Affordable HEDT, is there such a thing?

[Ruru]

Upd: might be possible to get a multiple socket X299 motherboard and buy yourself another 10980XE but this also has its disadvantages such as size at the very least.

Supports only single CPU operation according to Intel

Intel® Core™ i9-10980XE Extreme Edition Processor (24.75M Cache, 3.00 GHz) - Product Specifications | Intel

Intel® Core™ i9-10980XE Extreme Edition Processor (24.75M Cache, 3.00 GHz) quick reference with specifications, features, and technologies.

www.intel.com

 

[RootinTootinPootin]

Yes X399 improves on PCIe lanes, 60 vs 48, however on a compute scale would be at best a lateral move. And I would be giving up AVX512.

Then at this point, the best is still the one you have.

 

[Macro Device]

Supports only single CPU operation according to Intel

Real shame!

 

[Ferrum Master]

Aren't new Threadrippers coming in Jan?

 

[Bill_Bright]

but not many appreciate the expense of the workstation boards

Very true. I blame, as I often do, marketing weenies.

I mean they call this $57 Quadro NVS295 256M a "Professional Workstation Graphics Card". That's not a workstation card, let alone "Professional" grade card.

This is a workstation graphics card.

 

[Dr. Dro]

I know what it means. I explained what it means. I even explained how Intel created the term which explains your "used to be" scenarios.


No - that's not what happened. Intel stopped selling preassembled computers long ago. As for AMD, HEDT is just a label - essentially a marketing term similar to Kleenex or Band-aid, once brand names that became names for "tissues" and "adhesive bandages" respectively, or "hoover" in the UK for vacuum cleaners.

Many companies and custom independent builders still make "high-end" computers - they just don't call them HEDTs anymore - in part, maybe, because most are built in tower cases (not horizontally orientated "desktop" cases) that sit, perhaps, on the floor and not a desktop.

Don't get stuck on the original and now archaic meaning of the acronym. It is not the same thing as it "used to be".

You misunderstood mate. I didn't mean pre-built computers, it's that the Intel X299 platform has not received a successor to this day and the i9 10980XE is the last of the "Extreme Edition" line. It's also the only that offers quad channel (bandwidth figures only reached the same ballpark with DDR5 running > 7200 MT/s), 44+ lanes (although the platform is old now and this is limited to Gen 3), > 8 "big" P-cores (10980XE has 18 P-cores) and AVX-512 support, which not even Arrow Lake mainstream desktop has.

More recent exotic CPUs like the Special Edition "KS" chips are just binned mainstream desktop processors. They run on the mainstream chipset with all the same memory and expansion options from the regular H/B/Z type chipsets and don't offer a distinct feature set or better expandability compared to the regular counterparts.

The 10980XE is still one of the single most powerful processors Intel has released to this day, and while it's begun to get long in the tooth it still has no replacement from Intel at all and no replacement from AMD that comes at a reasonable price.

Aren't new Threadrippers coming in Jan?

At an extremely high price, yes.

 

[DemonicRyzen666]

Threadripper platform looks nice, but the biggest issues is the entry level cpu are literally twice the price of a 9950x or more. The Threadripper 79060x is $1250 to $1,500. Theres nothing in between that price range of $700 to $1,200 there for entry.
The cheapest current Threadripper board I think TRX50 board is around the price of the the high-end side ASUS/Gigabyte AM5 board's. in the $600 to $700 mark.

 

[Bill_Bright]

I do understand. You are still focused on the "marketing" hype.

If we go by what you are saying, there are, essentially no such things as high-end computers anymore. And that just is not true.

still has no replacement from Intel at all and no replacement from AMD that comes at a reasonable price.

So? The 10980XE - at least according to the ark, is still in production. And the same applies to AMD. But why does it matter to you that no replacements are in the works? You are suggesting a CPU must be designated for a specific purpose in order for that class of computers to be supported. That is not true. It is like saying a computer "marketed" as a gaming computer cannot be used for CAD/CAE work. Not true. It can also "mine", search for a cure for cancer, compile a database, or be used to create a Word doc, an AI person or email.

Look at the SUV. SUV stands for "sport" utility vehicle. What's sporty about the majority of today's SUVs? Heck, many don't even have 4WD or even AWD anymore. Its the same difference. Ford even stopped making sedans. Why? Because SUVs make great "family cars".

I do hear and understand what you are saying. I am just saying dedicated "workstation" CPUs are no longer needed to make "high end" computers these days. If someone "needs" that, maybe they should look into the realm of renting time in cloud or mainframe computing.

 

[Macro Device]

But why does it matter to you that no replacements are in the works?

Simply because software requirements go higher day by day and 10980XE no longer feels snappy. Bearable at best. It's a nine year old architecture (albeit refined a half dozen times) at this point. 18 cores isn't as extreme as this felt when 7980XE had been released. Single core speed is just not it, either. Mind me, 10980XE is just a polished 7980XE without any major IPC difference in whatever task.

Previously, one could throw about four thousand dollars into a CPU+MB+RAM platform that will be nuts fast and suitable for almost any workload.

