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My new rig :-)
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These pages are a copy of the official truespace forums prior to their removal somewhere around 2011.
They are retained here for archive purposes only.
My new rig :-) // Hardware
Post by Jack Edwards // Feb 4, 2007, 12:55pm
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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Hey guys been offline for a bit while building my new rig. After frying 2 motherboards and 1 CPU, I'm now finally the proud owner of a:
Intel Xeon 3040 (Core 2 Duo 6300 rebranded) 1.8 Ghz @ 3.3 GHz
Asus P5N-E SLI Motherboard 650i chipset (472 BS, 1890 FSB)
2 GB RAM Corsair XMS 6400 (661 Mhz, 4-4-4-12-2T sucks :mad: )
XFX (nVidia) 7900GS 256MB Ram "Extreme" (Factory overclocked)
320 GB Samsung HD
Samsung DVD R/W w/ Lightscribe
Acer AL2016W 1680x1050 LCD
Whupps forgot:
PowerTek 750W PS (took a risk on this one but so far so good and lots of power on the 12V rails)
Here's a photo of the CPU tests:
4162
I used an old case and modded out the thing for fun (and function!):
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-Jack. |
Post by Jack Edwards // Feb 4, 2007, 1:00pm
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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OS is dual boot Windows Vista x64 Ultimate and Windows XP Professional.
Here's some shots of the construction. The top fans aren't installed yet in the photo was still waiting for them to arrive when I took it ;)
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4165
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Enjoy!
-Jack. |
Post by Shike // Feb 5, 2007, 2:43am
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Shike
Total Posts: 511
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Looks powerful :D
Any rendertime improvement compared to your old one?
I'm curious about what dual core adds in tS-performance.
Don't think I'll be able to beat your performance when I get my new rig...since I'm too much of a coward to try overclocking ;)
(Also, I still havn't won the lottery, so the financing part is not clear yet) |
Post by Jack Edwards // Feb 8, 2007, 10:44pm
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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Thanks Shrike! :-)
I'm really surprised at how stable and cool it's running. These new Core 2 Duo Intel chips really rock once you get a decent cooling solution on them. Now that the Xalman thermal grease I used is breaking in, I'm seeing even lower operating temperatures. As low as 41-42 celsius under full gaming load. It's a real shame the CPU is at it's limit frequency wise since I've still got plenty of thermal headroom.
As far as render times go, I'm sure it will blow away my old computer considering that was a Pentium M 1.7 Ghz.... LOL!
I can tell you that my brother gets a kick out of the load times in WOW. He can zone after someone and still arrive at the new location several seconds before they do. :D
Overall the system would've only cost me about $1300 or so if I didn't need to RMA and cross ship replacement parts. Not counting Vista of course. I still spent I lot more than I'd intended, but I'm definitely happy with the results. Turns out I'm going to have to spend another $500 or so to get my laptop back up and running anyway. It's just too hard to do without the portability that a notebook computer brings. So when I get that back maybe next week sometime, I can do some quicky render benchmarks.
Thought I'd also mention that NewEgg is offering "Preferred Account" financing. The interest rate isn't the greatest but it's hard to beat 6 month interest defered and no payments. They were rather liberal with the credit line too. I was frankly rather surprised and had I known, I would've put more of the computer costs on that line of credit. So that definitely might be a useful option for you. Just make sure you print out the rebate forms when you place the order. I went back to do mine last week and the dates on the recently downloaded forms are all wrong so ... sucks :mad:
-Jack. |
Post by Shike // Feb 9, 2007, 2:34am
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Shike
Total Posts: 511
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I actually placed on order for a new computer the other day...my old one has now even failed to start on occasion...:(
I don't have your knowledge though so I didn't want to buy pieces and try to fit it together myself. :o
Will be very interesting to see if the succeed to build according to my wishes, with trippel-boot. XP, Vista32 and Vista64. ;)
About financing...well, partly on creditcard and only eating noodles for the rest of the year might solve that.:rolleyes:
( Order a computer and then thinking about how to pay....yeah, that's the way to go :D )
core2duoE6700 2.67ghz
4 gb mem
mobo: asus striker extreme 680i sli
bfg8800gtx
hd: 400gb x 2
The guy in the store said theese things would work together...but myself, I have no idea. They seemed to be skilled overclockers, unlike some stores where the sales people only owns a playstation, so hopefully it's a good package. :confused: |
Post by Jack Edwards // Feb 13, 2007, 6:44pm
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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Man Shrike,
That's a badass system! :banana: Can't get a motherboard like that an not overclock LOL! Way over my budget and that system could do 4 Ghz if you put it in the right case with a good cooling solution. :D Say maybe an Antec Nine Hundred? ;-)))) Make sure you get a copper heat pipe cooling solution for your CPU and some good thermal grease (the Zalman stuff is working great for me -- took a few days to reach maximum effectiveness though). The default Intel cooler didn't work for me at all. I went from 60degrees on the CPU down to 30 just swapping that out.
