Speed Time to Production with a High-Performing Simulation and Modeling Solution from Dell and Intel
Download PDFTue, 17 Jan 2023 05:19:17 -0000
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Summary
Computer-aided engineering solutions use high- performance computing (HPC) configurations to deliver the required scalability and performance. In this document, Intel and Dell Technologies present hardware recommendations certified to deliver the optimal level of performance using PowerEdge servers.
Manufacturing companies and research organizations use computer-aided engineering (CAE) to reduce costs and design products that provide a competitive edge. CAE requires a lot of compute power for simulation and modeling applications that are often distributed across high-performance computing (HPC) clusters. These companies face challenges in deploying and maintaining scalable HPC clusters while also getting their final products to market in a reasonable amount of time.
Dell Technologies and Intel can help with a complete bill of materials (BoM) that is configured and certified to deliver the performance required for demanding simulation and modeling applications. The BoM features PowerEdge rack server nodes powered by 3rd Generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable processors and key hardware components that comply with industry standards and best practices for Intel® based clusters.
The Base configuration provides the foundation for simulation and modeling applications on a small cluster, while the Plus configuration provides a higher core count and memory capacity for more complex, demanding workloads. The configurations use Ethernet as a starting point, but they can be adapted as needed to use InfiniBand fabric.
Key considerations
Key considerations for deploying simulation and modeling workloads on PowerEdge servers include the following:
- Core count: Simulation and modeling applications can run on small clusters starting at 16 cores per CPU and increasing to 28 cores per CPU to meet performance requirements.
- Scalability: This BoM provides four nodes for both the Base and Plus configurations, which is the minimum recommended configuration for simulation and modeling use cases. You can scale the configurations horizontally depending on your workload and needs.
- Flexibility: Although the BoM provides storage components, you can easily integrate both configurations into any storage solution. Speak to your Dell Technologies representative to design a custom configuration suited for your specific needs.
Table 1. Available configurations
| Base configuration | Plus configuration |
Platform | 4 x PowerEdge R650 servers | |
CPU (per server) | 2 x Intel® Xeon® Gold 6326 processor (16 cores at 2.9 GHz) | 2 x Intel® Xeon® Gold 6348 processor (28 cores at 2.6 GHz) |
DRAM | 256 GB (16 x 16 GB DDR4-3200 MHz) | 512 GB (16 x 32 GB DDR4-3200 MHz) |
Boot device | Boot Optimized Server Storage (BOSS)-S2 with 2 x 480 GB M.2 Serial ATA (SATA) solid-state drives (SSD) (RAID1) | |
Local storage | 3.84 TB Intel® SSD P5500 | |
Management network | Dual-port 10 gigabit Ethernet (GbE) Intel® Ethernet Network Adapter X710 OCP3 adapter | |
Message fabric | 100 GbE Intel® Ethernet Network Adapter E810-CQDA2 |
Learn more
Contact your dedicated Dell Technologies or Intel account team for a customized quote. 1-877-289-3355
- Read the Intel solution spotlight: www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/docs/select-solutions/simulation- modeling-ver3-spotlight.html
- Find out more about Intel Select Solutions: www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/architecture-and-technology/intel- select-solutions-overview.html
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Microsoft SQL Server Solution Overview
Fri, 03 Mar 2023 17:23:10 -0000
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Summary
Microsoft SQL Server solution is a high-performance data platform that is optimized for Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) and Decision Support System or Analytics workloads. This solution helps to provide customers with system architectures that are optimized for a range of business operation and analysis needs. It also enables customers to achieve an efficient resource balance between the SQL Server data processing capability and the hardware throughput.
Market positioning
SQL Server enables organizations to gain intelligence from all types of data. By using SQL Server with Windows on the latest generation Dell PowerEdge servers with the latest Intel® Xeon® Scalable processors, organizations get faster insights from transaction processing and analytical processing.
Expanded product features
Intel Xeon Scalable Processors
The 4th Generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable processor family has the most built-in accelerators of any CPU on the market to speed up AI, databases, analytics, networking, storage, and HPC workloads.
Along with software optimizations, the following features help improve workload performance and power efficiency:
- Intel® Advanced Matrix Extensions (Intel® AMX)
- Intel® QuickAssist Technology (Intel® QAT)
- Intel® Data Streaming Accelerator (Intel® DSA)
- Intel® Dynamic Load Balancer (Intel® DLB)
- Intel® In-Memory Analytics Accelerator (Intel® IAA)
With Microsoft SQL Server 2022 and Intel® QuickAssist Technology, customers can efficiently speed-up compressed database backups without significanly increasing CPU utilization, leaving more resources for handling user queries and other database operations.