Today, CPUs alone cost beyond that. Motheboards are scarce. 10980XE is five (de facto nine) generations old. Upgrading from 10980XE, one either gets a "standard" desktop platform for much less and misses out on PCI-e lanes and some other features or gets a gonzo priced server platform and misses out on a dozen thousand dollars or even more. This is the problem.

 

[Bill_Bright]

Simply because software requirements go higher day by day and 10980XE no longer feels snappy.

NO! You are missing my point. You do not have to have a CPU designated as a workstation CPU to do workstation tasks. That's the point.

 

[Dr. Dro]

So? The 10980XE - at least according to the ark, is still in production. And the same applies to AMD. But why does it matter to you that no replacements are in the works? You are suggesting a CPU must be designated for a specific purpose in order for that class of computers to be supported. That is not true. It is like saying a computer "marketed" as a gaming computer cannot be used for CAD/CAE work. Not true. It can also "mine", search for a cure for cancer, compile a database, or be used to create a Word doc, an AI person or email.

I think ARK's information is out of date, ARK itself has gotten completely butchered lately, Intel seems to be no longer maintaining it. The 10980XE is already ~5 years old (being the second refinement of the 7980XE, released all the way back in 2017) and it's been unavailable to purchase outside of marketplace listings alongside X299 boards for a very long time now. It's still the most sought-after LGA2066 chip (being both the flagship and its most capable, versatile offering), although you can usually find the 7980XE for half the price if you can tolerate the slightly lower clocks and some of the hardware-level errata that the 9980XE and 10980XE ended up fixing. 9980XE's aren't worth getting at all since they cost more or less the same as the 10980XE in the used market.

AMD's offerings are available in select retailers (meaning; few shops have them) but the problem with current generation Threadripper parts is that their prices are obscenely, insanely high. Zen 4 Threadripper starts at $1500 for the lowest-end 24-core model (7960X). with motherboards that tend to start in the $800 range. Since they have no competition, they do just like Nvidia and charge whatever they want for their products.

NO! You are missing my point. You do not have to have a CPU designated as a workstation CPU to do workstation tasks. That's the point.

I think you misunderstood us all, Bill. We agree there is no explicit limitation preventing the system from being used for any given role, it's just that "mainstream platforms" have certain hardware limitations. The amount of CPU cores, instruction sets, expansion ports, memory slots - they're all quite limited compared to their HEDT counterparts, making them unsuitable for workstations that will deal with complex calculations or high-demand, high-throughput I/O. These limitations make the machine ill-suited for the role because it's just not fast enough to complete the task in a reasonable allotment of time, or it could be that it perhaps cannot store all the data required to process the workload - in some cases, depending on instruction set required, it won't even execute it (currently, AVX-512 workloads if we're talking Intel).

Even with a motherboard like the MSI Ace Z690/Z790 series, with 5 M.2 slots and 3 PCIe slots, you deal with lots of lane-splitting and bandwidth halving, bifurcation is a must if you mean to use most of the connectivity present on the board, and you are still limited to only 4 memory slots, or effectively half the memory capacity of an HEDT system. Just look at my build as per system specs, it takes the Z790 platform to almost its absolute extreme, and all I have is an SSD and a GPU plugged into the motherboard. All of the memory channels are populated and in use.

 

[Bill_Bright]

No - once again, I understand what you are saying. It is you who refuse to take off the blinkers and look and understand what I am saying. Either that, or you just don't get it.

Why doesn't Ford sell sedans in the US anymore? Because SUVs do everything cars do, and more and therefore, people stopped buying Ford sedans.

Now you can argue all you want that sedans are more comfortable or they get better gas mileage, it does not change the fact you don't have to have a vehicle designated as a sedan to take passengers and their luggage to wherever they want to go.

 

[RJARRRPCGP]

Looking at this, if I even get into anything like this, I'm most likely getting an X299, X99 or X79.

 

[Wirko]

HEDT is frankly a mess

Also because AMD carefully designed the four variants of the LGA 4094 socket to be universally incompatible with each other.

 

[Dr. Dro]

Looking at this, if I even get into anything like this, I'm most likely getting an X299, X99 or X79.

X58 and X79 are good if you want cheap and compatible with early OS. You may run XP (and even 2000) on these if you want no sweat, 12-core CPUs like 2697 v2 available at ~$30, downside being, DDR3 only

X99 is good if you want a reasonably modern machine with tons of CPU cores, AVX2 and TSX support, you can pickup a 14-core 2680v4 for like $15. Requires some work but is perfectly passable for a modern W11 system. DDR4 support but only low speeds (2133 and 2400, up to 3000ish/3200ish with i7 chips)

X299 is still relatively powerful and has CPUs with very complete instruction sets, very much a "current" system

No - once again, I understand what you are saying. It is you who refuse to take off the blinkers and look and understand what I am saying. Either that, or you just don't get it.

Why doesn't Ford sell sedans in the US anymore? Because SUVs do everything cars do, and more and therefore, people stopped buying Ford sedans.

Now you can argue all you want that sedans are more comfortable or they get better gas mileage, it does not change the fact you don't have to have a vehicle designated as a sedan to take passengers and their luggage to wherever they want to go.

