Bulldozer PC build suggestions?

[Soundgardener]

Getting ready to build a Bulldozer rig ready to drop in the 8-core once it lands, at which stage my current Phenom II 970 + mobo + RAM will go into a new case to be a virtual server lab.

Keen to go relatively high end - system will be used for 3 x 24" screen gaming. I mainly want help with a mobo / cooler / RAM combo that all fits together gracefully, without having to use trial and error.

Motherboard - keen to go ASUS Crosshair 5, normally go with Giga but not a big fan anymore

Cooler? Want a top-notch air-cooler which will fit over the RAM, unless there is a
compelling all-in-one water cooler out there. Currently have a high-end but not top end Noctua.

RAM? (8 GB DDR-1866 CL8? 16 GB DDR3-2000?) - must fit comfortably under the cooler

Recycled components from current system will be:

CM Storm Sniper Black Mesh case
Corsair HX 850 PSU
6970 GPU (prob add another when I go to 3 screens, currently have one 24")
Vertex 2 120 GB SSD + 2 TB HDD

Cheers.

 

[Meghan54]

Personally, I wouldn't spend a penny prepping for a cpu that no one knows how it's going to perform. It's not like the other parts are going to disappear when BD finally makes its appearance. Until it finally shows up and real performance figures are sussed out via AT, et al, I wouldn't bother.

Plan, scheme maybe, but not spend a penny on something that's a complete unknown, esp. given AMD's history with new releases. Remember the original Phenom release?

 

[djshortsleeve]

Personally, I wouldn't spend a penny prepping for a cpu that no one knows how it's going to perform. It's not like the other parts are going to disappear when BD finally makes its appearance. Until it finally shows up and real performance figures are sussed out via AT, et al, I wouldn't bother.

Plan, scheme maybe, but not spend a penny on something that's a complete unknown, esp. given AMD's history with new releases. Remember the original Phenom release?

This exactly. The price points could make it more feasible to go SB.

 

[nanaki333]

still no guarantee it'll be out. could be delayed again. i didn't think we'd start seeing these "please help, building BD rig need opinions" threads until at least we saw benchmarks.

 

[xBiffx]

OP, I am in precisely the same situation as you. I would like to build a rig prepped for BD but I have thought it over and its a dumb idea at this point. I am going to give it another month to see what other information comes out. I may or may not end up with a BD setup but at least the wait will be worth it as far as prices go. SB should end up being slightly cheaper and who knows, that GTX 570 I have had my eye on could come down in price. This is not to say that if I'm near a Microcenter in the next month and a sweet 2500k deal is still around I won't drop the hammer...I will in a nanosecond. I just don't want to drop it now and eat a turd sandwich when BD comes out should the landscape drastically change.

 

[RussianSensation]

I just don't want to drop it now and eat a turd sandwich when BD comes out should the landscape drastically change.

That's pretty much not going to happen. A Sandy Bridge @ 4.5ghz+ will not bottleneck any GPU in the next 2-3 years. By that time, we'll be talking about next generation CPUs. The main reason to wait for BD is multi-threaded performance, not gaming. With 40% IPC advantage that SB has over Phenom II and amazing overclocking abilities, it's highly unlikely that BD will be any faster in games. Of course if you are doing video encoding, rendering, encyption, etc. then waiting makes sense.

 

[soccerballtux]

Getting ready to build a Bulldozer rig ready to drop in the 8-core once it lands, at which stage my current Phenom II 970 + mobo + RAM will go into a new case to be a virtual server lab.

Keen to go relatively high end - system will be used for 3 x 24" screen gaming. I mainly want help with a mobo / cooler / RAM combo that all fits together gracefully, without having to use trial and error.

Motherboard - keen to go ASUS Crosshair 5, normally go with Giga but not a big fan anymore

Cooler? Want a top-notch air-cooler which will fit over the RAM, unless there is a
compelling all-in-one water cooler out there. Currently have a high-end but not top end Noctua.

RAM? (8 GB DDR-1866 CL8? 16 GB DDR3-2000?) - must fit comfortably under the cooler

Recycled components from current system will be:

CM Storm Sniper Black Mesh case
Corsair HX 850 PSU
6970 GPU (prob add another when I go to 3 screens, currently have one 24")
Vertex 2 120 GB SSD + 2 TB HDD

Cheers.

I would get 8gb at first until we find out how well it performs with 4 sticks, then you could upgrade.

 

[soccerballtux]

That's pretty much not going to happen. A Sandy Bridge @ 4.5ghz+ will not bottleneck any GPU in the next 2-3 years. By that time, we'll be talking about next generation CPUs. The main reason to wait for BD is multi-threaded performance, not gaming. With 40% IPC advantage that SB has over Phenom II and amazing overclocking abilities, it's highly unlikely that BD will be any faster in games. Of course if you are doing video encoding, rendering, encyption, etc. then waiting makes sense.

Only a little imo, best scenario it barely outperforms a 2500k at stock clocks. Overclocked 2500k @ 4.5ghz and *dulldozer has no chance.

*you heard it here first.

 

[Soundgardener]

Personally, I wouldn't spend a penny prepping for a cpu that no one knows how it's going to perform

Suppose I should have mentioned a disclaimer: Even though I got stung by Phenom I in 2007 (double-whammy: It came with Vista Ultimate 64), I am a long time AMD fan. Although I did swear that if they ever Phenom'd me again, I'd turn agnostic.

To use an analogy, Microsoft recovered hugely impressively from Vista with Windows 7 (which is Vista plus time and a paint-job). AMD have had even more time to recover with Bulldozer, are just as much of an aspiring company, and the 45->32nm move on it's own couldn't fail to kick performance beyond Phenom II's lacklustre level compared to SB. (Yes, tone of desperation creeping in towards the end...admitted)

They'll be pulling out all stops. We've already seen their GPU and Fusion success...Bulldozer performing well is the critical last piece that needs to happen for them to get back to their mid-2000s level of success and beyond. Not saying it's definitely going to happen (*cough* Phenom *cough*) but I see every reason for them to have raised their game, learned from their mistakes, and for Bulldozer to be a success.

Anyway I hope they hurry up, I need to build my server lab.

 

[sandorski]

For Cooling I'd go with one of the Corsair or CoolIt liquid systems. Very good performance, no worries regarding RAM clearance, and it moves the Heat away from other sensitive components.

 

[soccerballtux]

<- prefer vista 64 to win7. Windows Explorer file view hadn't been bastardized yet. Now Win7 never displays anything right and makes the columns be spaced asynchronously.

 

[soccerballtux]

For Cooling I'd go with one of the Corsair or CoolIt liquid systems. Very good performance, no worries regarding RAM clearance, and it moves the Heat away from other sensitive components.

these are overated, just get a good air system and you won't have to worry about replacing the pump, in fact in several of the reviews I saw many common air coolers outperformed the H70 and definitely the H50. I was about to buy a better cooler then found "wow, my cooler is already at the top of the line and the H50 won't outperform it" so I didn't buy.

One benefit though is with the water cooler you can transfer the heat directly outside of your case, don't have to worry about having the fans to suck it out.