Anyone looking to adopt a playful dog?

[laurieny]

Walked into my home office with a nice tall glass of ice water a short time ago with a plan to get tons of work done today. My 45 lb dog snuck up behind me and jumped up on my back, wanting to play a game of tag. Needless to say, the majority of the water landed inside my running computer as my Antec case (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129176) has two large fan openings on the top. I ripped it open and sopped up the water, but I have to assume the whole thing is toast.

I can't afford to be without this computer, but I haven't done a new build in 3 years. Usually I will research each part for days - as that is half the fun of it. But I can't afford the time and need to get an order off to Newegg today.

I manage software dev projects, thus this machine does a fair bit of compiling. I use VMware workstation and *had* about 20 images. I use the whole CC suite from Adobe and work with a lot of graphics. I rarely play games anymore - rather spend my time on MOOCs.

My last build was about $1.5K, and while this money was NOT in my budget, cost is not particularly an issue - quality is. My probably fried board was this one: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129176.

I generally try to build N-1 generation systems. I did enough research in the last 20 minutes to know I probably(?) want a Z87 board - and I usually buy Gigabyte or Asus. For those of you have built a good machine recently, could you give me your suggestions for compatible parts for the whole rig minus the case and monitors?

I had/have a 2 TB drive and 24G of RAM currently. I expect I will get a new board and processor, HD, power supply, and 8G of RAM to start. I will wait on a dedicated graphics card and see if my existing one will still work. Same for the extra memory - though I don't remember what is in this one so it may not even be compatible. Your help is sincerely appreciated.

 

[MichaelD]

Do you have backups of your VMs/files? The HD might not be toast. MB and PS, probably, but you never know about the HD. At the very least, you might be able to hook it up as a secondary drive and get your files off it, even if you can't boot from it.

 

[laurieny]

Yes, I am praying to the computer gods that the HD survived. Where it sits in the drive bays it didn't really get wet, I just don't know if it got zapped when the whole thing shorted out. I have back-ups of a couple of the images I was using in my current project thankfully, but not all...

 

[Ken g6]

Wow, sorry to hear that, laurien. I work from home myself, and I've had a couple of issues recently that shut down my main computer - temporarily, fortunately. But I try to always have a portable computer on-hand that I can work from - if not as efficiently as from my desktop.

So, just to get you up and running, do you have one like that? I assume you have something since you typed from it. You might want to get an external 3 or 4-TB drive, hooked to that machine, to back up to. Or you might want to get an external HDD enclosure to test your existing HDD without frying your new mobo, and get a 2TB HDD to swap with it later. (>2TB requires some unusual configurations that I wouldn't try without a pre-assembled unit.)

I can't see your mobo - the link doesn't work - but I assume from your odd RAM size that you had an LGA1156 board with a first-generation Core? The RAM from it might work, but if you need a new mobo you should get a new CPU too.

Can you give us a ballpark budget for this? Minimum I'd go for a B85, an i3, and one stick of 8GB RAM. (You could add a second later, and you could reuse your existing RAM if it works.) Maximum I might aim you towards a Xeon, with a pro mobo that takes ECC RAM.

Edit: Oh, and one more essential piece of hardware.

 

[laurieny]

Appreciate the sympathy. I am sick about how much time it will take to re-install everything...

My old laptop died a month ago. Just got a new one last week (Lenovo T440P - took three freaking weeks to ship) and I can do some work with it, but I hadn't really set it up to be a dev machine yet. I have a couple old XP test machines. But that laptop purchase did absorb my current disposable income. I would like to keep it all under $1K if I could, but as this one *better* last for a couple of years again, I don't want to cheap out.

Getting an enclosure is a good idea. Will go buy that now.

My old one was an i7 core - GIGABYTE GA-X58-USB3 LGA 1366 Intel X58 USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard.

