Ubuntu 24.04 + Linux 6.9 Intel & AMD Server Performance
While earlier this week was looking at the AMD EPYC 4004 vs. Intel Xeon E-2488 performance for entry-level server performance, in today's benchmarking showdown is a fresh look higher up the stack at the current generation server performance out of Intel Xeon Sapphire Rapids / Emerald Rapids and AMD EPYC Genoa(X) / Bergamo / Siena with a leading-edge open-source software stack of using Ubuntu 24.04 LTS while also jumping from Linux 6.8 to Linux 6.9 for the very latest x86_64 Linux server performance.
Given last month's release of Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, I've been running a round of fresh current generation Linux server benchmarks. I also opted for going with Linux 6.9 given there have been some performance benefits for Xeon on Linux 6.9 as well as some EPYC wins too on Linux 6.9. Thus for both vendors the recently released Linux 6.9 kernel appears to be in very nice shape and delivering a fresh look at the AMD/Intel Linux performance.
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS is also now on the GCC 13.2 compiler as a nice upgrade from those currently using (or the results previously tested on) Ubuntu 22.04 LTS with its GCC 11 based compiler. Plus a slew of other updated software packages and improvements to find with the Ubuntu 24.04 Long Term Support release.
Each of the tested server configurations were with memory at the maximum rated memory speed and number of channels supported, using a Kioxia CD8P-R KCD8XPUG1T92 PCIe 5.0 NVMe solid-state drive throughout all testing, the reference platform for each server CPU under test, and again the very fresh Linux software stack for seeing how the current AMD EPYC and Intel Xeon processors are competing as we approach the middle of 2024.
For this round of fresh Linux server performance tests, the processors tested included:
- EPYC 8534P
- EPYC 8534PN
- EPYC 9654
- EPYC 9654 2P
- EPYC 9684X
- EPYC 9684X 2P
- EPYC 9754
- EPYC 9754 2P
- Xeon Max 9468
- Xeon Max 9468 2P
- Xeon Max 9480
- Xeon Max 9480 2P
- Xeon Platinum 8490H
- Xeon Platinum 8490H 2P
- Xeon Platinum 8592+
- Xeon Platinum 8592+ 2P
It's a mix of AMD EPYC Siena, Genoa(X), and Bergamo. And then on the Intel side is Sapphire Rapids and Emerald Rapids for their current processors. Note for the Xeon Max processors tested they were carried out in the HBM caching mode. Let's move on with this fresh Ubuntu 24.04 + Linux 6.9 server performance exploration.