Decisions..Decisions....Looking for some guidence on a new build.

[Sporinator]

Hi, I've been researching for over two weeks now.

I’ve been running three boxes here at the house since 2005. (So, it's been awhile since I've shopped/paid attention to the new stuff out now. Yes, I know that in about 6 months DDR4 RAM and NEW CPU's will be out for both AMD and Intel.)

Two AMD's ( Opteron 165 and Athlon 64 X2 4200+) and an Intel Pentium D-930.

Even my laptop is an old Dell Inspirion with an Intel Dual Core in it. Of course EVERYTHING I have here is using OLD regular Low Density DDR RAM. The Opteron is running REG/BUFF ECC RAM though.

The 4 Video cards between the three boxes.

The AMD CPU's are using a GeForce 6800 GT and a Asus GeForce 6200.

The Pentium D has a VisionTek HD 4550 and a Zotac Ion GT 218.


I wrote the above to give whoever comes here a good release of endorphins through the act of Belly Shaking Laughter!! Lulz


So, I've decided to build ONE NEW and up to date system. Tired of how SLOW these boxes are and having to find USED parts for them.



Here's the crux of it, I was all set to get an i7 3770k (I can't justify the cost difference to go up to the socket 2011 i7 3930k right now.) and then found that the VT-D and VT-X are not enabled in the socket 1155 i7 K series CPU's.

So, I thought I would go with the i7 3770 since it does have the virtualization instructions enabled for my VMware Workstation VM's that I run.

Then I found that the Z77 and H77 chipsets don't support ECC RAM!!!! Nor do ANY of the i7 CPU's.

So, now it was time to look at the Xeons. This made me sad since I had visions of doing some SERIOUS overclocking with the i7 3770k and some 2400 DDR3 RAM. Oh well, back to reality. LOL

I know that the cost difference between the E3 1245v2 and the E3 1275v2 really isn't worth it for the 100 mhz clock speed difference. But, the 1275v2 has a 7 year support cycle and you can see from what I wrote above that I tend to keep systems for quite awhile.


I'll list the components for 3 builds I'm looking at and then get back "my" concern/problem.



The Xeon Workstation Build:

CPU
Intel Xeon E3 1275V2 Ivy Bridge
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819117282

MB
Asus P8C WS (Has the C216 chipset in it for the ECC Ram.)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131849

PSU
Corsair AX860i
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817139041

RAM (Unbuffered/Unregistered ECC )
Kingston DDR3 1600 (4x8) 32GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820239371

Case
Fractal Design Define XL R2
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811352029

GPU
Sapphire Flex Dual X HD 7950 with Boost
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814202007

SSD
Samsung 840 Pro 512GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820147194

HDD
(x2) WD RE4 SATA II 2TB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136579

Seagate Barracuda SATA III 7200rpm 2TB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822148910

Blu Ray
Asus Black 14x
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16827135302


Case Fan (Only need 1 more for this case.)
Noctua 140mm PWM
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835608034

CPU FAN
Cooler Master Hyper TX3
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835103064

Monitor
(2) Dell Ultrasharp U2412M
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16824260047


That's the workstation build I've come up with so far.

I do have an account with Newegg, Amazon, and BestBuy but the last time I had do a REAL build I had a Brick & Mortar Computer Warehouse Store I could just drive to and get my parts. If there was a problem I just drove back over and get a new one right away.

So, of course I'm now much more concerned about getting the components RIGHT that will WORK together than I was in past builds. Hence me posting in here.

I run VMware Workstation VM OS's and will DEFINITELY need to have a permanent Windows 7 32 BIT running to keep using my OLD software. Lulz

This is why I'm getting the 32GB of RAM and do want the HT on the CPU. This of course FORCES me to use Win x64 now. (My other MB's maxed out at 4GB of RAM so I just kept using the x86 OS's.)

I also use Auto Cad from time to time and I'm looking to upgrade my Adobe CS 4 to maybe 5 or 6.

