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I regret building this $3000 Pi AI cluster

(www.jeffgeerling.com)
468 points speckx | 1 comments | 19 Sep 25 14:28 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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densh ◴[19 Sep 25 18:08 UTC] No.45304632[source]▶
For anyone interested in playing with distributed systems, I'd really recommend getting a single machine with latest 16-core CPU from AMD and just running 8 virtual machines on it. 8 virtual machines, with 4 hyper threads pinned per machine, and 1/8 of total RAM per machine. Create a network between them virtually within your virtualization software of choice (such as Proxmox).

And suddenly you can start playing with distributed software, even though it's running on a single machine. For resiliency tests you can unplug one machine at a time with a single click. It will annihilate a Pi cluster in Perf/W as well, and you don't have to assemble a complex web of components to make it work. Just a single CPU, motherboard, m.2 SSD, and two sticks of RAM.

Naturally, using a high core count machine without virtualization will get you best overall Perf/W in most benchmarks. What's also important but often not highlighted in benchmarks in Idle W if you'd like to keep your cluster running, and only use it occasionally.

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qmr ◴[19 Sep 25 19:42 UTC] No.45305628[source]▶
No need for so much CPU power, any old quad core would work.
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anaganisk ◴[20 Sep 25 02:46 UTC] No.45309795[source]▶
Aren’t newer CPUs especially AMDs more energy efficient?
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1. 0manrho ◴[20 Sep 25 16:20 UTC] No.45314677[source]▶
If the point is a multi-tasking sandbox, not heavy/sustained data-crunching, those old CPU's w/ boosting turned off or a mild underclock/undervolt (or an L spec which comes iwth that out of the box) really aren't any more power hungry than a newer Ryzen unless you intend on running whatever you buy at high load for long times. Yeah, on paper it still could be a double digit percentage difference, but in reality we're talking a difference of 10W or 20W if you're not running stuff above 50% load for sustained periods.

Again, lots of variables there and it really depends on how heavily you intend to use/rely on that sandbox as to what's the better play. Regional pricing also comes into it.