Intel® Speed Select Technology (Intel® SST) Performance Profiles can offer enhanced performance, reduced power, and flexibility

Executive Summary

In data center environments, workload performance and efficiency on a per-node basis is key to business operations. Extracting the maximum performance for a given workload on each server is essential.

What if there was a way to do more with what you already have?

This Direct from Development tech note describes how we lab-tested and explored the real-world benefits of Intel® Speed Select Technology Performance Profiles (Intel® SST-PP) on 4th  Generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable processors running on Dell PowerEdge servers. Intel SST-PP has been available on Intel Xeon CPUs since 3rd Generation Xeon products came to market in 2021. On Dell PowerEdge servers with supported CPUs, SST-PP allows the enablement of Performance Profiles (Also called Operation Points), which reduces the number of active cores while increasing the frequency of cores still active.

As a result, you can match the CPU to your specific workload and so allocate performance as needed, meaning that you are reducing complexity in your data center and lowering cost.

The following chart shows the SST-PP available for the Intel Xeon Gold 5418Y Processor we tested, with Performance Profile 0 being the default mode:

Test Results

Different workloads respond differently to available resources or changes in configuration. In the arena of CPU configurations, some workloads demonstrate a greater affinity for higher frequency while others respond to an increase in the number of available CPU cores. In this instance, the tested SQL database workload performed optimally using SST-PP 1. This Performance Profile increases each core’s frequency by 300 MHz while reducing the number of available cores by eight.

The following chart illustrates a performance gain greater than 12 percent, which was attained by simply switching to a different SST-PP in the system BIOS. 

A performance increase is often associated with a commensurate increase in power draw. However, in this instance when leveraging SST-PP, this is not the case. During this benchmark test, we see a nearly 5 percent reduction in total system power while enjoying an increase in performance of approximately 12 percent.

12% performance increase in SQL database workload⁽¹⁾

Increase of 18% in performance per watt in SQL database workload ⁽²⁾

Conclusion

Intel SST-PP can enable increased performance and create per-node flexibility in workload specialization, allowing for a dynamic array of servers that can be allocated optimally for any task.

SST-PP technology is available on all servers in Dell’s mainstream server portfolio. It is also available in CSP and Edge focused servers when they are paired with processors featuring SST-PP. Listed here are Xeon 4th  Gen processors featuring SST-PP technology. For more information, see the Intel Arc Product Specifications website.

Xeon 4th Gen processors with SST-PP

Legal Disclosures

1. Based on March 2023 Dell labs testing subjecting the PowerEdge HS5610 to Openbenchmarking.org PostgreSQL pgbench v1.130 benchmark. Actual results will vary.
2. Based on March 2023 Dell labs testing subjecting the PowerEdge HS5610 to Openbenchmarking.org PostgreSQL pgbench v1.130 benchmark. Power collection performed with IPMItool. Actual results will vary.