any experience with Cryo PC (uk) + some other questions

[flino2004]

I also built my workstation almost 2 years ago....I OC following an article using the same hardware and running all the hardware tests available I can say that it very stable.
buying high-end gaming stuff works great in my opinion because you get high- end for a fraction....I remember many years ago I wanted to buy a Gigabit 10/100/1000 router so after searching around I found one for small business for $350 and another one to play games for $150 (same manufacter) ...well, serching online I found that they were exactly the same internally.....the same happen with Geforce and Quadros several years ago.
I had a Inspiron laptop with 1920x1200 pixels screen($1200)....when I wanted to buy a new one that size it was available only for precision laptops ($4,000) so I got an Alienware almost for the same price of the precision but much better computer.

to me, after expending a lot money in high-end WS from HP or Dell (dual proccesors) top of the line Video cards. I decided build mine and I'm never going back again for those fancy computers....it doesn't matter how fast the new computers go because the programs will take more resources anyway and It doesn't matter how many GB in memory you buy because it's never enought..... pretty much your render time still the same now than 5 years ago because the quality of the rendering also changed.....nobody use displacement for grass or cutouts for trees and people or cars....everything is in 3D now.

[super gnu]

hehe i thought that boast might come back to bite me have to bear in mind im talking about a machine 2+ years old. 1st gen i7, watercooled and overclocked to 4.2 (4.4 with turboboost) at the time i compared it to the current xeon machines. it came within a few percent of the 2.4 ghz dual quad, when rendering in cinebench. depending on wether you also consider my 2gb gtx285 vs the equivalent quadro in a "proper" workstation or not, the price compared to mine was approx 2 - 2.5 times. maybe 3x the price was a claim too far :P

ive not had the pleasure to overclock a sandybridge yet, as my i7 is still going strong, although about to whack a 24 gig ram set in it ( needed for my current job) which is likely to require me to slow the cpu down much closer to stock speeds to keep stability.

so.. i cant comment of memory voltage issues.. however thanks for the heads up, ill be keeping an eye on that when i next build myself something.

sorry to hear about your quad. but to be honest, if you got 3 solid stable years out of it, and saved yourself close to £1000 by getting the cheaper parts, for the same performance, it might have been quite cost -effective in the end? im assuming it was a 1st gen quad part from intel? they did OC ok but were nowhere near as easy and happy with it as the later chips.

[BBB3]

One small thing... Why would increasing the RAM force you to lower the clock speed? What's the relation between the two?

(Cryo is offering massive amounts of RAM irrespective of the clock speed)

[super gnu]

mm to be honest it seems to be different for every different processor. mine was the first intel chip with the memory controller built into the chip ( could be wrong about that, but it was certainly less evolved than the current ones)

basically, i purchased a bundle with the cpu/mobo and ram together, and was advised that adding more ram put more strain on the memory controller and usually led to lower overclocks being achievable. - as in, they wouldnt guarantee id get the same overclock level if i added more ram to their kit.

it came with 6 gb, which was ok 2 years ago, and i still do very large projects within that limit, but im now biting the bullet and getting a nice 4x memory upgrade, as its time i moved on to stressing 24 gig rather than stressing 6 gig

good price too! £160 for 24 gig

hopefully i wont have to slow it down at all, but i suspect the heady highs of 4.4 ghz wont be easy with that old chip and 24 gig. was already at the limit of stability with 6 gb.


however i understand this memory / overclock thing is much less of an issue now, and if they are selling it with tons of ram already included, -and- overclocked- you can be pretty sure they dont have this problem. think the issue is if they guarantee an overclocked system, that guarantee wont hold if you upgrade any major components or flash the bios for example. but i think thats probably true of non-oc'ed machines too.

[lukx]

I'm also not a big fan of overclocking, life span of components will go down quickly! OC in my opinion is good for gaming if you really need to squash FPS but for rendering really how much speed gain you can get? Is it really worth it to risk it in long term. Let's not forget the long hours it will have to render being oc'ed it's not like gaming for few hours and that's it.
Also regarding noise with water cooling... I wanted to go water path some time ago because of noise... but it appeared it's still there and even might be more. You still will need big fans to cool the water down !

[super gnu]

well you have to bear in mind, big fans are quieter than small ones! they turn more slowly for the same volume of air moved. my watercooling radiator has 3 120mm fans on it, keeps my chip below 60 degrees at all times (even rendering for 2 weeks continuously) and the fans dont need to go above 800 rpm.. you can hear it, but its really quiet.

regarding benefits of oc'ing, i got my machine 2 years ago, and its still fast today (maybe some of the top 6 and 8 core chips beat it, but its faster than any quad you can currently buy)

i essentially got a 60-70% faster machine, for free.

im a nerd though, and have always built my own machines... i enjoy fiddling with them. i believe, as can be seen by the latest trend of guaranteed, pre-overclocked pcs for sale, its WAY less of a risk or challenge than it used to be, when you really needed to be a geek to even consider it.. even 2 years ago, buying an overclocked machine with a guarantee was unheard of.. now its relatively common.

those chips are just itching to go faster. since intel has no competition at the moment they didnt increase the clock speeds for ages really.. at the same time,they have been refining and perfecting their production processes (as they will always do)

this basically means those chips have loads of headroom.. anyway.. each to their own.. totally understand not wanting to go that route too.