Project:Gemini

Project:Gemini

(last updated: 05/03/2017)

this page is dedicated to the Project:Gemini evolution progress.
Updates will always be added at the bottom of this page.

So what is Project:Gemini? It is a computer. I pretty powerful computer to be more precise.

P:G houses a Z800 workstation motherboard that has two CPU sockets and can hold up to 192GB of RAM. Rare for this type of server graded board are the additional two PCI-E 2.0 x16 slots.

As the Z800 is salvaged from an ex CAD-Workstation these two slots are especially designed for high-power graphics cards of the Nvidia QUADRO lineup.
But I'm not wasting my money on those cards because right now the most powerful bang for your bucks comes with the Nvidia GTX 1080 Ti.

(sample image)

This puppy has a massive 11GB GDDR5X VRAM which is essential to high-resolution rendering as a scene with 3 or more "People" can easily take up up to 8GB of VRAM (my current limit with the GTX 1070). In addition a single 1080Ti has 3.584 CUDA cores which are the main muscle behind fast rendering (my 1070 has 1.920 cores).

Since this is a server grade motherboard the Z800 requieres ECC registered RAM. And a lot of it too.
The plan is to have at least 48GB so each CPU gets 24GB of it's own dedicated RAM.

Each Intel Xeon X5650 has six cores with a boosted speed of up to 3.06GHz (when optimal cooled) and thanks to Hyperthreading this results in 12 work threads for each CPU.
And P:G has two of these powerful hearts  giving it a total of 24 threads to work with (my current i7-4790K has 4 cores/8 threads)

So with 48GB of RAM each thread will get its own 2GB share and if that is not enough I might upgrade the system to have 4GB for each thread. Rule of thumb is 4GB for each core or 2GB/thread but more is always better.

To further optimize the system it is also planned to have both CPUs watercooled because these Xeons tend to get really hot and will slow down if not cooled sufficiently enough.

Same goes for the 1080Ti's which can auto-overclock to a higher frequency as long as the cooling can keep up.

This means that there will be two cooling loops, one for both CPUs and one for both GPUs.

And of course the system will use SSDs to further optimize the work speed.

So that's it for the introduction of Project:Gemini.
The following will be the project's journal where I will start posting pictures and update info on the build progress and what's going on with P:G:

The Beginning (04/18/2017)

(Banana for scale, or take the 120mm fan on the right for scale)

the HP Z800 motherboard arrived today. It is a refurbished unit I got off of eBay that, according to the seller, will work with two X5650.

The Corsair RM1000x and the two temporary CPU fans are brand new from Amazon and already arrived last week. The first batch of refurbished 24GB ECC RAM also arrived last week together with the first Xeon X5650.

Now all that is left to arrive over the next days is the power cable adapter. Since this motherboard is everything else than "normal" HP also added a proprietary power connector to it to make it harder to use outside their Workstations. But the solution to that is already on its way (from Hong Kong).

Once the basic components are installed and powered up I will post another update ;)

It's alive!! (05/03/2017)

today the eagerly awaited power adapter cable arrived from Hongkong!

it's not pretty but will do the job until I replace it with some custom cables to clean up this cable mess.

Speaking of a mess: mounting the heatsinks on the CPU sockets didn't work out as intended so I had to strap them down with zip ties... yes! Zip ties!

this will work fine until the heatsinks get replaced by the watercooling blocks later :D
and the board will not be mounted vertically anytime soon either.

and speaking of working fine: both CPUs with all 12 cores and 24 threads are recognized by Windows 10. same goes for the 24GB of ECC RAM

next step will be updating the OS to the latest version and update all drivers and stuff.
after that I will replace the Geforce GT610 with my GTX 1070 and do some test renders for performance testing.