Zen+ and coffee or Comet Lake CPUs work well with custom NAS and home router boxes.
Zen+ and coffee or Comet Lake CPUs work well with custom NAS and home router boxes.
Considering similar core and thread counts, I believe Coffee and Comet Lake offered superior performance compared to Zen+ and even outperformed Zen 2 in gaming and most tests. While some suggest this was due to apps being optimized for Intel and higher IPC, I’m curious about the actual impact on Linux and Free BSD workloads. For network servers like NAS or home NAT boxes, I’m not too focused on the newest models since they’re often too costly. However, I’ve found many good deals on used Zen+ systems and CPUs, as well as Coffee/Comet Lake builds for comparable pricing with quad cores. I’m leaning toward choosing a quad configuration. I don’t mind extra cores if they improve performance under load—especially for tasks such as home NAT routers and NAS units with RAID 5 SSDs and a 10GbE connection for the NAS. Unfortunately, I haven’t found clear benchmarks for network servers, NAS devices, or home NAT routers in this context.
Server performance isn't always about raw speed; it often depends on efficiency over time. Using performance per watt makes more sense for systems running continuously. It's rumored that Zen+ was marginally better than today's Intel chips. Still, if you're sourcing used components, Zen2 would likely be my top pick.
You're asking about the best options for Zen 2 processors on both AMD and Intel sides. On AMD, there are budget-friendly quad-core Zen 2 models with integrated GPUs available. For Intel, you're looking at a solid choice with the Core i3-9100 and a newer Ryzen 3400G at a reasonable price. Prices vary depending on the specific model and region.