If the tech guys at the store say they'll overclock it for you, I'd go for it. The main issue is heat and stability. RAM speed shouldn't be too much of a problem since that board has independent RAM clockings from the FSB/CPU. There was an issue with the 680i chipset and some boards corrupting data on SATA drives. I'm pretty sure it's been resolved, but you may want to do some hunting on the forums and mention it to your tech guys to make sure they do the correct BIOS and driver updates.
If I could've sprung for an 8800 I would've. That's a seriously awesome card. Double again the speed over the 7800 series cards. :D
When you set up the triple boot, you'll want to do 3 separate partitions and install each OS on a different partition. Don't forget that you'll either need a bootable Vista x64 install DVD or borrow a copy of XP 64 to install Vista x64. I found making the separate partitions made setting up the multi boot effortless. Also a good free app I found to help with the boot management is:
http://www.vistabootpro.org/
-Jack. |
Post by Shike // Feb 27, 2007, 7:42am
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Shike
Total Posts: 511
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Oh, bummer ! :mad:
When I passed the store today, they had a sign stating they where bankrupt.
All orders including mine where cancelled ! :mad: :mad: :mad:
Luckily I havn't lost a dime, and is just annoyed that I must look for a new system.
(Will look for the cooling solution you mentioned)
Hmmm, I think I'll go for Core2 QUAD instead... and since the new poll and FAQ seem to indicate that 64bit Vista isn't a complete waste of money I might only go for 32bitXP and 64bitVista.....better to spend money on CPU than OS ;) |
Post by Steinie // Feb 27, 2007, 7:59am
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Steinie
Total Posts: 3667
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Shike,
What your updating FROM I'm updating TO! When you get your super duper new computer just remember those you left behind!:p
Now where is that turbo button located... |
Post by Jack Edwards // Mar 1, 2007, 4:22pm
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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LOL Steinie! I know the feeling. I've been going the economy route myself for a while now and was planning to hold out another 6 months before upgrading, but the timing just worked out.
@Shrike:
Man that sucks! Good thing you didn't lose your money though! Best bet really is just to buy the parts from NewEgg and assemble it yourself. There are a lot of good forums where people will help you out. Here's one that seems to have a lot of great info:
http://www.hardforum.com/
Quad Core looks pretty awesome for multi threading apps like tS and VRay, but I'm hearing that some software will refuse to run because it's only licensed for 1-2 CPUs (I'm pretty sure I remember hearing something like that for 3dsMax) .... so you'll want to check into that for all your mission critical software.
Of course if you're looking for insane multi threading power, then you could drop two quad cores on a dual CPU board.... :D
For best bang for your buck, a C2D 6600 over clocked to 3.8ish is probably the best price/performance. That and the new nVidia 320MB 8800 gfx card.
The nVidia chipset boards seem to have some issues at the moment, particularly with RAM timings, but on the other hand the ability to set the RAM speed independently from the CPU/FSB speed is VERY helpful. I'm not very happy with my Corsair RAM and am recommending GSkill RAM instead at the moment. I put GSkill in my dad's machine, the construction looked quality and it's performed without any problems. You can get away with DDR2 667 RAM with this board but I'd recommend DDR2 800 RAM since it'll make your initial boot up and setup a lot easier. Make sure you check the recommended voltages for the ram. Some chips require more voltage to be stable than others -- chips that require more than 1.9v might have difficulty booting until you can set the voltage higher. Also you'll need to find out the RAM timings for you particular RAM so you can set them manually in the BIOS. My nVidia board (650i) only seems to like 4-4-4-12-2T on the DDR2 800Mhz Corsairs I have.
