23 replies to this topic

[duke_Qa]

I'm planning on getting together another box. Soon i'll have 4 computers i'm steadily using, going to be hell to bring along on a move.

Anyway, planning on getting myself a I7 cpu and a SSD OS disk. Beyond that I'm pretty clueless of whats good and whats not good. I won't be paying blood-money for that i7 so the ones around 150-200£ are the most likely choices. I'm guessing in rough estimates i got a budget of around £800+vat(have to convert my firm to a vat-firm and get me some vat on top of my big-ass website building bill i'm going to send off soon).

[dangerman1337]

When are you getting this system, if youre going to get it in the following:

• 1 Early 2011 - Intel Sandy bridge is getting released early janurary (likely around CES 2011 which is like the first and second week of january), the motherboards being released it are looking good (some will have USB 3.0 header ports and EFI instead of BIOS), and will likely be better than the current Core i7s (whether LGA1366 or LGA 1156) however it will require a new socket for it (only the P6* motherboards will be able to use thme). DDR3 RAM is dropping so a good chance of 8GB of getting a good price aswell, AMD/ATI's 69** series is likely to at least come in full force by this time and the overclocking on the K series (2500K which is looking from you're budget) seems to be good from snippets. Also Intel is releasing G3 SSDs early next year (maybe sandforce based ones are getting a next gen revamp early next year) but not till feburary from the looks of it though.
  
• 2 Now - Well prices are good now and DDR3 8GB seems pretty afordable to be bought but if that is stretching your limit i would go for 4GB as that's still good, AMD/ATI's 69** however is looking to be released during the second week of december. But if you're going to get a Core i7 (probably LGA 1366 based from your description) you won't be able to upgrade to sandy bridge (or its 22nm shrink after that Ivy bridge) though so you're upgrade choice without replacing the motherboard is a dead end form the looks.

Edited by dangerman1337, 15 November 2010 - 11:22 PM.

[Beowulf]

I'm planning on getting together another box. Soon i'll have 4 computers i'm steadily using, going to be hell to bring along on a move.

Anyway, planning on getting myself a I7 cpu and a SSD OS disk. Beyond that I'm pretty clueless of whats good and whats not good. I won't be paying blood-money for that i7 so the ones around 150-200£ are the most likely choices. I'm guessing in rough estimates i got a budget of around £800+vat(have to convert my firm to a vat-firm and get me some vat on top of my big-ass website building bill i'm going to send off soon).

Don't bother with an i7. Unless you're going to spend $300 to $400 on a processor, it's not worth an i7. Grab an i5 quad and your wallet will thank you. Impressive power for less cash than even a low-end i7. You'll save quite a bit on motherboards too, even more if you don't need to SLI/Crossfire your machine.

If you get an SSD, get one with the Sandforce 2 controller. Those are the OCZ Agility 2, Vertex 2 and WD's SSD (there's probably more but those come to mind right away). The Intel X-25 lines are usable, as well. I'm having some luck with my Corsair Nova and make goddamn sure you research OS optimizations before committing to an SSD. If you can't, or won't, perform common optimizations, do not get an SSD. Get a high-speed traditional platter drive (WD Raptor comes to mind).

For video, I recommend the GTX4xx series. The GTX460 1GB is a good bang for your buck; if you don't need as much oomph, the GTS450 is a respectable choice as well. I plan on getting a GTS450 to replace my 9600 in the coming months. However, you can't go wrong with AMD's 55xx or better lines. They're pretty solid, but don't worry too much about latest gen video. They're usually far too expensive and power hungry.

Oh, and make sure you get a nice case. The Fractal Design R3 line is a damn good choice. But you can't go wrong with a nice Lian Li either. Though, I do like my Cooler Master.

[Jeeves]

Or just go AMD, save some cash, and have a rig you can upgrade cheaply if need be. There's no point paying absolute top dollar for the best given in 3 months it won't be, but there's no point getting something that's no good today because tomorrow it'll just be abysmal. Going by local prices - expect yours to be lower - an i7 is $1349 and a Phenom x6 is $265. Given you won't be getting 5 times the processor, I wouldn't personally pay five times the price. Dollar for dollar AMD's outperform, so if you don't need that 5% more compute, it seems silly spending 500% more cash. And if you want to do anything like rendering, a hexacore phenom is going to put an i7 quad to shame.

On the flip side, get a good mobo. Makes it easier to upgrade in future and less likely to die in present. Especially if you're going AMD - Intel change socket more often than some people change socks, but if you have AMD you can usually upgrade the CPU or mobo separately rather than needing to save up for both if either breaks or gets old down the track.

When it comes to the GFX, its worth getting a decent one if you intend to use 7 (it'll use the extra cycles), need to render, use CS5 a lot, or play games. For gaming you probably want something higher end, depending on screen size - on a 17" display even a 4550 will run most games on full settings. For workstation you'll be fine as long as it says DX11 and ATI on the box, and its just how much you want to spend.

