[SOLVED] Advice on CPU for HP Microserver Gen8 ESXi server- Xeon E3-1260L?

[itm]

I'm thinking of upgrading my HP Microserver Gen8 to use it as an ESXi host. It will replace my existing ESXi host, which is a Dell Optiplex 3010 with an i5 3470 processor and 16GB RAM. This performs fine, but doesn't have enough drive bays (I need at least 4), and more importantly it doesn't have remote server management (the equivalent of HP ILO). As the server will be up in the attic this is a pre-requisite for me.
The guest OS's and applications that I want to run are:
1. Windows Server 2008 (or maybe Windows10)
- Blue Iris IP camera monitoring (12 cameras)
- Web server (low traffic) for 4 sites
2. Lubuntu
- Logitech Media Server
- Home Assistant (home automation server)
- File server
- Mediawiki server (low traffic)
3. Development VMs
- Ad hoc Linux/Windows VMs for development/testing purposes (only one running at any one time)

The above will be for home (non-commercial) use, and I'm looking for something not too noisy, and with reasonable power efficiency.
The Microserver currently has a Celeron 1610T processor. I'm thinking about a Xeon E3-1260L to replace it (plus 16GB of RAM), and was wondering whether it would offer the same performance levels as the existing i5 3470 for the applications described above.
Any feedback would be much appreciated.

 

[kanewolf]

I'm thinking of upgrading my HP Microserver Gen8 to use it as an ESXi host. It will replace my existing ESXi host, which is a Dell Optiplex 3010 with an i5 3470 processor and 16GB RAM. This performs fine, but doesn't have enough drive bays (I need at least 4), and more importantly it doesn't have remote server management (the equivalent of HP ILO). As the server will be up in the attic this is a pre-requisite for me.
The guest OS's and applications that I want to run are:
1. Windows Server 2008 (or maybe Windows10)
- Blue Iris IP camera monitoring (12 cameras)
- Web server (low traffic) for 4 sites
2. Lubuntu
- Logitech Media Server
- Home Assistant (home automation server)
- File server
- Mediawiki server (low traffic)
3. Development VMs
- Ad hoc Linux/Windows VMs for development/testing purposes (only one running at any one time)

The above will be for home (non-commercial) use, and I'm looking for something not too noisy, and with reasonable power efficiency.
The Microserver currently has a Celeron 1610T processor. I'm thinking about a Xeon E3-1260L to replace it (plus 16GB of RAM), and was wondering whether it would offer the same performance levels as the existing i5 3470 for the applications described above.
Any feedback would be much appreciated.

The 1260L was not sold as a CPU for that server. The 1220L is the only Xeon listed as sold with that server. I do see threads -- https://homeservershow.com/forums/topic/16028-e3-1260l-upgrade/ that others have successfully used a 1260L, so it should work. Make sure you read up on any prerequisites for BIOS, iLO, etc BEFORE the CPU swap.
Based on passmark the Xeon will be SLOWER than your current CPU -- https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/Intel-i5-3470-vs-Intel-Xeon-E3-1260L/822vs1203

 

[itm]

Thanks for that. If the 1260L is slower than the i5 3470 then how about the E3-1265L v2?

 

[kanewolf]

Thanks for that. If the 1260L is slower than the i5 3470 then how about the E3-1265L v2?

If you read the first link I posted, one of the people had problems with a 1265. Another poster said it worked. But the 1265 is the same CPU as the 1260 but with built-in graphics. So no benefit.

 

[itm]

Using the 2nd link from your previous post, I added the 1265L to the comparison table. It has a higher CPU mark and Single Thread Rating than the 1260L. Would that be explained entirely by the on-board GPU?

 

[kanewolf]

Using the 2nd link from your previous post, I added the 1265L to the comparison table. It has a higher CPU mark and Single Thread Rating than the 1260L. Would that be explained entirely by the on-board GPU?

You need to be careful to get the V1 of the 1265L. The first one that shows is the V4. It does have higher performance. The V1 version shows a lower score. You can't use the V4.

 

[Satan-IR]

Using the 2nd link from your previous post, I added the 1265L to the comparison table. It has a higher CPU mark and Single Thread Rating than the 1260L. Would that be explained entirely by the on-board GPU?

Are you sure you checked v1? Maybe it's the v4 which has of more cache. Intel Xeon E3-1260L has 8 MB 16-way set associative shared cache (Level 3 cache) and Intel Xeon E3-1265L has 6 MB 12-way set associative shared cache (Level 3 cache) but Intel Xeon E3-1265L v4 has 128 MB 16-way set associative shared cache (Level 4 cache). That might explain the higher performance/score. But that CPU works on a socket 1150, whereas your board is 1155?

 

[itm]

Actually I checked the V2 (there's a guy here who has successfully upgraded to it - https://tomssl.com/upgrading-the-cpu-on-an-hp-microserver-gen8/)