I have only ONE LCD monitor and it's a Dell Ultrasharp 1700FPT and ALL of my other Monitors are 19 & 20 inch Flat Screen NEC CRT's. (Go ahead, laugh, I understand.) Hence the need for at least two of the 24" LED/LCD monitors. Figured I'd use the 1700FPT in Portrait Mode for my 3rd monitor with the Flex Vid card until I can afford a third 24".

I have a 4TB external HD and 2 3TB externals that are USB 3.0 so that too was a factor in the MB I chose. I also have 3 more USB 2.0 externals I'd like to hookup as well.

I've kept AWAY from Gaming on the Computer or I'd NEVER get any work done!! lol When I do game it's RPG's on the Xbox 360 like Skyrim. (I see that it's available for the computer and that the HD 7950 runs it quite well and I also hear tell that it kinda looks PRETTY GOOD on those eIPS UltraSharp 24" panels. I'm in trouble!! lulz)

I had thought about running Crossfire, but it would seem that for what I'll be doing with the computer it really won't be that big a benefit right now.

I was a little worried about going to the 860 watt PSU over say a 650 PSU due to not being certain yet if I can keep it at 50 to 80% load for the best efficiency. Figured I'd err on the side of too much rather too little.

I had been SET on the SeaSonic X 1250 in case I were to run Crossfire. But figured it was overkill for now. That and I know they make the Corsair PSU's, but after reading about SeaSonic Customer support and the STIFF cables, I figured I'd give Corsair a shot since they seem to have pretty good support.

I think that 860 PSU should handle me putting the PCI x1 Ion GT 218 card and the PCI 2.0 HD 4550 in the board to dedicate them to my VM's. That and maybe a USB 3.0 card in the PCI slot.

I'll be reusing a couple of WD RE4 500GB SATA II's in a Windows Software RAID 0 for data retrieval and writing with the SSD. They only have about 8,000 hours on them in the RAID 0 I had them in. I like the smaller 500GB drives for RAID 0 since "I" feel they respond faster. I know that a Raptor would be quicker, but these 7200 rpm RE4's are giving me 165mbs video file transfers on these Socket 939 MB’s. So I "think" they'll do OK for this new build.

The OS and ALL programs will be on the SSD. I'm sick and TIRED of these SLOW computers.

The two 2TB WD RE4 drives will be for data backup. One for the SSD and RAID. The other to backup the Seagate SATA III 2TB. I know that SATA III for a HDD is bologney, but all 4 of my onboard SATAII ports will be filled with the 4 WD drives. So, that only leaves me the two SATA III for the SSD and the Seagate.

I'll be using the two 3TB externals to backup the two RE4 2TB backup drives.

I'm STICKING to using ONLY 2TB and below drives for any Windows OS. I'm fine in EXt4 using above 2 TB's though.



Ok, the only difference with the next build will be the CPU, RAM, and MB. The rest will be the same as the Xeon Build.



Intel i7 3770 Build:

CPU
i7 3770 Ivy Bridge
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819116502

MB
Asus P8Z77 WS
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131822

RAM
Mushkin Enhanced Red Line DDR3 1600 (4x8) 32GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820226385



For the i7 3770k O.C. Build I would have used the same MB as above in the 3770 build. Only the CPU, RAM and CPU Cooling would have changed.

CPU
I7 3770k Ivy Bridge
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819116501

RAM
G Skill RipJaws Z Series DDR3 PC2400 (4x8) 32GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231522

CPU Cooler
Corsair H100i (Has 3/8" water hose vs. 1/4" in the H100 and H110.)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835181032


My REAL problem is that I fell IN LOVE with the Asus P8Z77 WS MB right after I first decided on the 3770k. Then I found out that not only do the i7 CPU's NOT support ECC ram but that the Z77 & H77 chipsets don't either. This board will take the Xeon V2 IB CPU's but NOT with ECC Ram!!

I keep talking about the ECC ram. To "me" the only REAL ECC ram is Registered/Buffered. Not this Unbuffered/Unregistered stuff.