Physical storage has to be Seagate, and the best SSD seems to change almost daily, so just Google before you buy to check for bad reviews. RAM Dangerman's hit the nail on the head - just because its cheap theres still no point buying something you don't need. I get by with 3GB of DDR2 running an XP VM, multiple browsers, DW, PS, FW & Office. You can always get more later for less.

Overall what's good depends on how you want to use it, how long you want it to last, and how much you're willing to spend, but that's how I usually go.

[Beowulf]

I can never, in all good conscience, ever recommend a Seagate. I've had nothing but issues with them in the past and every computer I fix for people with a dead drive is always a Seagate. I actually use a Seagate right now, but I always, always, ALWAYS recommend Western Digital. I've used them for years and never had a single failure with one.

As for SSDs, the best doesn't change daily. Anything using a Sandforce 2 controller is top notch. As such, OCZ's Agility 2 and Vertex 2 are your best bets.

[EDIT] Screw AMD. Intel's processors are quite a bit more powerful than AMD's. And it's not a small margin like it used to be. AMD is a great business class processing core, but if you need real oomph, you need an Intel.

[duke_Qa]

Yeah, Intel is the winner of the current cpu-war. Haven't had AMD since multicores became standard.

If you get an SSD, get one with the Sandforce 2 controller. Those are the OCZ Agility 2, Vertex 2 and WD's SSD (there's probably more but those come to mind right away). The Intel X-25 lines are usable, as well. I'm having some luck with my Corsair Nova and make goddamn sure you research OS optimizations before committing to an SSD. If you can't, or won't, perform common optimizations, do not get an SSD. Get a high-speed traditional platter drive (WD Raptor comes to mind).

Define common optimizations. I've got no experience with SSD disks so I can't say I know anything about taking care of them. I know that there is a risk that the cells in them can get spent if you only use a few over and over again, but I'd expect the internal programming of the disk to handle that itself.


On the topic of I7's, the best priced ones are at the moment around $400 including vat. AND when i'm making a render-machine, I'd rather spend a few extra bucks on the CPU

The I7 930, 870 and 950 all being at the same price-range. It would have been fun with the hexa I7 970, but $1050 is a bit too much for a cpu

Also, the biggest difference on these CPUs seem to be the cache memory. 950(second-costliest): L2 - 4 x 256 KB - L3 8 MB 930($1 more expensive ): L3 8 MB 870(cheapest): L2 - 4 x 256 KB - L3 8 MB



On Dangerman's questions about timing: If there is some giant revolution within pc's coming out within 3 months, then I might consider waiting for a bit. But if one was to wait for every little revolution within the computer-world, you'd be sitting at home with a commodore 64. Sandy bridge is the new intel microchip standard? prolly will take a few months before that becomes standard.

[dangerman1337]

On Dangerman's questions about timing: If there is some giant revolution within pc's coming out within 3 months, then I might consider waiting for a bit. But if one was to wait for every little revolution within the computer-world, you'd be sitting at home with a commodore 64. Sandy bridge is the new intel microchip standard? prolly will take a few months before that becomes standard.

I wasn't saying you should but however i was recommending it, the current Intel Arch (nehalem) isn't going to have any real upgrade path (due to the fact that Sandy bridge is going to require a new socket which means that it is very unlikely there is going to be a derative to fit in LGA1155 or LGA 1366 sockets) incase you don't want to change the motherboard. Sandy bridge is going to be released at CES 2011 aswell Sandy bridge release at CES 2011 so since its looking like you're building this yourself, there's a reasonable chance that it will be avaliable during CES 2011.

Though another question, what size is your monitor's resoultion BTW?

Edited by dangerman1337, 16 November 2010 - 10:48 AM.

[duke_Qa]

I use Benq 24" screens that has a optimal resolution of 1920x1200. I doubt' I'll be needing much more than that for the future. Though i would have liked to get me a dell $1000 proper screen for photoshopping, It prolly won't happen anytime soon.

So, Sandy-bridge is most likely commonly available around february. The question is if i got time to wait for it. It seems to have some internal graphics advantages over the current generation.

[Beowulf]

Define common optimizations. I've got no experience with SSD disks so I can't say I know anything about taking care of them. I know that there is a risk that the cells in them can get spent if you only use a few over and over again, but I'd expect the internal programming of the disk to handle that itself.

http://www.tweaktown...uide/index.html
Make sure you use Windows 7 for this. It's the only mainstream OS on the market to support the TRIM command, and make sure you set your motherboard's SATA ports to run on AHCI mode, which is an INTEL standard. Running AHCI on an AMD board is doable, but I've seen some problems with it. That guide I linked to has a proper Intel RST driver that can pass commands right to the SSD. TRIM also runs automatically with W7 so you don't need to worry too much about it. Keep a few things in mind like installing large apps to traditional platter drives. I split my page file among 2 physical drives and I've seen an increase in performance because of it.

On the topic of I7's, the best priced ones are at the moment around $400 including vat. AND when i'm making a render-machine, I'd rather spend a few extra bucks on the CPU

The I7 930, 870 and 950 all being at the same price-range. It would have been fun with the hexa I7 970, but $1050 is a bit too much for a cpu

If you need a good processing core, get the EVGA classified board so you can run 2 Xeon processors. But in all seriousness, you could easily run an i5 quad and have the same performance for less money.

