New workstation - Need advice!

[CCS]

This is endlessly discussed, I know. My machine died a while back and I've been limping on my older machines and laptop. That has to change. I'm looking for some input on this system before I press "Submit Order". I'm not looking for the absolute best, but a good fast stable machine that is the best bang for my buck. Right now, I think that's a 6300, and I'd like to have OCing as an option.

Here is where I'm at do far:
(thanks to Lele btw for getting me this far)


***CASE
COOLER MASTER Centurion 5 CAC-T05-UB Black /Blue Aluminum Bezel , SECC Chassis ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Retail

***PSU
SeaSonic S12-430 ATX12V 430W Power Supply - Retail

***MOBO
ASUS P5B Socket T (LGA 775) Intel P965 Express ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail

***CPU
Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 Conroe 1066MHz FSB LGA 775 Processor Model BX80557E6300 - Retail

***RAM
Crucial Technology Ballistix 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 667 (PC2 5300) Unbuffered Dual Channel Kit System Memory Model BL2KIT12864AA663 - Retail

***HD1
Western Digital Caviar SE WD800JD 80GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM

***HD2
Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD2500KS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM

***VIDEO
As for video, here are a few ideas:
- New SAPPHIRE 100141L Radeon X1300 256MB DDR PCI Express x16 (About $65 new)
- Used nVidia Quadro 4 980 XGL 980XGL 128MB AGP Video Card (About $75-100 on ebay)

- My last card was the nvidia. It worked great for me, but that was 4 years ago. I need 2 (or more) screens, so it's either a dual-head card or several singles. What's my best choice for budget/performance?



In reality, I may end up using some HDs from my last machine. I also have (2) 1GB sticks of Corsair PC-2100 and (4) 512MB sticks of Elpid PC-2100 ... so many flavors of RAM I don't know what's what anymore.

I'm open to all opinions. Overall, I'd like the total package to fall around $1000 as it does now. I may be convinced to move a little on that, but it would have to be for a noticeable benefit.

Thanks!!

[RErender]

Specs look pretty good, the 6300 is a pretty good deal at around $200, The x2's may be a little bit better value right now though check out http://www.monarchcomputer.com/Merch...ricewatch&NR=1

the 5000+ should be quicker than the 6300 unless you plan on OC'g the Core2

For the video card I'm not sure which of those I would choose, actually I wouldn't buy either :P A good video card is probably the most important piece for working in max, I'd rather wait for a render than for the viewport to refresh. an nvidia 7600 gt would probably be a better compomise.


Your old pc2100 is worthless these days you need ddr2 and it is just ddr

[percydaman]

I think ive had that case before. If its the one where the little cdrom panels are supposed to push open when you hit the button for the cdrom, they dont work worth jack. I replaced it within a couple weeks of using it. The exterior button to open the cdrom didn't work very well.

[CCS]

Thanks guys.

@Percy....
So, I have to pick a new case? Crap! There are simply no other choices.

@Eric....
I'd never heard of a x2 5000. It's news to me. A bit weird too that the chip is $600 at Newegg, but the chip, mobo and hs/fan together is $382 at Monarch. What's up with that?

So, my Qs....

#1 - Going by advertised speed alone, the AMD beats the Conroe (2.6 vs 1.86) and price is comparable if that combo deal price is accurate. Does that speed ratio hold up in Vray tests? (40% faster!) I don't see a 5000 or a non-OC'd 6300 in the bench thread.

#2 - I know you can OC the 6300. Can you OC the AMD? And... is that advisable?

BTW, that vidcard doesn't look too bad. Dual head even.

(Thanks again!)

[DaForce]

Check out this for a case... really quite good.

http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=81800

[jujubee]

I have 4 of those P180 Antec cases with Antec Truepower 2 500W PS. Theyre really cool, and SUPER quiet. I can't tell my computers are on.

I have to agree with Eric - those video cards will not cut it. I like the Nvidia 7800GTs. And the RAM - you don't want to underclock on PC2100s.

[studioDIM]

This would be a good renderbox, imo, no more.
For a workstation, i'd agree you'll want a better videocard, and maybe it may be worth spending some money on a faster boot/applications disk (raptor, for instance: splendind on non-sustained operations).
Also, i'd go for a bigger PSU to support the hungry videocard, and possibly 4 GB of ram, so opening 30 textures in PS with max open isn't a problem anymore.

Lele

[crossbow]

If this is going to be a primary workstation, I'd swap the asus motherboard for an Intel 975XBX Badaxe. It's a more stable platform, as it was used during the conroe development phase, and is pretty battle tested. In terms of stability, the newer motherboards can't touch it.

You also might want to ramp up the powersupply. Seasonic is a great company though, good choice there. I don't know what minimum psu spec's most individuals are specing, but I'm going for EPS PSU's with a 500 min spec on my conroe builds. (Either FSP, PC Power and Cooling, or Seasonic)

I'd also get a E6600 instead of a E6300...but thats just me. The 6600's go for around 340ish, which isn't a big jump in price from the E6300 for what you're getting. Another 2 megs of l2 cache, and a whopping 1140 more megahertz. (Remember this is a multicore cpu, so any gigahertz jump is multiplied by 2...if you need further rationalization!!)

Also dump that 80 gb harddrive...are you kidding? A 2 gb flash drive is worth more then that. There isn't any reason you couldn't get a set of 250's and run a raid 1. If money is that tight, don't upgrade! Never upgrade/build on a limited budget. It's much better to wait a bit for prices to stabilize THEN upgrade, maximizing what money you have!

