Ryzen boards. If these are to be ordered directly from Gigabyte with a minimal order of 100, they suddenly get a lot less interesting for home builds.

Not yet but it has been replaced. Only a matter of time. Plus why settle for last gen when you can get DDR5

DDR4 has not been replaced yet. Its more expensive successor is, slowly, coming to the market, and both will co-exist for some years. Actual replacement is a matter of middle-term.
Form my point of view the question is: Why rush for last tech as soon as it's out the stepper?

 

[Davvo]

There is no reason to buy DDR5 besides using lastest gen CPUs that require it. Your money, your call.
To me it's not worth.

 

[stand]

@jgreco had collected data some time ago. Maybe it would be worth to revisit and update the figures now that Intel offers "35 W TDP" T parts which actually draw 125 W under full load but the principle should stand.
'T' and "regular" CPUs should have similar idle power draw since they just different bins from the same architecture on the same process.

He has a lot of posts, I could not find it. Can you post a link to what you are referring to, please?

By the way the T variant draws 106W at full load, not 125W.

Compared with the 12900K, which maxes out at 241W, the latter is more than 2x less energy efficient. Like you said the architecture and core count are the same, so to be worth it it needs to somehow also be more than 2x more poweful than the T variant, which is not the case. According to PassMark, the performance difference between the two is about 25%.

All of this is still theoretical of course. But it does make sense to me, so unless empirical data shows different, I would say the T variant is more energy efficient.

Nice find indeed: A first sighting. But the price…
For the same amount of money, one could get at least twice the amount of RAM with DDR4 and there's no question what ZFS would prefer.

ZFS does not work with DDR5? Or do you just mean more RAM = better?

Beside taking advantage of cheaper second-hand RAM along the way, I do not see the need to upgrade anything in a NAS for the next 5-10 years. My Atom and Xeon-D come soldered anyway.

Well, like I said I will have a lot of services running on it and probably 1-2 gaming VM in the future, so an Atom wouldn't be my first choice. But I can see the point you are trying to make. It really depends on what you plan to do with your system, how much future proofing you want and how much money you are willing to spend.

 

[Etorix]

By the way the T variant draws 106W at full load, not 125W.

Fine. That's still three times the "TDP" figure on the spec sheet, and enough of a margin to make it essentially meaningless.

BIOS setting
Compared with the 12900K, which maxes out at 241W, the latter is more than 2x less energy efficient.

It's not more energy efficient, it runs at lower clocks and is capped at lower maximal power.

Like you said the architecture and core count are the same, so to be worth it it needs to somehow also be more than 2x more poweful than the T variant, which is not the case. According to PassMark, the performance difference between the two is about 25%.

All of this is still theoretical of course. But it does make sense to me, so unless empirical data shows different, I would say the T variant is more energy efficient.

Ah! Then you're referring to the "regular" and "gamer/overclocker" K CPU are run at high power limits to squeeze extra performance, in a part of the power curve where the "law of diminishing returns" applies.
ArsTechnica has a good description of that in their Ryzen 7000 review, with comparison points showing that it also applies to Zen 3 and Alder Lake:

Ryzen 7600X and 7950X review: Zen 4 starts off expensive but impressive

Thermal behavior is a bit odd, but there's lots to like about these new CPUs.

arstechnica.com

The initial offering of Zen 4 CPU come with 170 W TDP, but can operate at 105 W or 65 W by tweaking BIOS settings, and AMD plans to officially offer an "Eco Mode" option to run the CPU one power level down. As tested, lowering power level one notch reduces temperature and power draw with comparatively minimal effect on performance. Which is what you want, and probably what you could achieve by taking an 12900(K) and tweaking down PL1/PL2 in BIOS.

ZFS does not work with DDR5? Or do you just mean more RAM = better?

The latter: More RAM is always better. Sorry if that wasn't clear.

 

[stand]

Fine. That's still three times the "TDP" figure on the spec sheet, and enough of a margin to make it essentially meaningless.
It's not more energy efficient, it runs at lower clocks and is capped at lower maximal power.

Sorry, you are correct, energy efficient is not the correct term. I was meaning to point out that it requires more power, without it being proportional to the performance boost it provides (i.e. the law of diminishing returns).

However, the TDP is not meaningless! Although I would agree that well, it means... less these days. As you can read in the article you provided there are different levels of TDP:

PL1 is the amount of power a CPU is allowed to use under a sustained, heavy workload that keeps all of the CPU cores busy for a while. PL2 governs how much power a CPU can use when boosting for short periods of time—or times when only one or two cores need to run at their top speeds. Most games and day-to-day computing tasks fit this "bursty" pattern, where extended periods of low activity or idleness are punctuated by brief requests for peak performance. But many pro-level workloads like CPU-based video encoding and rendering benefit from better sustained performance.

Spec sheets show "processor base power" and "max turbo power", which are the PL1 and PL2 TDPs respectively.

You can underclock/undervolt all most CPUs to make them draw less power. However, you are playing the silicon lottery and you will get mixed results.

