Where will the bottle neck be?

[theEmbark]

Hey all,

I have a few old hp proliant ml350 G5 servers that I am going to turn into audio workstations and I'm trying to spot where I might have troubles.

The first of the 2 has the following:
2 x e5440 2.83ghz 4 core 8 thread
32gb ddr2 ram
This machine will be used with VEP5 to host virtual instruments for my main stations. Hoping to be able to run a minimum of 30. A combination of kontakt, serum, xln drums and keys, etc.

The second of the 2 has the same:
2 x e5440 2.83ghz 4 core 8 thread
32gb ddr2 ram

I plan to use it to host a daw. Probably starting with sonar and hoping to move to Cubase. Multiple track recording is important. Hoping to be able to play back 50-150 tracks at once. And record about 8-12 tracks at once. Some of which may have VSTis running.

Do you think these older xeons and ddr2 ram can manage it? I can always upgrade ram. Just trying to get an idea before I convert them.

Thanks,
Kevin

[BertKoor]

I'd start with running the DPC Latency Test. Otherwise me thinks they should be up to such a task. Just try it and see how far you can push things.

[Stanoli]

here

http://www.samash.com/dunlop-218-bottle ... short-d218

[planetearth]

Hey all,

I have a few old hp proliant ml350 G5 servers that I am going to turn into audio workstations and I'm trying to spot where I might have troubles.

The first of the 2 has the following:
2 x e5440 2.83ghz 4 core 8 thread
32gb ddr2 ram
This machine will be used with VEP5 to host virtual instruments for my main stations. Hoping to be able to run a minimum of 30. A combination of kontakt, serum, xln drums and keys, etc.

The second of the 2 has the same:
2 x e5440 2.83ghz 4 core 8 thread
32gb ddr2 ram

I plan to use it to host a daw. Probably starting with sonar and hoping to move to Cubase. Multiple track recording is important. Hoping to be able to play back 50-150 tracks at once. And record about 8-12 tracks at once. Some of which may have VSTis running.

Do you think these older xeons and ddr2 ram can manage it? I can always upgrade ram. Just trying to get an idea before I convert them.

Thanks,
Kevin

The Xeons should be fine, but how fast is that DDR2 RAM? You can upgrade to faster RAM, but it will still be DDR2, not the faster DDR3, and more RAM won't solve your bottleneck/speed problem.

You'll also want to look at cooling and noise. Servers are usually built with several fans in place for cooling; these fans will add considerable noise to your recording environment.

What's your hard drive configuration? Are they SATA-II or (hopefully) SATA-III? If you want to play back up to 150 tracks, you may need to consider an SSD drive (or, perhaps a RAID configuration).

Basically, if you're looking to work with what you have, make sure you have the fastest RAM your mobo can support. And unless you're sure you need two systems, I wouldn't outfit both of them until I'd gone beyond the capabilities of one alone. I'd also update the BIOS of each machine, to make sure it's as "optimized" as you can get it. And then turn off any server-level options (you won't need them) in the BIOS, and anything in Windows 7 (not 10, hopefully) that you don't need, either.

Steve

[planetearth]

I'd start with running the DPC Latency Test. Otherwise me thinks they should be up to such a task. Just try it and see how far you can push things.

One of the biggest "hits" on the DPC Latency test will be the network adapters. Since most servers are built with two, you'll want to disable the second one in the BIOS (not in Windows); you'll only need one NIC for your DAW.

Steve

[Kaine]

The Xeons should be fine, but how fast is that DDR2 RAM? You can upgrade to faster RAM, but it will still be DDR2, not the faster DDR3, and more RAM won't solve your bottleneck/speed problem.

I'm not so sure on that, I don't think that's going to be the bottle neck here. RAM on any given generation is generally more than capable of feeding the CPU quickly enough for audio work. More troubling is that a pair of those Xeons pull the same benchmark wise as a single i5 6600 CPU these days.

If your drives are fast enough you'll be able to stream the audio itself, but if your slapping on the processing to your sounds then you may find yourself hitting a wall pretty quickly.

[planetearth]

The Xeons should be fine, but how fast is that DDR2 RAM? You can upgrade to faster RAM, but it will still be DDR2, not the faster DDR3, and more RAM won't solve your bottleneck/speed problem.

