Requested advice for hardware

[robertico_rdk]

I plan to build a system for the company I work for.
Can someone give me some hardware advice.

Requirements:

- Rack based server
- Space for 4 to 6 cards (depends on the number of GPUs)
(What's the max number of GPUs supported ?)

Required information.

- Prefered server case (in connection with cooling and power supply)
- Prefered motherboard
- Prefered graphic cards (it seems that AMD is preferred - price-speed ratio)
- Prefered power supply (one or more)

Intended for all kind of calculations (oclHashcat/cudaHascat)

Please share (recent) building experiences

Thanks in advance

[Flomac]

I plan to build a system for the company I work for.
Can someone give me some hardware advice.

Requirements:

- Rack based server
- Space for 4 to 6 cards (depends on the number of GPUs)
(What's the max number of GPUs supported ?)

Required information.

Sagitta Systems

- Prefered server case (in connection with cooling and power supply)
- Prefered motherboard
- Prefered graphic cards (it seems that AMD is preferred - price-speed ratio)
- Prefered power supply (one or more)

Intended for all kind of calculations (oclHashcat/cudaHascat)

Please share (recent) building experiences

Thanks in advance

You need something like this -> Server Rack

But honestly, since some people (including me) are making money by giving advice to people/companies like you, that's as far as I can go here. And no, AMD is not preferred when it comes to TCO. It all depends on what hashes you have to crack.

[robertico_rdk]

Sagitta Systems

Many thanks for the link. I will definitely determine if this is an option for us

And no, AMD is not preferred when it comes to TCO. It all depends on what hashes you have to crack.

I there any documentation about this subject ?

[epixoip]

AMD used to be the way to go for many years. This is no longer the case starting with Nvidia Maxwell. The best GPUs you can buy right now are GTX 970, GTX 980, and GTX Titan X.

[Shady_Wushu]

If you want documentation, go back through the hardware forum and look at some of the posts from around when the 980s came out. Epixoip and others who managed to get 980s right when they were released posted a number of benchmarks and statistics. You can easily compare these to see the reason why they are recommended. The benchmarks between the 980s and 290x are very similar in terms of speed, yet the 980 draws much less power. Combine that with the fact that nVidia has better multi-hash performance and much better driver support (which I can wholeheartedly attest to), and the Maxwell series of cards are a much better choice today.

My team has always built our servers from scratch - mainly because I enjoy building and tinkering with them, and I have the ability to do it and an understanding wife who lets me put in extra time at the office to tinker with it. That said, other teams in my firm use Sagitta Systems servers and have nothing but good things to say about them. So take the time commitment and technical ability into account when you are looking at this.

[epixoip]

I try not to get involved with discussions about my company on these forums, as I try to keep my professional life separate from my community volunteer work and do not want to risk the appearance of advertising, but I must state for the record that the company name is Sagitta HPC, not Sagitta Systems I know it's confusing because of the URL, but Sagitta Systems is actually an entirely different company that we are not affiliated with, and indeed didn't even know they existed until people started calling us by that name. We're planning to change the URL to avoid any further confusion (the old URL will still be valid, will just redirect to the new one.)

Back on topic, if you'd like documentation, see:

https://gist.github.com/epixoip/abd64f1af800013abb1f
https://gist.github.com/epixoip/1f26f43e9036d9ce0eb8

[Shady_Wushu]

*facepalm* Doh.

Noted for the future.

[Flomac]

... but I must state for the record that the company name is Sagitta HPC, not Sagitta Systems

Sorry for the confusion, just copied that link

[robertico_rdk]

Many thanks for the responses. Specifically with regard to the choice of the cards.

Any advice regarding a suitable motherboard?