It might be worth looking into some of the intel based 965 boards, but I don't think any of those have seperate RAM bus speed, so you'd have to spend more on good RAM.
I can add links to the exact parts I'd recommend based on a particular budget if you'd like. Also if you get an ASUS nVidia board I can probably help you with the BIOS settings for voltages, RAM timings, and bus speeds.
Best of luck with this! :D
-Jack. |
Post by Jack Edwards // Mar 1, 2007, 5:40pm
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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Whupps forgot to mention the cooling!
Here's a website with a lot of great cooling ideas and products:
http://www.frozencpu.com/
Gotta love these guys! They did a great packing job on my order too. I bought my case mod stuff from these guys and Xoxide.
Back to Newegg, here's the cooler I bought:
MASSCOOL 7WD01L3 92mm Hydro Wave CPU Cooling Fan/Heatsink
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835150074
It required that the top bracket be physically modified (with a dremel tool) to fit around the large capacitors around the CPU on my board. It works great and has a great price, but maybe one of the following would be better?
This looks like it should work real nice:
AeroCool HT102 92mm Sleeve CPU Cooler
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835129040
(Make sure you get 2 nice fans for it though!)
This seems to be pretty much the industry standard choice:
ZALMAN CNPS9500 AT 2 Ball CPU Cooling Fan/Heatsink
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835118003
Unfortunately the Thermaltake Big Typhoon has the same I-frame mounting kit as my Masscool HSF, so you'd have to cut away sections of the aluminum mounting bracket to make it fit.
Here's the thermal compound I used:
ZALMAN ZM - STG1 Thermal Compound
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835118010
The applicator brush really helped out and there was enough in the bottle to do the NB chipset 3 times, and the CPU 6-7 times.
For NorthBridge cooling I strongly recommend this:
Thermaltake CL-C0034 Copper Fan&Heatsink
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835116018
This guy makes all the difference when you overvolt the Northbridge Chipset to make the higher bus speeds stable.
Hope that helps!!
-Jack. |
Post by TomG // Mar 2, 2007, 10:06am
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TomG
Total Posts: 3397
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I got an NVIDIA chipset board, with G-Skill DDR800 RAM and had no problems, though the customer reviews on NewEgg for the board did say they had difficulty getting the board to run with RAM timings etc. Mind you I am not overclocking or anything, not at the moment, just running everything at its basic.
It was P5N-E board from ASUS. I was going for another ASUS board at about $20 less, but turned out it didnt have internal RAID (advertised as having RAID, but only with an array made up of one internal and one external drive!). This was on the 965 chipset, so be sure to check such a board and ensure if has the correct chipset for internal RAID if that is something you want to go for.
The 320Mb 8800 is working well too, the one extravagance in the system hehe. No extra cooling system included in the setup, but then it's only a 1.8GHz Core 2 Duo, and not overclocked, so the basic Intel cooling fan is working fine. While I can snap things together, I couldn't get into gluing, soldering, cutting or wiring, just don't have that sort of skills (one dead computer , coming right up!).
Let us know how it goes with your system now that you have to shop elsewhere. Buying the bits (from NewEgg as it happens - personal statement, not a Caligari statement or endorsement) and then building it myself saved several hundred dollars on buying a completed pre-built system (and got me exactly the system specs I wanted for what I could afford).
HTH!
Tom |
Post by Shike // Mar 3, 2007, 7:47am
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Shike
Total Posts: 511
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@Steine:
My old rig still feels enough for my rendering hobby, never felt that trueSpace/ZBrush/Photoshop needed much more, BUT my gaming needs are way higher :D There are some games now that feels very sluggish and since my old MB didn't support PCIexpress the upgrading possibilities was limited.
