CentOS - Oct 2006 - CentOS 4.3 on Intel Xeon Core 2 Duo

Dear list,

I am planning to buy a new server -because the new Core2 Duo based Xeons 
(5100 series) are considerably faster in some scenarios than Opteron 
machines while not beeing more expensive, I would like to hear some 
real-world experiences from people who have installed CentOS 4.3 or 4.4 
on such a setup.

Specifically:

CPU:   2x Intel Xeon 5100 2GHz
Board: Intel S5000 chipset
RAID5: 3ware 9550SXU-4LP

I have some experience with the 3ware Adapter (new kernel module needed 
on install) but now nothing about compatibility, extra drivers or other 
problems related to the relatively new Xeon/S5000 platform and CentOS 
4.3/RHEL 4.3.

Thanks for any feedback.

-- 
Bye,

Marc Saric

On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 at 3:12pm, Marc Saric wrote
> I am planning to buy a new server -because the new Core2 Duo based Xeons 
> (5100 series) are considerably faster in some scenarios than Opteron
machines
> while not beeing more expensive, I would like to hear some real-world 
> experiences from people who have installed CentOS 4.3 or 4.4 on such a
setup.
>
> Specifically:
>
> CPU:   2x Intel Xeon 5100 2GHz
> Board: Intel S5000 chipset
> RAID5: 3ware 9550SXU-4LP
>
> I have some experience with the 3ware Adapter (new kernel module needed on 
> install) but now nothing about compatibility, extra drivers or other
problems
> related to the relatively new Xeon/S5000 platform and CentOS 4.3/RHEL 4.3.
I've got a testbox with a Supermicro X7DVL motherboard and dual Xeon 
5140s.  The onboard network was *not* supported in CentOS 4.3, but is as 
of 4.4.  Also, the 3w-9xxx received a significant upgrade in the 4.4 
kernel vs. the one from 4.3.  So, you *really* want to go with 4.4 on that 
hardware over 4.3.

-- 
Joshua Baker-LePain
Department of Biomedical Engineering
Duke University

> CPU:   2x Intel Xeon 5100 2GHz
> Board: Intel S5000 chipset
> RAID5: 3ware 9550SXU-4LP
It appears you did not encounter this problem?

http://www.3ware.com/kb/article.aspx?id=14932


With regard to the stability issues I raised in the other thread, the 
korean portal that did should have been in a position to provide proper 
power supplies and cooling or maybe not. I guess it is safe to say that 
Woodcrest + FB-DIMM = hot.


You may therefore want to go with the board that Joshua is using since 
he has not encountered stability problems. It does have 64-bit PCI-X 
slots for your 3ware card.