Memory
The latest Dell PowerEdge servers with Intel 4th Gen Xeon® Scalable processors supports eight channels of DDR5 memory modules per socket running at up to 4800MT/s with 1 DIMM per channel or up to 4400MT/s with 2 DIMMs per channel, offering up to 1.5x bandwidth improvement over previous generation platofrms with DDR4 memory, increased memory capacity, and power efficiency.
Storage/RAID
Intel® Optane™ SSDs deliver performance, Quality of Service (QoS), and capacity improvements to optimize storage efficiency, enabling data centers to do more per server, minimize service disruptions, and efficiently manage at scale. Intel® Optane™ SSD P5800X with next generation Intel® Optane™ storage media and advanced controller does not comprise I/O performance read or write (R/W) and high endurance, and provides unprecedented value over legacy storage. In the accelerating world of intelligent data, Intel® Optane™ SSD P5800X offers three times greater random 4k mixed R/W I/O operations per second (IOPS) over Intel® Optane™ SSD P4800X1 (PCIe* 3.x).
Key Considerations
- Higher performance with lower licensing costs - All configurations are based on the latest Dell PowerEdge servers with high-frequency 4th generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable Processors to achieve best Microsoft SQL Server performance and optimize software licensing costs.
- Data redundancy and high availability - The Dell PERC H755N NVMe RAID controller provides high performance local data redundancy, resilience, and reliability for critical workloads and applications such as Microsoft SQL Server. For high availability, performance, and capacity scaling, use multiple servers with SQL Server replication, log shipping, mirroring, clustering, or AlwaysOn Availability Groups (AG).
- Data throughput - Microsoft SQL Server Solution on Dell PowerEdge servers is built on high-performing Intel® architecture. The solution uses the high-performance Intel® Xeon® processors and better network, storage, and integrated platform acceleration products optimized for high workload density and performance.
- Optimized backup operations with QAT accelerator - The Intel® Xeon® Platinum 8462Y+ processor has a QAT accelerator that supports a high performance compression engine that can significantly shorten backup/restore operations on highly utilized servers running Microsoft SQL Server 2022.
Recommended Configurations
Base for SQL Server Standard Edition
Table 1. PowerEdge R660-based, up to 8 or 10 NVMe drives and optional HW RAID, 1RU
Feature | Description |
Platform[1] | Dell R660 chassis with NVMe backplane (10x 2.5” – direct connection without RAID, or 8x 2.5” with HW RAID support) |
CPU | 2x Xeon® Gold 6426Y with SST-PP (12c @ 2.5GHz base / 3.3GHz turbo), or 2x Xeon® Gold 5418Y with SST-PP (12c @ 2.7GHz base / 3.2GHz turbo) |
DRAM | 256GB (16x 16GB DDR5-4800) |
Boot device | Dell BOSS-S2 with 2x 480GB M.2 SATA SSD (RAID1) |
Storage adapter[1] | Optional Dell Front PERC H755N NVMe RAID |
Log drives | 2x 1.6TB Enterprise NVMe Mixed Use AG Drive U.2 Gen4 (RAID1) |
Data drives[2] | 4x (up to 6x/8x) 3.84TB (or larger) Enterprise NVMe Read Intensive AG Drive U.2 Gen4 |
NIC | Intel® E810-XXV for OCP3 (dual-port 25Gb) |
Base for SQL Server Enterprise Edition
Table 2. PowerEdge R660-based, up to 8 NVMe drives and HW RAID, 1RU
Feature | Description |
Platform | Dell R660 chassis with NVMe backplane (8x 2.5” with HW RAID support) |
CPU | 2x Xeon® Gold 6442Y (24c @ 2.6GHz base / 3.3GHz turbo) |
DRAM | 512GB (16x 32GB DDR5-4800) |
Boot device | Dell BOSS-S2 with 2x 480GB M.2 SATA SSD (RAID1) |
Storage adapter | Dell Front PERC H755N NVMe RAID |
Log drives | 2x 400GB or 800GB Intel Optane P5800X U.2 Gen4 (RAID1) |
Data drives | 6x 3.84TB (or larger) Enterprise NVMe Read Intensive AG Drive U.2 Gen4 |
NIC | Intel® E810-XXV for OCP3 (dual-port 25Gb) |
Plus for SQL Server Enterprise Edition
Table 3. PowerEdge R760-based, up to 16 or 24 NVMe drives and dual HW RAID, 2RU
Feature | Description |
Platform | Dell R750 chassis with NVMe backplane (16x 2.5” / 24x 2.5” with dual HW RAID support) |
CPU[3] | 2x Xeon® Platinum 8462Y+ (32c @ 2.8GHz base / 3.6GHz turbo) |
DRAM | 512GB (16x 32GB DDR5-4800) or more |
Boot device | Dell BOSS-S2 with 2x 480GB M.2 SATA SSD (RAID1) |
Storage adapter | Dual Dell Front PERC H755N NVMe RAID |
Log drives | 2x 400GB or 800GB Intel Optane P5800X U.2 Gen4 (RAID1) |
Data drives[4] | 6x (up to 14x/22x) 3.84TB (or larger) Enterprise NVMe Read Intensive AG Drive U.2 Gen4 |
NIC[5] | Intel® E810-XXV for OCP3 (dual-port 25Gb), or |
[1] optional Dell PERC H755N NVMe RAID controller supported only with 8-drive chassis
[2] max number of drives depends on the chassis version and HW RAID support
[3] The Xeon 8462Y+ SKU includes QAT engine for crypto and compression acceleration
[4] max number of drives depends on the chassis version and HW RAID support
[5] 100Gb NIC recommended for high throughput Data Warehouse loads and ETL processing
Learn more
Contact your Dell or Intel account team for a customized quote, at 1-877-289-3355.