But, it's better than NOT having ECC at all and I suppose it is a clock cycle or two faster.

I loved the 4 SATA III ports for future SSD expansion and the 6 SATA II ports as well. Not to mention that the board has more features and better heat sinks.



So here is what I'm down to, I can go the Xeon route and have at least some kind of ECC but have to go with the Asus board with LESS features.

I could go the 3770 route and "almost" have all the same features as the Xeon. With the exception of ECC ram and the Flexible Memory Control features. The VM stuff seems to be the same. Oh, and I'd be giving up the 7 year life cycle support. I'd get to use the MB I really want with the expansion options and even thoug it’s not a K/unlocked CPU I could use the Turbo stepping in the Z77 chipset that this board's BIOS and CPU support to get it up around 4.2Ghz. (Not certain that the C216 chipset will let me do the same in the BIOS.) I really don’t want to mess with the Bclk.

Then I could just get all CRAZY and go with the 3770k. I would lose some of the VM features, but I've read where some guys are still using VMware Workstation with it. I would still get the MB I REALLY like and I could play around with DDR3 PC 2400 ram (Did I mention that I'm using only DDR 400 right now. LOL) and some over clocking.

BTW, I like having the Video on the CPU in case any or all of my video cards ever go down. Another reason I'm NOT looking at the AMD FX8350 or the Xeon's ending in 0.


So, If you took the TIME to read this post/plea for some advice or confirmation please leave your thoughts in a reply.


I thank you for taking the time to go through this.


I use to wonder why anyone would take the time out of their busy lives to help someone without getting paid.

Back in 2002 I found a Golf Forum. I use to be an Independent Professional Golfer who played the Mini-Tours when I was younger. (Almost 50 now.)

I have over 12,000 posts there now and most of those were after going to Youtube to view someone's golf swing and then do my best to help them with their problem for free.

I love golf and therefore enjoyed helping them. Hopefully it's the same for you here that really enjoy not only using but thinking about computers and solving problems.


Thanks again!!!



P.S. I’m leaning heavily towards the Xeon due to the ECC & stability. So, I need to know if those components will/should work together.



You saw how I feel about my data by using Enterprise drives for my RAID and Backups. Then also having double backups, both internally and externally. (Can't afford a REAL dedicated server or even a NAS right now.)


Those backups do me no good if the RAM is throwing CORRUPT data to everything without me knowing it until it's too late.



Yes, I need to setup OFF SITE backups as well. Lulz

 

[DSF]

Holy overkill PSU, Batman!

I don't see a reason for you to go Crossfire. There seems to be a fair bit of waste in your build in general.

1) If your professional apps will benefit from a 7950, great. If not you could step this down if you truly don't plan to game on the computer.

2) Is this a workstation you're depending on for your livelihood? If so, forget about overclocking and Crossfire altogether. Simplicity and uptime is the name of the game. (Are the names of the games?)

3) Since most of your storage is NAS and external drives, why such a huge box for this rig? You could very easily move to a smaller case. Well-designed mid tower cases are a lot easier to work in than many of them used to be.

4) With all of that in mind your rig will be drawing less than 500W from the wall, oftentimes less than 350W I would venture. Bring the PSU down a couple notches. Even 750W would be plenty for Crossfire, which again doesn't seem right for you. Don't overthink efficiency - the differences aren't huge, in fact they're negligible on a monthly power bill even in areas with high electricity prices..

5) Not much point in AIO watercooling at that price in my opinion. Quality air is just as good and just as quiet in that price bracket.

 

[xXdragonbatXX]

I love my XFX Radeon HD 7950 3GB...graphics are so much better then console...i don't know why I didn't switch to PC sooner.

 

[Sporinator]

HI DSF, Thanks for the reply.

I'll start with the last first.

For the Xeon cooling I figured the Cooler Master Delta Fin Air would be fine. I looked at $60 $100 air solutions but didn't see the need. I've never used Water and to be honest, it makes "me" nervous to have water anywhere near my electronics.