On Dangerman's questions about timing: If there is some giant revolution within pc's coming out within 3 months, then I might consider waiting for a bit. But if one was to wait for every little revolution within the computer-world, you'd be sitting at home with a commodore 64. Sandy bridge is the new intel microchip standard? prolly will take a few months before that becomes standard.

LGA1155 is coming, yeah, but keep in mind that you don't have to use the latest standard. You've seen my current specs. I still LGA775 for cryin' out loud and my machine is a nice, happy one. You need what's good for your needs, not what's the latest and greatest. Quite honestly, I don't see any revolutions coming around in the next six months so spend while you can. May wait til the holidays though; shops may have big sales so you can really save yourself some dough.

[duke_Qa]

I rarely go for the latest standard. I still have a quadcore at home that I bought 1.5 year ago that works perfectly fine. But is more a home-pc with a lot of distracting elements and I got a office space both here and in the potential area I'm moving to in a few months, so it would be helpful to have a new and fancy pc. I could have waited until the Sandy-bridge comes out and hope for a price-ditch on the i7s.

The I5 760 is the only i5 with quad core. But I have to say by comparison there's not a big difference among them. One of the i7's uses the 1366 slot, which might be nice if i want 1333Mhz on my ram.


Thanks for the helpful link on the SSD's, seems like a very thorough list of things that needs to be done. It is very good to know WIN7 is the best OS for this, I'd hate to go over to something else.

Mmmm... double Xeon processors *gargle*. Though I can't find the motherboard with more than 1-cpu slot(in the run-of-the-mill pc shop at least). Do xeon-cpu's come in other kinds of slots for these pcs? Alas, I probably won't be playing around with Xeons before I can afford to build dedicated renderfarms, and they will probably be rack-based so I dunno how useful normal Motherboards will be. Besides, What is the biggest difference on consumer cpu's and Xeon cpus? are xeons just designed to react faster or do they calculate more as well?

[Beowulf]

The EVGA Classified was kind of a joke in reference to your willingness to spend more on a processor. In any case, Xeons are actually server processors and they can handle loads more efficiently I think. Not really sure, I'd need to research the major difference between Xeons and i5/i7. However, I know of at least 3 in the i5 line that are quad cores. The 760 is the top of the i5 quad line I think, but it's a quad and performs as well as a moderately priced i7. A renderfarm should do fine with an i5.

Also, there are plenty of 1156 boards that support 1333 mHz RAM, and higher of course.

[duke_Qa]

Yeah I checked it out of pure curiosity. I'd check it out even if I knew it would be like $2000 for the motherboard alone because it might be doable one day

I'm not sure what CPU's render-farms rather would use. But it wouldn't surprise me if Xeons were good for it.

Yeah, I might survive with a 1156 if I go for it right now, We'll see how expensive it gets. I might have to cut down a bit and get a proper screen as well which will increase the cost quite a bit.

[Beowulf]

I just did some research on i7 vs Xeon. If you're looking to creating a workstation wherein you render, video encode, etc, Xeons are the better choice. They're 'server' grade processors, but their workstation application is apparent as well. You'd need a server board and ECC RAM, but if your intended use is workstation/rendering, Xeon is the way to go.

[duke_Qa]

So there's no problem running win7 with generic stuff like Photoshop and the likes on Xeon hardware? Have standardization come this far? would have been nice

[Beowulf]

Far as I know, you can do that without any trouble at all. A Xeon is still just a processor; it just has a few more instruction sets and optimizations is all.

[duke_Qa]

Just had a talk with the local computer-shop man. He was like "Workstation Xeon? go for it, though you might want to wait for some shop to come with some happy-deals at ridiculous prices". Recommended getting two quad-cores and a basic workstation box right away if you were going to get it. I'll have to ask him what shop that was so i can have a lookout for it.

[duke_Qa]

Bleh, had another talk this day with him why one should go Xeon, and the argument was "because it's cool!" in a "Tesla is a cool car" mentality or in even simpler terms "F stability and availability, I got COOLZ". This basically is a big no for me, so I'll just go for some quad-core. But it's been a month now since last time so I figured I'd go and ask again if I should wait until January-march to get something? At the very least I think ordering parts right now is not the best of times, so it won't happen this year.

Edited by duke_Qa, 17 December 2010 - 02:15 PM.

[Beowulf]

If you need good oomph, grab an i7 quad. It's more expensive, but it's the top of the line consumer-level quads. However, I still say a Xeon would suffice because it is designed for heavy loads.

[duke_Qa]

So, now I've waited until the sandy bridge came out, and I'm starting to get some money in my firm-account that i want to spend before taxes come and eat them up. Which MB and cpu is looking like the best for a stationary 3d workstation?

I'm looking at the i7-2600k, but I'm reading now that Intel have stopped production because of some SATA flaws in the MB, which might make it hard to get MBs before april :S

[Beowulf]

If there's a SATA flaw, you might as well go with 1366 instead of 1155; you have more solid, and reliable, choices at your disposal.