Scaling and Optimizing ML in Enterprises
Tue, 16 May 2023 19:53:46 -0000
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Summary
This joint paper, written by Dell Technologies, in collaboration with Intel®, describes the key hardware considerations when configuring a successful MLOps deployment and recommends configurations based on the most recent 15th Generation Dell PowerEdge Server portfolio offerings.
Today’s enterprises are looking to operationalize machine learning to accelerate and scale data science across the organization. This is especially the case as their needs grow to deploy, monitor, and maintain data pipelines and models. Cloud native infrastructure, such as Kubernetes, offers a fast and scalable means to implement Machine Learning Operations (MLOps) by using Kubeflow, an open source platform for developing and deploying Machine Learning (ML) pipelines on Kubernetes.
Dell PowerEdge R650 servers with 3rd Generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable processors deliver a scalable, portable, and cost-effective solution to implement and operationalize machine learning within the Enterprise organization.
Key Considerations
- Portability. A single end-to-end platform to meet the machine learning needs of various use cases, including predictive analytics, inference, and transfer learning.
- Optimized performance. High-performance 3rd Generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable processors optimize performance for machine learning algorithms using AVX-512. Intel® performance optimizations that are built into Dell PowerEdge servers can help fine-tune large Transformers models across multi-node systems. These work in conjunction with open-source cloud native MLOps tools. Optimizations include Intel® and open-source software and hardware technologies such as Kubernetes stack, AVX-512, Horovod for distributed training, and Tensorflow 2.10.0.
- Scalability. As the machine learning workload grows, additional compute capacity needs to be added to the cloud native infrastructure. Dell PowerEdge R750 servers with 3rd Generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable processors deliver an efficient and scalable approach to MLOps.
Recommended Configurations
Cluster | ||
| Control Plane Nodes (Three Nodes Required) | Data Plane Nodes (4 Nodes or More) |
Functions | Kubernetes services | Develop, Deploy, Run Machine Learning (ML) workflows |
Platform | Dell PowerEdge R650 up to 10x 2.5” NVMe Direct Drives | |
CPU | 2x Intel® Xeon® Gold 6326 processor (16 cores @ 2.9GHz), or better | 2x Intel® Xeon® Platinum 8380 processor (40 cores at 2.3 GHz), or 2x Intel® Xeon® Platinum 8368 processor (38 cores @ 2.4GHz), or Intel® Xeon® Platinum 8360Y processor (36 cores @ 2.4GHz) |
DRAM | 128 GB (16x 8 GB DDR4-3200) | 512 GB (16x 32 GB DDR5-4800) |
Boot device | Dell Boot Optimized Server Storage (BOSS)-S2 with 2x 240GB or 2x 480 GB Intel® SSD S4510 M.2 SATA (RAID1) | |
Storage adapter | Not required for all-NVMe configuration. | |
Storage (NVMe) | 1x 1.6TB Enterprise NVMe Mixed- Use AG Drive U.2 Gen4 | 1x 1.6TB (or larger) Enterprise NVMe Mixed-Use AG Drive U.2 Gen4 |
NIC | Intel® E810-XXVDA2 for OCP3 (dual-port 25GbE) | Intel® E810-XXVDA2 for OCP3 (dual-port 25GbE), or Intel® E810-CQDA2 PCIe (dual-port 100Gb) |
Resources
Visit the Dell support page or contact your Dell or Intel account team for a customized quote 1-877-289-3355.