I do recognize it has become a niche and most people will be OK with modern MSDTs, but it's a bit undeniable that HEDTs of old were and remain more versatile systems

 

[damric]

48 lanes or Gen3, 4 or 5?

I'd be happy with 4x16 gen 4 slots for cheap thank you

 

[RJARRRPCGP]

X58

I already got X58 back in the late-2010s. I did change the motherboard in summer of 2019, though. In December, 2020, I got a 12 GB Corsair Vengeance triple-channel kit.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Yes, I’m looking for more compute. However, as much as I see that Zen2 would resolve the compute issue minus AVX512, I’d still be saddled with an antiquated platform from Q4 2019. And, for a significant sum of money, though well short of a Zen3 platform.
I appreciate your analysis, and am inclined to source and price out the Zen2 and Zen3 parts needed. Then I will determine my course of action. I have a number of upgraded components ready to go, including Asus Dual RTX4080, Kingston 2TB Gen4 m.2 ssd, Crucial 1TB Gen4 m.2 ssd, Corsair RM850x (thinking to exchange for RM1000x). Cheers.

"Antiquated" is a subjective thing but also doesn't apply to Zen2 TR models. That said, Zen3 is not super expensive, relatively speaking. For example ATM a used 5965WX(24C/47T) can be had for about $1300-$1500 on Ebay. A 5975WX is around $1600 to $1900. A matching motherboard can be had for about $800-$900. Quite reasonable all things considered and a marked upgrade from what you have.

Simply because software requirements go higher day by day and 10980XE no longer feels snappy.

That's not true at all. I have a Dell Vostro i5-2450M that runs Windows 11 and it feels very "snappy". If someone is running a 10980X and it doesn't have good & snappy performance, they need to debloat their install of Windows.

 

[eidairaman1]

"Antiquated" is a subjective but also doesn't apply to Zen2 TR models. That said, Zen3 is not super expensive, relatively speaking. For example ATM a use 5965WX(24C/47T) can be had for about $1300-$1500 use on Ebay. A 5975WX is around $1600 to $1900. A matching motherboard can be had for about $800-$900. Quite reasonable all things considered and a marked upgrade from what you have.


That's not true at all. I have a Dell Vostro i5-2450M that runs Windows 11 and it feels very "snappy". If someone is running a 10980X and it doesn't have good & snappy performance, they need to debloat their install of Windows.

Old ass Toshiba Satellite laptop from 2008- had pre-release w10, 3G ddr2, found another 2GB dimm to replace the 1GB, what a difference 4 made in it with windows 10, then it updated. I even got drivers to install from that era for the igp/chipset which were ATi/AMD.

 

[RJARRRPCGP]

X58 and X79 are good if you want cheap and compatible with early OS. You may run XP (and even 2000) on these if you want no sweat, 12-core CPUs like 2697 v2 available at ~$30, downside being, DDR3 only

X99 is good if you want a reasonably modern machine with tons of CPU cores, AVX2 and TSX support, you can pickup a 14-core 2680v4 for like $15. Requires some work but is perfectly passable for a modern W11 system. DDR4 support but only low speeds (2133 and 2400, up to 3000ish/3200ish with i7 chips)

X299 is still relatively powerful and has CPUs with very complete instruction sets, very much a "current" system

Yep, no TR for me, because the prices remind me of a great inflation catastrophe or like the pre-internet-era CGI stuff.

TR is off the table, just like video cards in '21! Fiddlesticks! If I was planning a TR, then it would be another PC project in the trenches!

Even more than when people were price gouging Phenom II X6s in the mid-2010s!

 

[Toothless]

Would a not-new but not-old dual socket work? I've ran W10 Pro on multiple dual sockets (even a dual socket 1366) perfectly fine and they do pack enough PCI lanes. V4 Broadwells can run W11 with a TPM module and go up to 22 cores per chip.

However my dual 2698v4 matches a 5950x in multi threading. You'd want something much newer but that may make the price spike pretty high.

 

[freeagent]

I was looking at prices on Amazon using links in this thread.. prices don't seem too terrible considering what you are getting.

If it were me I would probably be aiming for at least Zen 3, but I am merely a peasant.

Wait, I am on Zen 3

 

[lexluthermiester]

Yep, no TR for me, because the prices

Xeon parts aren't much better and TR is more accessible to the consumer.

 

[eidairaman1]

I was looking at prices on Amazon using links in this thread.. prices don't seem too terrible considering what you are getting.

If it were me I would probably be aiming for at least Zen 3, but I am merely a peasant.

Wait, I am on Zen 3

My issue is the skt confusion with the amd hedt platform, i mean they changed too rapidly since 2017

 

[Keithw1975]

I have a 9820x Intel system that got passed down to my kids after I upgraded to a 5900x and now a 9950x. The lack of a 4 channel memory controller and additional PCI lanes is just pathetic. Both companies have been stagnant in these areas for way too long.
You should probably just bite the bullet and get a 7960x. The MBs are about the same price as nice AM5 boards and the chip is only around $1,200.