The worst computer purchase is the one you buy, then immediately turn around and upgrade in 6-8 months. The best is the one you buy, and upgrade 3 years later. Option #2 always costs more initially, but less overall.

[CCS]

ok....

I appreciate the input. A bit overwhelmed by this topic. There's never consensus on this stuff.

Just to clarify though. I understand I don't want junk. I don't want to be forced to upgrade in 6 months. But understand, I'm upgrading from dual 2400s, so just about anything is going to be a step up. I know RAID is great, and super fast HDs, and oodles of RAM, faster procs and on and on. But *how* important?

I'm not a power MAX user. I'm not doing animated particle flow, etc. My primary work is arch vis. I usually model in Sketchup - sometimes ACAD - sometimes MAX. But the majority of my MAX work is creating and assigning materials, setting up cameras, and rendering. Do I really need all these things? I want a fast enough machine so it won't impede my workflow - especially for rendering. But for everything except rendering, my last machine (dual 2400s, 2GB, 980xgl) was just fine for me. Now, if I was running PS while rendering, sure that put a crimp on things...

I just want to make sure I'm not being set up with a primo film FX system. Anyone follow what I'm saying? Feel free to set me straight - I just wanted to make sure my priorities were clear.

[crossbow]

Raid 1 isn't about speed, its about redundancy. It's a mirror array. Each harddrive mirrors the other. Your write performance is the same, or about 1% slower then a single drive, but your read performance (and access time) is almost twice as fast (both drive heads used for accessing data).

Because of the relatively declining quality of harddrives in the past few years, I heavily recommend a raid 1 in any personal machine, to help prevent SDF situations. (Sudden Drive Failure). Considering that a decent 250GB 5yr warranty drive is roughly 80 bucks, it's not a big expense. If you want to run cheaper 250's, you can actually drop down to 60 bucks a drive. I consider this "sanity" money.

Thats my rationalization for the hd's at least...plus you don't want a slow 80gb drive in a system with brand new drives. Bottlenecks are only useful for pouring alcohol.

[CCS]

I understand the size and speed issue for HD. I don't follow the need for RAID though. I mean, I know it's good and all, but all my projects, maps, etc. are on my file server. And I know HDs are cheap, but wouldn't I also need a RAID controller then?

I'm just not following what I need RAID for if this machine is primarily holding OS and apps. You just talking about recovering from a crash and not having to reinstall?

[crossbow]

SDF (sudden drive failured). The drive dies. You lose everything on the drive. No data is recoverable. Have to buy a new drive and install everything from scratch (or hopefully you have a clone disc ready to go).

If you have all your data offsite on a fileserver, then you'd be fine, assuming the file server is running a raid 5. My advice is mainly for those running a single workstation who want some enhanced reliability. I thought your motherboard was using the 975x chipset (which includes raid support), but its actually the 965 (which doesn't have any), so yes, you'd need to run a seperate controller.

Thus in your situation (already having files off location with redundant backup) and no integrated controller, I'd skip trying to do that.

[CCS]

Followup...
I've been delayed by a few nonpaying clients. Had some time to revisit things tonight. Please take a look at THIS

Thoughts?

[ene.xis]

If this is going to be a primary workstation, I'd swap the asus motherboard for an Intel 975XBX Badaxe. It's a more stable platform, as it was used during the conroe development phase, and is pretty battle tested. In terms of stability, the newer motherboards can't touch it.

i m getting ready to purchase another workstation and i m quite lost in relation to the motherboard choice...
i ve had crossbow s post in the back of my head since then so i went looking for that board...but this led me to a dilema:
ATI* CrossFire* Multi-GPU Platform Support
does this mean i have to swith over ATI? am i right? it sounds wrong to me...spetially now when AMD owns ATI...
it s been one hard decision to switch over to an intel base...i don t know if i can take all this changes!

[mike.edel]

i have some cinebench 9.5 benchmarks (uses cinema4d to test cpu performance so it should fit in your/our case) for several cpus:

c2 extreme q6700 (quad core, 2.66ghz, 2x4068kb cache, listprice 1050€): 1419
c2 extreme x6800 (dual core, 2.93 ghz, 4048 cache, listprice 970€): 905
c2d e6700 (dual core, 2.67ghz, 4048 cache, listprice 540€): 829
athlon 64 fx-62 (dual core, 2.8ghz, 2x1024 cache, listprice 800€): 783
c2d e6600 (dual core, 2.4 ghz, 4048 cache, listprice 330€): 750
athlon 64 x2 5000+ (dual core, 2.6ghz, 2x512 cache, listprice 315€): 723
c2d e6400 (dual core, 2.13 ghz, 2048 cache, listprice 230€): 663
c2d e6300 (dual core, 1.86 ghz, 2048 cache, listprice 190€): 575

several x2s (4800+, 4600+) and pentium 4 (extreme edition) are faster than the e6300
source: pc professionell 12/2006 page 48

regarding motherboards they have a review in the same issue:

performance-wise they are almost all equal (only one nforce board and no ati boards were availlable, the rest is intel)

recommendation: asus p5b deluxe wifi-ap (best accessories - wlan, heatpipe cooler, quad-core capable - 190€)
budget rec: foxconn p9657aa-8ekrs2h (115€, no frills, but everything you need - including p-ata for optical drives that is missing on some boards)

both are intel and have gigabit lan (the asus has dual gbit lan)