The PSU, I tend to go WAY over what's needed in that regard for some reason. I have Modular 750 Dual rail on the Intel 945G MB with the Pentium D and the two Video cards.

I have a 500 Antec and a 450 Xfinity on the two AMD socket 939 rigs here.

I chose a Platinum Plus for the Component quality and the warranty. The SeaSonic Gold X series had great benches and tight voltages.

As far as gaming goes, I might maybe dabble here and there. But I've made it a point over the last 15 years to purposefully only use Consoles for gaming. So, I was mainly looking at having a FAST video card so that with 3 monitors hooked up to it I could have say Auto Cad 3 D Automation running on one and have some video trans-coding going on the other. I also use Adobe Dreamweaver, Photoshop, and After Affects.

I always have at least 50 tabs open in FF. Normally over 100. People think I'm crazy until they see how I search for info on projects. I have saved sessions with over 300 tabs.

I also wanted the 32GB of ram to setup a RAM disk to run my other active APs as well as the VM stuff. I'm reading the VMware Workstation 9 is making better use of Hyper Threading.

I just setup an old Pentium 4 single core with HT I had around here for a friend to use. I threw in a 32GB OCZ Vertex I SSD SATAII for the OS and 4 GB of DDR2 RAM with an old SATA I 400GB Seagate and loaded Windows Pro x86 SP3 on it. I then installed VMware Workstation 6.12 on it and was able to setup another XP VM and a Win 98 VM for his OLD games. LOL

It ran just FINE!!! Actually almost as fast as my Opteron system.

There is a lot I haven't been able to do with these Ancient computers. So, I just wanted to be SURE I build a system strong enough to handle whatever I throw at it with what's available NOW.

Everything is getting ready to change again and I don't want to be paying through the nose to source old computer parts later.

Hence filling the RAM now so that it all matches. Went with the larger SSD since I KNOW that in order for the TRIM to work right and extend it's life & reliability I don't ever want it to be more than say 60% full any given time.

I'm still a little nervous about the SSD as well. If it fails, how in the world do you recover the data? (Can we say, HOURLY BACKUPS?!! lol) I can take the platters out of a HDD if it completely fails and still have a chance for recovery.

I just had two HDD's MFT's get corrupted by using a Dual Bay Thermaltake Black X Duet. What a PAIN that was on these SLOW Rigs to recover the data using Seagate's Recovery Tools for Windows!!

Yes, this is now going to be my lively hood. I was in a head on car wreck that rolled my Park Avenue 3 times and I now have permanent Vestibular Damage.

I'll have the new rig plugged into my IBM version of the APC 1500 UA since I live Florida and the summers are hell on power outages and Brown outs. I have APC 1500 UPS on my other rigs and TV's in the house as well. I then run APC surge protectors plugged into the UPS to my other peripherals that don't fit directly into the UPS.

About the Case and Storage, I'm still struggling over that. I was gonna go with the Fractal Design Definity R4. All my other cases here, including my Aluminum Case are Mid Towers and run on small after market Air Coolers.

I was thinking along the lines of a Larger case allowing more room for Hot Air to move AWAY from my components seeing as how the cases I'm looking at are the ones with the Silencing Padding in them. I HATE noisy computers and have always used Video cards with Heat sinks and NO FANS until I got the GT 6800. It drives me crazy. LOL

I normally subscribe to the Wind Tunnel type of cooling from Front to Back and NOT out of the top and in from the side. But it would seem that even the Corsair Obsidians have an intake fan on the bottom as well as the front & back. but they were Flimsy and no SILENCING on them.

I looked at Water Cooling not so much for O.C.ing, but to NOT HAVE the WEIGHT of a HUGE Air Cooler pulling on my Mother Board. I have been known to move my boxes around and sometimes they don't set down so easy. I'd HATE to get a CRACKED MB. It's only been the last few days that I've seen where some more reasonable sized Air CPU coolers are giving decent enough temps.

