time for a new workstation

[gilicom]

Hi all, I know that this issue has been talked about in this forum for many posts, but I'm asking about a dual 265 opteron with asus k8n-dl to be used as a workstation for max and vray.
Any known stability issues there?
does sombody use them for a workstation or just for render nodes?
should i get 2g or 4g ram if i plan to use win 2k?
If so should i make the 3g switch?
did anyone heard about a new dual x2 ,is it gonna be faster then the opteron 265?
Thanks
Gili

[dlparisi]

I'm using a new Dual 270 on a K8N-DL as my main workstation for about a week now (2GB Corsair ram, Quadro 1400, 450W Antec TruePower w/8pin adapter, Thermaltake coolers, etc). It's nice that it fits into a standard ATX case too (Coolermaster Centurion if I rememeber correct). I have it overclocked about 5% to 210 GHz. Not the longest test but I've had no problems with the MB and CPUs and I've been pushing some tough renders through them this last week, probably 2-3 straight days of 100% CPU graphs. The only thing is that it appears that one CPU is running hotter than the other by about 7deg Cel. (50 deg vs 57 deg. under full load). Not sure what's going on with that.

I tried to run win x64 but ran into problems with File Linking so I reverted back to XPsp2 so I can't comment on using win2K. Definitely recommend the 3GB switch, has helped out rendering large scenes and have had no problems with it. I'm not sure the 3gb switch is supported in Win2K though, anyone?

Good Luck. PM with any questions.

[gilicom]

thanks dlparisi.
I'm gonna use win xp not win 2k (my mistake) but i'm wondering about the new dual x2 machins that about to go out, wonder if they are faster.
btw do you think that a quadro 1400 is better then a gforce 6600 (256mb on it)

[joconnell]

Get a top line geforce card and run it under direct x - they're really fast cards and far more cost effective than a quadro. I'd never buy a quadro card again, the performance under max simply doesnt justify the extra cost. In work I'm on a quadro 980, we've got a quadro 1100 and 1400 too. A geforce 6800gt under direct x beats them all for high poly scenes.

[visions]

dlparisi: I was thinking of getting either the K8n-dl or the Tyan Tiger 2877 motherboard, the latter was recommended by the vendor as it overclocks better.

Any insight on weather these Dual opteron Systems can be overclocked by the normal 20-25% that all Dual core Amd's are capable of?

I also read somewhere that the Dual core dual Opteron 165's are just 30% faster than a single X2 4200....(Cgarchitect forum)

http://www.3dfluff.com/mash/cbtop.php

Vivek

[SteveC]

gili,

Go with the quadro 1400, I had a 6600gt 256mb installed on my machine and it comes nowhere near the quadro 1400 with maxtreme drivers, the 1400 was £150 from ebay brand new. You used to be able to softmod the older 6600gt's to quadro, but not anymore.

Where did you hear the news about dual X2's, do you mean dual optis

steve

[gilicom]

steve do you have the link for that card in ebay?
and another question , does all the dual opterons must go with ecc ram?

[dlparisi]

Gili: I bought mine on ebay as well. Just do a search for "Quadro 1400" and you'll find a bunch. I'm not sure how its perf. is relative to a 6800gt but I'm quite happy with it w/ Maxtreme 8 drivers. Granted, I wouldn't pay full price for it, but at ~$200-$250 it seems like a good performer.
David

[roppin]

Get a top line geforce card and run it under direct x - they're really fast cards and far more cost effective than a quadro. I'd never buy a quadro card again, the performance under max simply doesnt justify the extra cost. In work I'm on a quadro 980, we've got a quadro 1100 and 1400 too. A geforce 6800gt under direct x beats them all for high poly scenes.

what settings do you use? I think its OK as long you don´t want to see wires, but as soon you want wired mode or shaded wire it´s lot slower than open gl. no matter what card.

[Da_elf]

question about the new AMDs and heat. remember the old days when we were all trying to get the most bad-ass cooling fans for our AMD machines due to the age old thing that AMDs always overheat? with the new AMDs im wondering how many people are running them on the standard heatsink sold with the chip? when i look inside my box the heatsink and fan on my opterons are damned small yet my box has never even come close to overheating and we all know 3d work can keep your processors working up at 100% power for a couple of days straight.

[jujubee]

Ive got an ASUS A8N Premium and its the best motherboard I've owned so far (aside from some outdated RAID drivers they provided on their install disks.) I really like the A8Ns from ASUS - theyve been given very good awards but are slightly pricey.

[paulison]

how about currently?

is the dual 265 the way to go with 2gb ram?...or 4gb with windows 64

looking at good value without resorting to an X2 for my workstation (although talk of a dual X2 motherboard is interesting)

I cant wait, will be ordering a machine within a week so need to decide ASAP. thx

Oh I also need a couple of rendernodes. Was thinking of X2 4200's for these running windows 64 bit also

I think we arnt far away from the full blooded 64 bit apps...?

[SteveC]

Hi paulison,

I've got 4 X2 4200 render nodes with 2gig of ram, running on windows
xp pro, they're great little machines as render nodes, and overclock very
nicely without any problems, mine are overclocked by 5% and the buckets
keep up nicely with my X2 4800 when DRing.

was considering XP64 for the nodes but could'nt really see a need for it,
with only 2gig of ram on them, sound affordable system i recon.

steve