Just clicked your last essential link. Cute. rolling eyes. ;-)

 

[laurieny]

So I found a recommendation for this:

(1) Processor: Intel Core i7-4770K ($329 at Amazon)
(2) Motherboard: Asus Z87-Pro ($169 - with $15 rebate Newegg)
(3) Memory: Crucial Ballistix Elite 2x8GB DDR3-1866 ($160)
(4) Solid-State Drive: SanDisk Extreme II 240GB ($189 Newegg)
(5) Hard Drive: Toshiba 3TB 7200RPM ($118)
(6) Power Supply: Seasonic X850 ($166)
(7) Optical Drive: LG 24x DVD Burner ($18)
(8) CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-U14S ($76 Newegg)

That's just over $1200...Is this good bang for the buck for a higher end system nowadays? I don't overclock - do I really need the CPU cooler? The case has several fans already. I would like to carve a couple hundred off this if possible...and I don't know who is making the best power supplies currently - never used Seasonic before.And still I may need to add a video card...

 

[MichaelD]

That's a decent price for that nicely-spec'd system. I've found that b/t Newegg and Amazon you really can't do much better price-wise (as well as customer service, if necessary). You could spend the next 5 hours saving another couple of bucks here and there, but it's not worth the effort IMO.

Seasonic makes some of the best powersupplies out there. They OEM for many other brands such as Corsair. You cannot go wrong with a Seasonic PSU. Go ahead and pull the trigger on this build.

You might also want to invest a couple of bucks in a good backup program like Norton Ghost 15...it's cheap and works well. I use it 2x/week to back up my main PC to an external HD. FWIW, I got my copy of Ghost 15 for free when I bought a Samsung SSD kit (drive+3.5" conversion bracket, SATA cable).

 

[Cerb]

That's just over $1200...Is this good bang for the buck for a higher end system nowadays? I don't overclock - do I really need the CPU cooler?

No, nor the CPU, nor the motherboard. K = overclocking, Z = overclocking. You can also go with a Xeon E3 a bit cheaper, too.
(1) - Look at the Xeon E3-1245V3, E3-1230V3 (no IGP), or even i7-4771.
(2) - Look at the ASRock H87 Pro4. If you need wireless, you have room for cards.
(3) The Seagate 600 is cheaper, right now, and also very fast.
(6) Overkill, unless you use SLI. What would a roughly $60 S12II-520 not do? Granted, I haven't seen any mention of what your video cards are, but unless you have more than one roughly 300W card, that PSU is crazy. If you do, you might want to get a new midrange card anyway.
(8) Quiet stock operation can be had cheaper, or you can just use Intel's cooler.

 

[Cerb]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1230 V3 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor ($244.68 @ SuperBiiz)
CPU Cooler: Thermalright Macho-120 73.6 CFM CPU Cooler ($43.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: ASRock H87 Pro4 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($93.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($129.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Seagate 600 Series 240GB 2.5" Solid State Disk ($129.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($100.00 @ NCIX US)
Video Card: Zotac GeForce GT 640 2GB Video Card ($79.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: Rosewill Capstone 450W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($69.99 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: LG GH24NSB0 DVD/CD Writer ($14.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $907.59
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-03-15 14:11 EDT-0400)

The CPU cooler may be entirely wasted.

The video card was added in case yours doesn't work, and the CPU needs some video out. It's also faster than the IGP by a good bit. But, it's not much good for gaming.

The CPU is a mere 200MHz, or about 6%, slower than the i7-4770K, but $70-90, or about 25%, cheaper. The i7-4771 is 3.5/3.9, just like the i7-4770K, but a bit cheaper, and no overclockable.

The PSU I put in for being partially modular. It's a Super Flower, I think a Golden Green. Seasonic are good, too.

You may want to add one of these, too.

Worthy SSD upgrades:
M500 480GB (3 year warranty, good GB/$, consistent performance, but not chart-topping)
Extreme II 480GB (5 year warranty, extra speedy)

 

[mfenn]

Nice build from Cerb as always.

Looking at the bigger picture, something as simple a water spill on the computer should never ever put you in the position where you're worried about losing critical data. It should be more of an inconvenience that you can't use your primary machine for a few days.

This means that you should have good image-based backups to external media. A point which I'm sure you're painfully aware of now.

