Great upgrade during years, a big downgrade in CPU Perfor...

We did announce that we changed the CPU layout, both in the blog post (https://blog.linode.com/2014/04/17/lino … much-more/">https://blog.linode.com/2014/04/17/linode-cloud-ssds-double-ram-much-more/) and on the page in the Manager for claiming your upgrade. The new CPUs are faster, and our tests showed that the new scaling of cores provided much more stable performance. Overall, CPU performance on the new plans is dramatically better. One of the few exceptions is workloads on smaller Linodes which expect to be able to pin multiple CPU cores at once, and for those people, the larger plans now offer a much better way to improve CPU capability than existed with the old plans, where it was not possible to increase maximum CPU allowance.

• Les

thanks for the reply, I'm glad to know that I was wrong.

@akerl:

We did announce that we changed the CPU layout, both in the blog post (https://blog.linode.com/2014/04/17/lino … much-more/">https://blog.linode.com/2014/04/17/linode-cloud-ssds-double-ram-much-more/) and on the page in the Manager for claiming your upgrade. The new CPUs are faster, and our tests showed that the new scaling of cores provided much more stable performance. Overall, CPU performance on the new plans is dramatically better. One of the few exceptions is workloads on smaller Linodes which expect to be able to pin multiple CPU cores at once, and for those people, the larger plans now offer a much better way to improve CPU capability than existed with the old plans, where it was not possible to increase maximum CPU allowance.

• Les

Dumping the SVN repository on my single threaded linode requires four times more than my older 8 threads linode.

So I don't agree that CPU performance are better now, I completely disagree.

Sense can not be made out of your post.

@XReaper:

Sense can not be made out of your post.

Before they switched to SSDs, Linode 2048 had 8 core cpu, now they give 2 core CPU.

They are saying that CPU performance are better with the latest "configuration" but how can 2cores be better than 8 cores?

Older linodes was really faster in terms of CPU.

You can still get more than two CPU cores. In fact, up to 20. See https://www.linode.com/pricing and click "View All Plans."

@hoopycat:

You can still get more than two CPU cores. In fact, up to 20. See https://www.linode.com/pricing and click "View All Plans."

to get 8CPU core I need to spend 8 times more than before.

I stand by my previous statement:

> The new CPUs are faster, and our tests showed that the new scaling of cores provided much more stable performance. Overall, CPU performance on the new plans is dramatically better. One of the few exceptions is workloads on smaller Linodes which expect to be able to pin multiple CPU cores at once, and for those people, the larger plans now offer a much better way to improve CPU capability than existed with the old plans, where it was not possible to increase maximum CPU allowance.

• Les

@akerl:

I stand by my previous statement:

One of the few exceptions is workloads on smaller Linodes which expect to be able to pin multiple CPU cores at once, and for those people, the larger plans now offer a much better way to improve CPU capability than existed with the old plans,

I stand with my previous statement too.

To get the same CPU performance of the "old linode 2048" now I need to spend 8 times more.

If your workload falls into that category, then yes.

• Les

@akerl:

If your workload falls into that category, then yes.

• Les

my workloads does not fall in that category but previously, doing intensive task with small plan was possible,

now is not possible.

I can understand that, in this way you can differentiate various plans in a better way, but as a customer of small linodes,

you dropped the firepower by four times.

for this reason, newer "middle/small" linodes are a big downgrade over previous linode and I think that most linoders uses small linodes.

If you need a large amount of CPU power for shorts amount of time, you can get a faster linode since they're billed hourly. Otherwise, the new CPU setup provides better performance for the majority of Linode's customers, and complaining about it endlessly isn't really going to do much good…

I have a small Linode, and have never come close to needing more cpu, though I do notice a huge increase in performance due to the new ssd drives (and more ram).

@sblantipodi:

my workloads does not fall in that category but previously, doing intensive task with small plan was possible, now is not possible.

(…)

for this reason, newer "middle/small" linodes are a big downgrade over previous linode and I think that most linoders uses small linodes.
I suppose there's no way to know definitively, but my strong suspicion is that most of the users of the smaller Linodes are actually more likely to be just like you than not, with workloads that do not fall into the category of those harmed by the CPU change. Therefore, I would disagree with your generalization that the newer Linodes are a big downgrade for most users; instead I suspect the opposite. Certainly my own experience bears that out.

Will there be users who were previously able to take sufficient advantage of the additional cores for this to be a downgrade even with the per-processor improvement? Sure. But it works the other way too - there will be users for whom the reduction in cores (and corresponding reduction in contention) see a benefit for their workloads. I have no way to judge which side is more prevalent though I have my suspicion that more fall into the second.

While it's mentioned occasionally in threads like these, contention (and processor scheduling overhead) is not something I think is emphasized enough, at least in terms of the impact I see in my own use. To be honest, I was extremely happy to see the core count changes, given my experience with the last upgrade, and applaud Linode for restructuring things the way they did.

When Linode expanded from 4 cores to 8 cores in the prior upgrade, my workload suffered noticeably (something I hadn't expected and actually got burned by when I took advantage of the upgrade). On my (largely smaller) Linodes steal rates rose a lot, and even with the bump in CPU type, my processing was not as effective. I ended up separating services into multiple Linodes to maintain my prior performance.

Even worse was the uncertainty as to whether going to higher plans would be a viable solution as load rose, given that even the entry plan already had access to the same core count as the higher plans. While I'm sure others saw improvement with that upgrade, for myself, I'm firmly in the camp that expanding the plans from 4 to 8 cores was a net negative.

So I'm quite happy with the recent change. To date, steal is vastly improved. It's hard to judge since there's so much else changing (and the ssds have such a large impact too), but CPU behavior appears more consistent and I appear to more readily be able to take advantage of the cores I do have access to. How effectively the CPU can be used is just as important as how many cores I have, to my mind. Certainly as an entire package, the new plans are night and day better than the old for my own workload.

So for me, I see the 8->2 core change as a solid improvement, and not a downgrade at all.

Of course, as with the other anecdotes quoted here, this is my own experience, and not necessarily a general result. However, it's experience that directly contradicts your statement about the new plan being a big downgrade - in general - for smaller Linodes (as I primarily use 2048s), so it's at least one counterpoint to that assumption.

– David