What you said did intrigue me though, so I looked around the internet for people who have undervolted their 12900Ks and most of them manage to get them to draw around 170W-180W PL2 relatively easy. There was even one Chinese reviewer who managed to get that down to about 115W (note, close but still not 106W) while keeping around 90% of the performance. This is great, but keep in mind that there are also a lot of people who weren't as lucky and only managed to make their systems unstable.

Let me know if I misunderstood what you are saying, but I just don't see the point of paying a premium for the 12900K, then playing the lottery and risking to make your system unstable, just to see if you will manage to get it close to the 12900T power draw. All of this for about 5-10% performance upgrade compared to the stock 12900T, which was designed and tested to be stable at these power levels.

 

[ChrisRJ]

I couldn't find any half-way decent performance requirements, neither for CPU, GPU, nor storage (sequential and random). Did I overlook those, or are they indeed missing?

 

[stand]

I couldn't find any half-way decent performance requirements, neither for CPU, GPU, nor storage (sequential and random). Did I overlook those, or are they indeed missing?

I am not sure what you mean.

Are you in the correct thread?

 

[Davvo]

I couldn't find any half-way decent performance requirements, neither for CPU, GPU, nor storage (sequential and random). Did I overlook those, or are they indeed missing?

They (kinda) are, the opener just wants the latest hardware.
I believe his intention was to receive feedback about a DDR5 ECC RAM based system.

 

[Etorix]

Let me know if I misunderstood what you are saying, but I just don't see the point of paying a premium for the 12900K, then playing the lottery and risking to make your system unstable, just to see if you will manage to get it close to the 12900T power draw. All of this for about 5-10% performance upgrade compared to the stock 12900T, which was designed and tested to be stable at these power levels.

As far as I know, the 12900T is not "designed" for anything, it is just binned ("tested") from the same wafers as its siblings. Those with defective CPU or GPU cores come out as i7 or 'F' CPUs; those which respond well to overclocking get the 'K', and corresponding price tag; those who respond well to low power get the 'T'; those who are well formed but lack any special merit end up as plain 12900.
At idle, all 12900/12900K/12900T are probably within 1 W of each other. So don't get the 'T': It's not "designed" or especially qualified to sip power, rather it is throttled at the factory to limit its maximal power dissipation to fit into small form factors or industrial designs where thermal dissipation is more severely constrained than in a gamer's desktop—and castrating maximal performance in the process.

I do NOT suggest to undervolt and/or underclock a server, for which stability is essential.
I suggest that, for Ryzen 7000 users, the "Eco Mode" (or manually setting power limits one notch down) looks an attractive—and official—option to get most of the performance while limiting temperature and power draw.
I suggested that it might be possible to similarly dial down PL1/PL2 in BIOS for Intel CPUs, and cap power draw with minimal impact on performance. On second thought, that was an error because, contrary to Ryzen, there's no indication on suitable, vendor-sanctioned, limits. The ArsTechnica piece has a 12900 with three different PL1/PL2 values, but the lower values 65/205 W are the base specification, 125/241W dials UP to simulate a 12900K and 241/241W is "full crazy, no brakes"—contrary to the Ryzen CPUs, which are shown at specification and dialled DOWN. No "Eco Mode" for Intel.

I am not sure what you mean.

Are you in the correct thread?

@ChrisRJ is definitely in the right thread, trying to bring some sanity and practicality to the conversation.
Theoretical considerations on CPU power limits and power dissipation are fine, but admittedly do not help building an actual system.
@ChrisRJ wants precise performance requirements and detailed use case. To understand why you consider using a last generation Core i9 in the first place, because that's a lot of computing power for a NAS… And to provide helpful recommendations that are tailored to your specific requirements and use case.

Otherwise, this is just about getting feedback on a given hardware list.
Which is, I suppose, the equivalent of "this Ferrari looks nice", where the feedback should rather be "it's not practical for the weekly shopping at the supermarket", or "do not even think about driving it into the outback".

 

[stand]

As far as I know, the 12900T is not "designed" for anything, it is just binned ("tested") from the same wafers as its siblings. Those with defective CPU or GPU cores come out as i7 or 'F' CPUs; those which respond well to overclocking get the 'K', and corresponding price tag; those who respond well to low power get the 'T'; those who are well formed but lack any special merit end up as plain 12900.

This has been true in the past yes, especially for AMD who used to have a 3 core CPU (really a 4 core CPU with a disabled core, which might or might not work stably/at all). However, I do not know how different/the same different Intel CPUs are currently and do not want to speculate.

throttled at the factory to limit its maximal power dissipation to fit into small form factors or industrial designs

You said it - throttled, tested, ready for use in production, cheaper than the K. My personal opinion - perfect for my use case.

@ChrisRJ wants precise performance requirements and detailed use case. To understand why you consider using a last generation Core i9 in the first place, because that's a lot of computing power for a NAS… And to provide helpful recommendations that are tailored to your specific requirements and use case.