That and it seemed the Water Cooling would be less obstructive for air flow as well as keeping a Cool Zone over the CPU area rather than having the HOT air blowing around there in the case.

But, that was all before I found out I would NEED to go with the Xeon CPU. If I had the EXTRA SATA II or SATA III ports I would move more storage inside this new rig. Kinda why I wanted the other MB. But alas, I must compromise it would seem.

I REALLY THANK YOU for your reply. It's confirmed what I KNOW I "need" to build and now need to quit wasting Brain Power on what I might "want" to build.

All my CPUs here idle at around frick'n 48*c. The ambient in the Condo is 73* F all year round. I've tried every type TIM and method of applying imaginable. But they don't get any cooler. I've even used straight Vasaline looking Thermal Bearing Grease. I've settled on Arctic Freeze MX2 and the Rice Grain method.

I was kinda hoping to see idle Temps in the LOW 30's with the new build. And NOTHING over 60*c at load.

You are absolutely 100% correct about Simplicity and UPTIME!! My Athlon II Rig just rebooted on me while typing this on the Opteron. ARGH!! Now I have to bring EVERYTHING back up on it.


So, if I dropped down to say a SeaSonic Platinum 660 watt PSU and the Fractal Design Define R4 I'd be OK an most likely better off?

I'm kinda STICKING with the Sapphire Flex since it will hook up my 3 monitors outta the box without me having to buy Mini Display Port adapters. I also like the 384 bit memory buss and the 3GB of DDR5 for kinda Future Proofing for later Program requirements.

The other 7950's like the HIS IceQ and IceQ2's would have NEEDED me to get at lest 1 Active Mini Display Port Cable to hook my 3rd monitor up. That's a minimum of another $70 right there.

I had looked at the HIS IceQ 7850 Turbo with 4GB of DDR5 Ram and a 256 bit buss. It had two DVI ports and I would have only needed to buy 1 Mini Display Port to Display Port adapter. But, for the money & performance difference the Saphhire looked like the way to go.


Again, I thank you for helping to steer my thoughts in the proper direction.

 

[Sporinator]

I love my XFX Radeon HD 7950 3GB...graphics are so much better then console...i don't know why I didn't switch to PC sooner.

Hmm....Almost ALL the Youtube videos I've seen, (I know, most of them are filmed with their iphones. lol) look like there is a TON of frame stutter.

Even the ones where they have 3 way SLI or 4 way Crossfire running.

I don't play first person shooters, only RPG's and I have never had any Frame Stutter on my Xbox 360 hooked up to 36" Flat Screen Mitsubishi CRT TV's.

My xbox 360 was bought the first week they ever first came out. I've sent it back to MS to have the Ring Ring of Death fixed and just recently had to buy a new power brick off eBay. It only has the 20GB HD in it so I have two 16GB USB sticks for game storage and I'm still using the same wireless controller too.

So, I have the OLD MB, DVD, and Video card in it. I'm thinking that when the NEW xbox 720 comes out I might spring for it since it will still play all the xbox 360 cartridges.

I've been to a few LAN parties since a Programmer buddy of mine hosts them. Even there the frame rates didn't seem as smooth to me.

I will admit, when I was looking at getting the i7 3770k and maybe Dual Video cards I did look into a Microsoft USB receiver to use my xbox 360 controller on the computer since I would hate to have to use keyboard keys & a mouse. My Microsoft Sidewinder 2.0 and the OLD Flight sticks don't work so well in Winodws 7. LOL

But, I was jealous of the guys who could just enter CODES with their keyboard in the PC version of Skyrim. Lulz Oblivion and Skyrim were my two favorite RPG games for xbox 360. I did enjoy Fallout 3, but kinda bored with it. All three are by Bethesda SoftWorks I think.

I bought Ultima for the PC and Wheel of Time back in 1999 and realized after about 5 hours that it would take me almost a YEAR to finish those games if I were to play them every single day for 10 hours a day.