@j_edwards&TomG:
Ops, I didn't see all your good advice until today, and yesterday I ordered the computer from another place. They are very cheap and the price gets pretty close to "do it yourself", at least when using one of their packages as a base. Also, I'm not sure about ordering hardware from US, I would most likely end up paying both 25% tax and toll-fees (reason I stopped using Amazon)
And since I want to run both 32&64bit it's good to have someone responsible for all the hardware to work. ;)
So, they will check if everything is compatible with 64bit and get
back to me with a price next week, but for now i looks like this:
CPU: Core2 Quad EE QX6700 2.66GHz
MOBO: Intel D975XBX2
MEM: 4Gb PC6400 DDR2 800MHz (don't want to go for 1000MHz since it appears to be tricky to get that speed to work)
GFX: LeadTek 8800GTX 768Mb DDR3
HD: 2x 400Gb Hitachi S-ATA II
PSup: Thermaltake 750W
CpuFan: Sunbeam Tuniq Tower Ultra Silent (not sure if it's the best cooler, but it sure is heavy enough to brake the MOBO in half ! :rolleyes: )
and some other stuff of course... don't remember the Case-name but it looked pretty good.
Oh, are you sure 3Dstudio-licenses limit the use of CPU cores? Sounds crappy...I can understand that software companys don't want us to use their program on several computers in a network....but limiting the use of multiple cores in one computer is just plain stupid ! :(
(since Intel and AMD doesn't seem to be able to increase speed by GHz as fast as they used to, and instead adds cores)
Shouldn't affect me though... don't think trueSpace/ZBrush/Photoshop have this limit ?
Hm, I'm starting to think that my computer-crashes might be caused by an impending powersupply failure.... have on occasion seen messages from the Nvidia driver that it needs to slow down the card because of power drain...
So when I've paid for the new computer and saved some more money I might try to fix it. |
Post by Jack Edwards // Mar 3, 2007, 9:22pm
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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WOW yet again you've far exceeded any budget constraints I would've come up with, and you're definitely right about not wanting to pay the import taxes. Forgot that you were in Sweden.
It'll be interesting to see how your system performance compares with mine considering the significant price difference. Obviously your gaming performance will be WAY better than mine since gfx card is WAY more important than CPU speed for games. Any modern CPU over 2.0 Ghz is usually video card limited long before being CPU limited. Software based rendering is where it will get cool, higher clocked dual core, vs. lower clocked quad core. Of course your system will totally blow mine out of the water if you can get it to overclock. By getting the "Extreme Edition" of the CPU, you've side-stepped the ram speed issue since those aren't CPU multiplier locked and you can change the CPU multiplier to get an optimum RAM frequency to match the overclocked CPU speed, so overclocking is definitely an option. Also the HSF you picked out should be more than adequate assuming it fits in the case! :-) BTW, you're right about the motherboard snapping under the weight of the HSF. Be very careful transporting the computer...
@Tom:
That's great to hear about the GSkill ram, since I'm probably going to call up Asus and try and get one of the boards I messed up repaired and will need to pick up some additional ram.
I wish the 320MB 8800s were out when I bought the parts for my system, I would've sprung for that in a heart beat! [insert jealous icon here] :D
With the P5N-E board overclocking is all software based. Everything is controlled right in the BIOS. The only physical change needed is removing the battery and moving the clear CMOS jumper if you need to reset the BIOS after choosing settings that won't boot up. With the new nVidia nForce drivers out there, the board frequencies and voltages can even be controlled from within Windows.... something that seems a bit unsafe... but hey if it works... :rolleyes:
-Jack. |
Post by Shike // Mar 4, 2007, 11:09pm
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Shike
Total Posts: 511
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Yeah, I guess the price will be close to $5000 (still havn't got any final answer), and it's high. :rolleyes:
I'm starting to think that my way can be classified as stupid: Waiting until the available performance is twice of what I have...and then buy the latest stuff. Though I'm still not convinced I'll get the 2x CPU-performance since the new CPU's and their GHz isn't completely comparable. :o
Pentium4 3.2GHz vs Core2 2.6GHz Quad....if only one core in the Quad is used...will it be slower than my old?