So with this new machine, start off on the right foot. Pick up a copy of Acronis True Image, a 3TB external drive, and set up Acronis to do an automated daily backup.

 

[Cerb]

And, as always, +1 on mfenn's backup method suggestion.

 

[laurieny]

Breathing loud sighs of relief. Connected the HD to one of my XP little desktops and it came back up albeit really slow due to only 4gb of RAM and recognizing that it didn't shut down nicely. While I would like to get a new SSD drive, that can fortunately now wait a bit. I will certainly be buying Acronis and another drive for backup with my order.

So I got brave and turned on the system. There was power, but it just shut itself off after attempting to boot a couple times. Does anyone think that means I don't need a new power supply? Or just a bad idea to even try. The video card is definitely toast.

And I wonder about the RAM. GSkill DDR3 1600 9-9-24. Is it playing with fire to use it in the new MB? Or, will it most likely be safe enough to try even if it is dead? Is it worth the performance increase to go with DDR3 1866?

@Cerb - PCPartPicker is new to me - very cool. So I believe I am going to go with your suggestions. The only thing I wondered is that the board you picked doesn't support the DDR3 1866 - though yes, I am trying to save money which your selections accomplish. But, if there is a performance boost and I will have this for a few years - should I not go up to a board that supports that?

 

[mfenn]

The H87 Pro4 will run DDR3 1866, you'll just have to set the memory speed manually.

As for how dead you current PC is, what motherboard do you have (link in OP is to the case twice)? If it has an IGP, you can try pulling the GPU completely out and seeing if it boots further.

 

[laurieny]

GIGABYTE GA-X58-USB3 LGA 1366 Intel X58 USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

I may as well try that too!

 

[laurieny]

No luck. Tried a different video card. Lights on the MB, and the case fans run, but it won't boot.

 

[Cerb]

And I wonder about the RAM. GSkill DDR3 1600 9-9-24. Is it playing with fire to use it in the new MB? Or, will it most likely be safe enough to try even if it is dead?

Good question. I wouldn't try it, with that kind of failure, since (a) the new PC has to do with your livelihood, and (b) you don't seem to have disposable PC parts. I would say the chances are very good that it's fine, and the CPU likely is, too. What I would do is, once up and running with a new PC, try to find a cheap used 1366 board on FS/FT or eBay, and then see what can be salvaged.

Is it worth the performance increase to go with DDR3 1866?

Not with a video card.

With a video card, RAM speed matters little. Improvement from dual-channel are typically <5%, as is the benefit from 1600MHz to 2400MHz, much less to 1866MHz. Typically, only simulation and AI type work get anything substantial from faster RAM.

Without a video card, such as if going with a Core i5 CPU (no HT), the IGP can hog bandwidth, and can often process graphics faster than it can be fed data, so decent value 2133MHz kits might be worth getting.

But, given prices, spending more on a gaming-friendly video card, like a GTX 650 Ti, GTX 750 Ti, GTX 660, or GTX 760, would be better places to put more money, IMO; compared with an i7 or E3 w/ IGP and fast RAM. Adobe's stuff can get a decent boost from up to a GTX 650 or so, today (and likely only more in the future), so a faster card wouldn't be totally wasted even without gaming. A 750 Ti would offer sufficient performance for light gaming here and there, and the GTX 760 is a pretty nice midrange gaming card, and not unpopular for student-budget CAD users, either.

While I don't do just what you do, I have a close enough usage profile, I think, to say confidently that you really don't want to give up HT in the upgrade. You could also get the E3-1245V3 or i7-4771 now, to get up and running, and mull over video card choices for later purchase.

 

[Charlie98]

So with this new machine, start off on the right foot. Pick up a copy of Acronis True Image, a 3TB external drive, and set up Acronis to do an automated daily backup.

Mfenn speaketh the truth! I use Acronis to backup full images everyday to 3 different drives (as opposed to just one external drive, for example. ) It HAS saved my bacon on one occasion when my SSD died. With an Acronis backup and a new drive, I was back in business in about 30 minutes.