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PostPosted: Tue Oct 04, 2011 7:14 am 
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I have a EX490 and am looking to upgrade the CPU. I was looking at a E6600 which has the best price but I am worried about the CPU's reveiws on the seller website. MAny people have said the CPU was unstable. What are your thoughts? What is the best CPU for the price with little concerns regarding heat?

Thanks for helping.


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PostPosted: Tue Oct 04, 2011 9:18 am 
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Hi Tacomaman,

Welcome to MediaSmartServer.net. :) If you do a site search, it would seem quite a few folks here are running the E6600 processor and having success with it. I myself am running an E5300 in my EX490 and my EX487 and they're awesome.

The only major differences I see between the processors other than clock speed (3.06 GHz vs. 2.6 GHz) is the bus speed (1066 MHz vs 800 MHz), plus some models of the E5300 do not support Intel VT-x (virtualization technology) -- both of my E5300s support VT-x.

Again, people are having success with them. If you use the processor in its stock configuration (i.e. you don't overclock it) then I doubt you should have any problems with it. A fellow member, erail, speaks to a few really handy tools in some of his posts. The first is OCCT, a CPU stress tester. The other is SpeedFan, which provides temperature monitoring and fan speed controls, among other things. SpeedFan isn't required, unless you find your gear tends to run hot and/or you think your fans are running too fast or slow.

OCCT is a must after installing an upgraded CPU. Install the CPU, fire up the server, wait until it comes up, log in and reboot. The reboot is necessary because the server (Windows) just changed from a uniprocessor kernel to a multiprocessor kernel. The reboot will cause Windows to boot with the multiprocessor kernel and then you should see both cores in Task Manager. Once you've done this, you should run OCCT and see how the CPU performs and how hot it gets.

When you install the CPU, go easy on the thermal compound! Different people have different strategies of how to apply it. A little bit of Arctic Silver goes a long way on a CPU. The total amount of AS you should put on the CPU is less than the size of a pea. Some folks like to put a very thin ribbon of AS down the middle of the CPU and then gently "rock" the heatsink over the CPU to spread it. I prefer to put a small amount of AS in the middle of the CPU and then use a defunct credit card to gently spread it across the CPU to the edges, wiping excess compound off the card. This puts a very fine coating of AS on the CPU, and offers complete coverage of the surface. Set the CPU in the socket, close the CPU cover and lock the bracket, then install the heatsink.

If you see Arctic Silver ooze out or you hear a "farting" sound (AS is squirting out of the tight space) when the heatsink is tightened, you've put too much compound on! Excess compound will NOT do a good job, and will probably damage your CPU and/or socket. When the CPU is sitting in the socket, the Arctic Silver should be a thin film on the CPU, not an ooey gooey mess. I've seen more heat related stability problems with excessive thermal compound than I've seen where folks neglect to use any thermal compound at all.

Matt

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HP EX490, 4GB, E5300, 15TB - Server 2012 - Sharing and Streaming
HP EX487, 4GB, E5300, 13TB - Server 2012 Essentials - Backups


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PostPosted: Tue Oct 04, 2011 10:33 am 
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Matt,

Thanks for the information and tip about the thermal paste. I will definately do some reading. Can you tell me how to get programs like CPU-z or OCCT on the server. (BTW what is OCCT?)

Thanks,
Jeff


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PostPosted: Wed Oct 05, 2011 9:37 pm 
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Hi Jeff,

Here's where to get CPU-Z: http://www.cpuid.com/softwares/cpu-z.html

OCCT is a CPU stress testing utility. There are others out there like Core Damage, etc. The job of such a tool is to max out your CPU running a variety of instructions with the objective of getting its temperature to rise. If your server has proper airflow, cooling, correct application of thermal paste, proper heatsink, etc. then you should not overheat the processor or trigger a thermal shutdown. OCCT does a good job of letting you know if errors were detected or if it thinks you hit an unsafe temperature.

My CPUs typically run in the high 30s to mid 40s Celsius. OCCT got them to flirt with 60, but that's about it. If you start getting into the 70s, you've got reasons to be concerned.

You can get OCCT here: http://www.ocbase.com/perestroika_en/index.php?Download (the name stands for OverClock Checking Tool)

To get these onto your Server, the easiest way is to just copy them into one of your shares on the server, then use full remote desktop (not the WHS console) to pull up the desktop. That'll let you interact with the server from its own desktop. If you have the debug cable for HP EX servers, you can use that as well and work directly from the console.

Matt

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HP EX490, 4GB, E5300, 15TB - Server 2012 - Sharing and Streaming
HP EX487, 4GB, E5300, 13TB - Server 2012 Essentials - Backups


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PostPosted: Thu Oct 06, 2011 11:38 am 
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We've got a Wiki article with more detailed instructions that you might find helpful: http://www.mediasmartserver.net/wiki/in ... the_server

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PostPosted: Fri Oct 07, 2011 6:22 am 
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I want to thank everyone first of all for the help. I am learning alot.

I was able to get OCCT and CPU-Z onto the server and used the add-in "To Desktop" to install and run them. The one problem I have now is I ran OCCT with the original EX490 Celeron CPU and OCCT stopped after 1-2 min and said my CPU was to hot. I was watching the CPU temp via the servers software and it stayed aroud 55c. Do I have to install another program to work with OCCT? If so what do you recommend? I want to get this all right so I can properly install my new CPU and test it when it arrives.

Thanks Again!!


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PostPosted: Fri Oct 07, 2011 3:58 pm 
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According to Intel, the "TCASE" for the Celeron is 60.4C. At least that's for the Celeron 440 (EX487 stock CPU). I'm not sure what OCCT considers to be its threshold, but if you were hovering around 55, you were within 5 degrees of the theoretical temperature limit for that CPU. OCCT is probably built to be "smart enough" to not actually let you go into thermal shutdown.

The TCASE for my E5300 is 74.1C, and OCCT never even got close to that for me. I think the closest I got during an hour-long test was 14 degrees (62C), and that was the peak. I generally ran in the 50s during the test. Under normal load, both cores run in the high 30s, and run in the low-to-mid 40s under medium-to-heavy loads. If I push them really hard, I can get them into the low 50s, well below the TCASE limit.

So if OCCT was running your CPU at 55C, it would only need to creep up an extra degree or two, even briefly, for OCCT to throw in the towel and halt the test.

In my less than humble opinion, the Celerons that came with the EX490 and the EX48x are terrible, cheap processors. I upgraded both my servers (a 490 and a 487) to E5300s without any fuss or trouble and they run great.

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HP EX490, 4GB, E5300, 15TB - Server 2012 - Sharing and Streaming
HP EX487, 4GB, E5300, 13TB - Server 2012 Essentials - Backups


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PostPosted: Fri Oct 07, 2011 4:09 pm 
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Here is what I got from OCCT:

Attachment:
2011-10-07-18h00-CPU1.png
2011-10-07-18h00-CPU1.png [ 18.57 KiB | Viewed 19657 times ]


I watched the CPU temp and fan speeds from the hardware tab on the HP meadia server and the fans barely moved and the CPU temp went from 50-54C. The above is what OCCT read. I hope the new CPU is alot more like what everyone else is reporting.

Thanks,
Jeff


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