(and overclocking is still a bit creepy in my opinion....if the CPU have a meltdown...I can't afford a new one. Scares me abit ! :o)
I'm curious though, since you overclock and sometimes get hardware failure...doesn't the total systembuilding-price become rather high for you also?
(I'm guessing that you will have to pay for the MOBO repair...?)
Oh, and good thing you mentioned the Extreme+memory thing...must make sure that they actually set the hardware to 1000/800MHz clock.
About HSF/MOBO snapping...wonder if I can get them to assemble the computer in my apartment? :D |
Post by Jack Edwards // Mar 5, 2007, 1:28am
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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No worries about CPU melting unless your board gets too hot. The CPU's now have thermal throttling (make sure you turn it on in the bios) that slows the CPU when it gets too hot. So Intel has made overclocking safer than ever. :cool:
The Pentium 4 was a dead end chip and sad to say rather a failure since the time that Intel spent trying to squeeze better performance out of it allowed AMD to take the performance lead. My old laptop's Pentium M at 1.7Ghz was way faster than my brother's Pentium 4 at 3.2Ghz. The Core 2 chips now leave all that in the dust and are WAY (2X) faster than even the Pentium D's as can be seen here in this benchmark:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core2duo-shootout_4.html
Also it's important to keep in mind that speed is related mainly to CPU frequency, multi-core only helps in certain situations with applications that can take advantage of multi-threading. Fortunately for us, VRay is multi-threaded and takes full advantage of both CPUs on my new system so I'm seeing amazing performance in regular apps as well as HUGE performace gains in render times as well. I'm not entirely sure but tS itself seems faster in 64bit mode under Vista as well, so it's definitely worth the step up from P4.
I'm not sure I'd sink so much money into it at this time though because there's going to be a flurry of CPU and GPU changes over the next 2 years. Both AMD have new chip technology releases coming up. AMD is banking a lot on the K8L architecture and Intel has already announced that they plan to dramatically reduce prices on their C2D chips starting with the release of the C2D 4300. And according to this article the 4300 overclocks really well:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core2duo-e4300.html
Xbitlabs got 3 Ghz out of the chip without increasing voltages and 3.4 GHz with voltage increase. That's pretty insane for a $180 chip!
This is my first new computer build (desktop) in years. I used to do it when I was a kid, but I'd gotten pretty lazy of late. But with the components as cheap as they are now and the exciting new technology it's pretty hard to resist upgrading and pushing them for the most. As far as the parts lasting less long, what does it matter if the part only lasts 2 years if it's obsolete in 2 years anyway? That's also why I don't like paying a lot for parts if I can buy cheap and overclock. The way I look at it: <$200 for the CPU and $150 for the MB getting performance better than $1000 chip + $100 MB is a good deal even if you screw up a few times. Now that I'm familiar with the new technology it's actually pretty easy, and my screw ups were acts of sheer stupidity -- lets just say 1.7 volts on north bridge isn't a good idea even if the motherboard lets you do it.......:rolleyes:
I RMA'd the first Motherboard and chip since I was never able to confirm that they worked in the first place, but the 2nd board was clearly my fault. I need to find out how much it's gonna cost to send the dead MB back and get it repaired. If it's more than $150, then it would be simpler and cheaper to get a new one. LOL
Hehe, hopefully the brace installed on the back of the Motherboard will help prevent your HSF from putting too much stress on the board during travel. Just be careful moving it around -- and pick it up in person instead of shipping. :-)
-Jack. |
Post by parva // Mar 5, 2007, 1:51am
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parva
Total Posts: 822
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Cool combo Shike :D
I would say 2000€ to 3000€ would be the price of this.
I'm interested in the quad cpu's too but the price is, ouch. The Q6600 is currently at 727€, still too much ^^.
The greatest problem so far seams to be still the heat and the boxed cooler (very loud, don't know if they have fixed this).
I think watercooling would be the best... overclocking possibilites too.
Or a good air cooler like Scythe Infinity.
I read yesterday a thread at Toms Hardware Guide that Windows XP is still the way to go if you do heavy cpu usage things. Rendering, Video De-encoding etc. Vista is slower there (currently).