I agree. This is an old thread I created back in June to enquire if someone has found a DDR5 module with ECC. I stated this clearly in my OP. I did not receive a response for months, during which time I found the Micron DDR5 ECC DIMM, which I also shared earlier when the thread started getting traction. It was never about a proposed build or advice on such. However, somehow got off topic very quickly.

I already shared my use case earlier, but for sake of completeness it pretty much boils down to:
1. Regular simultaneous users between 2 to 6 people. Probably as much occasional users, although very unlikely to be simultaneous with the rest.
2. Need/want to be low power
3. Needs to handle transcoding (the iGPU of the Intel CPU will be enough)
4. Needs to have lots of storage (i.e. need MB with lots of PCI-e)
5. May run 1-2 gaming VMs in the future with passthrough to external GPUs.
6. Want to be as future proofed as possible - meaning no DDR4, older gen CPUs, second hand parts, etc.
7. Should "feel" as a production build, but it is definitely not one. Will be used by me, family, friends. Downtime acceptable, tinkering assumed.
8. Price is not necessarily my first concern. I do not mind to overspend a little but be satisfied with what I have and certain it will last for years to come.

That is pretty much it.

 

[Davvo]

I did not receive a response for months

Because DDR5 ECC did not exists yet.
I continue to not understand you being dead set on DDR5 CPUs.

 

[stand]

Because DDR5 ECC did not exists yet.

Uh:

to enquire if someone has found

A "no we haven't found yet either it is still early" would have been enough.

 

[Davvo]

A "no we haven't found yet either it is still early" would have been enough.

Generally here if we don't have a good degree of certanty we don't post and wait for someone with the required knowledge. There wasn't any disrespect, I can assure you.
Besides, do remember people here do this service for free.

 

[stand]

No disrespect from me either. Like I said this thread got off topic.

 

[Etorix]

You said it - throttled, tested, ready for use in production, cheaper than the K. My personal opinion - perfect for my use case.

Forum wisom: Throttled rather than efficient; takes longer to complete and ends up using more power than regular CPUs; not really desirable for NAS use.

I already shared my use case earlier, but for sake of completeness it pretty much boils down to:

Thanks for the reminder. There are too many posts to keep track off.
From that, there are some contradictory requirements, some of which appear self-inflicted, and that's where a good understanding can help give the best advice.

1. Regular simultaneous users between 2 to 6 people. Probably as much occasional users, although very unlikely to be simultaneous with the rest.
2. Need/want to be low power

This is where Atom C3000 (very much current) or Xeon D-1500 shine, and why Xeon D-2100 has not completely superseded the old, pre-Skylake, D-1500 line.
Let's keep in mind that none of TDP, PL1 or PL2 are good indicators of actual power draw in a NAS.

3. Needs to handle transcoding (the iGPU of the Intel CPU will be enough)

Agree that this a good pointer to an Intel CPU with iGPU.

4. Needs to have lots of storage (i.e. need MB with lots of PCI-e)

"Lots of storage" can mean very different things to different people.
How large? How many drives? This may have consequences for RAM. Many drives means that the NAS is NOT low power, irrespective of CPU.
Why "lots of PCIe"? A single HBA can drive a large number of drives with a suitable backplane.
Do you want all NVMe storage? That would be a strong pointer to Xeon E5/Scalable or EPYC.
Or is that in anticipation of the "GPUs" (plural!) in point 5?

5. May run 1-2 gaming VMs in the future with passthrough to external GPUs.

Not being a gamer, I certainly do not fully grasp what that entails. How much computing power is required here?
Point 1. alone did not made a case for all the 24 threads of an i9-12900.

6. Want to be as future proofed as possible - meaning no DDR4, older gen CPUs, second hand parts, etc.

I can understand the desire to avoid second-hand hardware (though that's a pity considering that the UK provides about as many relevant eBay listings than the continent as a whole…). But avoiding "older gen" in general is a bit too far to be helpful. And DDR4 is certainly no old stuff yet. Complete DDR4 systems are going to be build and sold, fully new, for years to come.
Conversely, DDR5 is too new. As noted, DDR5 ECC UDIMM are barely making it to retail channels; DDR5 RDIMM are still nowhere to be found.

7. Should "feel" as a production build, but it is definitely not one. Will be used by me, family, friends. Downtime acceptable, tinkering assumed.
8. Price is not necessarily my first concern. I do not mind to overspend a little but be satisfied with what I have and certain it will last for years to come.

Money and will to tinker will certainly help. The rest is more of a psychological, and personal, nature.

If you do want to tinker with the latest tech out there, it's probably possible to put up something on DDR5. But no experienced contributor here will recommend it because the hardware is too new, and having few parts to choose from (few boards, only Alder/Raptor Lake or Ryzen 7000 but no dedicated server CPUs at as this writing) can mean compromises or forced choices.
If you accept that a well-designed server may have some 5-10 years of service ahead of it, that long-serving hardware will necessarily be "old gen" through most of its service life, and thus that it is acceptable for the server to not belong to "the latest and greatest" from the start, there will be many more options to choose from.