I'm not so sure on that, I don't think that's going to be the bottle neck here. RAM on any given generation is generally more than capable of feeding the CPU quickly enough for audio work. More troubling is that a pair of those Xeons pull the same benchmark wise as a single i5 6600 CPU these days.

If your drives are fast enough you'll be able to stream the audio itself, but if your slapping on the processing to your sounds then you may find yourself hitting a wall pretty quickly.

My concern was more that this was ECC RAM, and there could be a slight performance hit. I should have stated that earlier, however. And if this was a simple e-mail or file server, it may not have been the fastest DDR2 RAM in the first place.

Since the OP was looking for potential bottlenecks and things that could be upgraded, I didn't really think replacing the CPUs was an option--especially not on an HP mobo, where HP doesn't always provide BIOS updates. You're right, though: if the OP is going to stay with the HP mobo, I'd get the fastest CPUs, RAM and drives the mobo can support. But I'd make sure HP had a BIOS update to support the new CPUs. (Doing this on my own HP mobo years ago was...interesting, but I was able to upgrade it to be able to accept a dual-core Athlon at a higher clock frequency, and it was worth it.)

At some point though, replacing the CPUs, RAM, hard drives and fans with the fastest/quietest you can get is going to come close to buying a modest system new. Your performance would be about the same, but you'll still have two huge servers in your studio, making a lot of noise and generating a lot of heat. At what point does it just become a better idea to build a modest system with room for upgrades? I'm all for trying to use these servers for audio, and using one for VEP5 might work well, but using the other for the DAW might not.

Steve

[theEmbark]

Thanks for all the replies!

First of all the second machine (the daw machine) isn't for me. I just built a new workstation for my studio. It's for a friend that co owns our studio but doesn't own a machine powerful enough for our projects in his apartment.

That a side the VEP server is really more of what I am interested in. As far as the noise - I've taken care of that. Nothing a few case mods can't fix. I've also pulled both network cards and going to replace them with a lower latency workstation card.

My main work station is running dual x5680s but I still want to keep that for processing everything but my VSTis that I regularly use.

Thanks,
Kevin

[Kaine]

At some point though, replacing the CPUs, RAM, hard drives and fans with the fastest/quietest you can get is going to come close to buying a modest system new. Your performance would be about the same, but you'll still have two huge servers in your studio, making a lot of noise and generating a lot of heat. At what point does it just become a better idea to build a modest system with room for upgrades? I'm all for trying to use these servers for audio, and using one for VEP5 might work well, but using the other for the DAW might not.

Yep, I'm with you on that. You're right as well that ECC will run slightly slower, but I doubt it's going to make any difference from a audio processing point of view.

I wouldn't suggest for a second trying to upgrade the CPU's as unless you can get some for free (or as close as...) it's unlikely that going up the range on that generation is going to yield you much that can top a single current generation i7. As you rightly say, once you take into account cost of upgrades (if you go that route), heat, noise and the age of the hardware that is in there (how long is it, until things start to die), I'd say if your paying for the machines I'd strongly consider buying something new and mid-range as it's likely to outperform it.

However if OP is getting / has these for free, the's no problem with attempting to leverage them. I was just commenting that they may spend a lot of time setting that up and not be overly happy with the end result.

[theEmbark]

I agree that the memory might be a sticking point.

And by no means would I spend the money to buy/build these machines. They came from an office of a buddy and I figured I'd attempt to repurpose them before stripping them for parts.

The only money I spent was right around $30 for hard drive trays and a FireWire card. I'll probably get these running today or tomorrow. I'll let you know how they perform. I'm curious about the one running the daw but ultimately I just want to get the VEP server up.

[planetearth]

I agree that the memory might be a sticking point.

And by no means would I spend the money to buy/build these machines. They came from an office of a buddy and I figured I'd attempt to repurpose them before stripping them for parts.

The only money I spent was right around $30 for hard drive trays and a FireWire card. I'll probably get these running today or tomorrow. I'll let you know how they perform. I'm curious about the one running the daw but ultimately I just want to get the VEP server up.

Good luck, and let us know how it goes!

Steve