At least it does make my decision easier to stay longer with XP. |
Post by Shike // Mar 5, 2007, 2:08am
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Shike
Total Posts: 511
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Phew, good to hear that old P4 GHz isn't better than Core2 ! :D
Will be interesting to see how my benchmark comparisons turn out....
Luckily I've got my old scores on paper since I'd probably not be able to run 3DMark without the GPU to throttle down now :(
Throttle down...I forgot about that !
Can you see in for example the "Event Log" if it has throttled down, or will it trigger a message?
(Considering that my Nvidia power-throttle-down messages causes a lot of problems when running games.)
It would be nice to do what you've done, and build a complete system yourself. You can actually show what you've done with pride....I'm only going to be able to show a big creditcard bill and a motherboard split in half ;)
However, skilled overclock-people like you ruin stuff for wussy-guys like me ;)
Reason: Since overclockers prefer to do everything by themself, it doesn't seem to be a market for what I'd like:
A local shop with low prices and extremely skilled overclockers that offers the best hardware systems, overclocked to stable and safe limits, 100% safe water or vapochill cooling and offering full warranty for any hardware failures.
(Hm, the shop that went bankrupt was almost like that, so it's probably not profitable..:confused: )
BTW Is there any "official" trueSpace7 benchmark scene that works with both LightWorks/VirtuaLight/VRay for us to compare systems?
It's going to be interesting to see how it goes in XP vs Vista64 now that Norms FAQ and Vista thread seem to show that it works! :jumpy:
@Parva: Ah, is that the price for a "build it yourself"? I'm being punished for my incompetence ;)
The now bankrupt store had the ScytheInfinity...but I hope "Sunbeam Tuniq Tower Ultra Silent" will work too (it was the best they had in the new place)...at least it looks as big and
bulky as the Scythe? :confused:
And I also saw that TomsHW report...scary, especially since I'm in the CAD-selling business and CAD performed horribly in Vista :(
Though, since I'll be running XP on one disk and Vista64 on the other I'm safe! :D |
Post by Shike // Mar 6, 2007, 6:29am
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Shike
Total Posts: 511
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Why is it so hard to buy a new computer?
Just got a message from the store, and apparantly, even if they
succeed to find drivers and software that works in Vista64,
they must "lock" it before delivering... so when I start it, it will
require me to enter name and stuff...and then it will remove all
uncertifed software/drivers !?!? Thanks Microsoft ! :mad:
I've decided to skip Vista64 and purchase it in a couple of months and do the installation myself...and if I choose ultimate I think I get both 32bit & 64bit.
(will also lower the total price since I don't have to get DVD-burner software and security solutions for 2 OS until later on.)
The service guys also recommended that I'd choose the
"Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro" CPU-cooling instead,
and after looking at Sweclockers test of it together with:
Gigabyte 3D Rocket II
Scythe Infinity
Thermalright Ultra-120
Thermaltake Big Typhoon VX
Titan TTC-NK34TZ
Zalman CNPS8000
it did very well, for half the price, and most important, half the weight ! :D
( surprised that the 1kg Scythe only was a few degrees cooler...apparantly size isn't everything ;)) |
Post by brotherx // Sep 11, 2007, 2:47am
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brotherx
Total Posts: 538
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I've been looking at a little upgrade as my base pc is pretty sound - a nice quad 2.4Ghz and motherboard to match (was considering a new P35 Express chipset) all for 370 Euro including shipping.
I'd love to buy it but I figure it isn't going to happen since I'm away to move house.... |
Post by Jack Edwards // Sep 11, 2007, 4:09am
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Jack Edwards
Total Posts: 4062
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Price should be coming down as the new technology comes out and they get better at the current manufacturing process. If you're ok with what you've got, waiting will always help you buy more for less when you finally do buy in. :) |
Post by brotherx // Sep 11, 2007, 6:20am
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brotherx
Total Posts: 538
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yeah...I know...the 45nm processors are gonna be out in 2 months and the 65nm ones will drop in price but i just like the idea of getting a nice fast machine now...I know I can get a decent dual 2.33 (1333 bus) and board for about 260....
The price is right...:) |
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