That's when I decided that I would ONLY play on the Console and leave the Computer for WORK stuff. lol


Thanks for your reply.

 

[Torn Mind]

I noticed you're not using an enterprise-grade SSD. I don't know much about that market or if you really need one over the 840 Pro, but of course they usually will cost more.

 

[DSF]

I hope you don't take this the wrong way, because I only mention it to improve the feedback you get.

I think it would help if you focused your posts on what your requirements are now. Some of your posts have quite a bit of reminiscing about your old parts. (Hey, we all do it - it's fun from time to time.) But it makes it hard to quickly look through your posts and give you concise, useful feedback.

As far as heat it's really not an issue with a single video card and zero or modest overclocking. I have the Define R4 with a 3570K and a 7950. I could overclock if I wanted to without temp issue and my house is also around 73F ambient. The first thing you need to realize is that idle temps are pretty meaningless, and the second is that keeping your computer under an arbitrary number like 60C doesn't do anything to meaningfully protect the computer. You can easily go into the 80s without any issue at all. (That said, again I wouldn't bother overclocking a machine you're depending on for your living.)

In regards to your most recent post, SLI/Crossfire tend to have more microstutter, not less. I also have a 7950 and am totally happy with it.

 

[Sporinator]

I noticed you're not using an enterprise-grade SSD. I don't know much about that market or if you really need one over the 840 Pro, but of course they usually will cost more.

Hi TM, you're correct.

This is will be my second Workstation/Hybrid Build. It'll also be a Low End Entry type build as well.

I can't afford Quadra Video Cards and True Color Adobe 4 or 6 ms IPS panel monitors either.

I'm rolling the dice on the Samung 840 Pro. I've read reviews that the 830 was a little more reliable. But they're a little harder to come by.

Also after all the SanForce Controller fallout over the last few years and them breaching their confidentiality agreement with Intel for the controller design on the Cherryville SSD's I'm staying away from "Compress-Decompress" data writing and retrieval. Samsung is using their own in house controllers similar to Plextar which do NOT compress any of the data. I chose Samsung due to their almost equal read & write speeds.

No, I can't afford a SCSI SSD drive the plugs into a PCI slot right now.

I hope you don't take this the wrong way, because I only mention it to improve the feedback you get.

I think it would help if you focused your posts on what your requirements are now. Some of your posts have quite a bit of reminiscing about your old parts. (Hey, we all do it - it's fun from time to time.) But it makes it hard to quickly look through your posts and give you concise, useful feedback.

As far as heat it's really not an issue with a single video card and zero or modest overclocking. I have the Define R4 with a 3570K and a 7950. I could overclock if I wanted to without temp issue and my house is also around 73F ambient. The first thing you need to realize is that idle temps are pretty meaningless, and the second is that keeping your computer under an arbitrary number like 60C doesn't do anything to meaningfully protect the computer. You can easily go into the 80s without any issue at all. (That said, again I wouldn't bother overclocking a machine you're depending on for your living.)

In regards to your most recent post, SLI/Crossfire tend to have more microstutter, not less. I also have a 7950 and am totally happy with it.

Right now my requirements are a FAST and STABLE system that can do anything from compiling code to video editing as well as run my VMs and some Auto Cad 3D Model Automating.

Have at least 3 monitors going, will be hooking up 3 more to make 6 total by the end of the year hopefully. The MB's I've had to chose from don't have 3 connections for me to use the 3 monitor feature of the embedded HD 4000 graphics so I will need another Video card down the road. But, it won't actually need to be in Crossfire or SLI to run 3 more monitors to view VM's and other working programs.

The next part is my usual jibberish & ramblings. LOL

Everyone keeps telling me that having FireFox, Internet Explorer, Opera and Chrome open all at once with no less than 50 tabs open in each uses hardly any system resources.

They are DEAD wrong. I have these CPU's pegged most the time and at least 80% of my RAM used with only two browsers going and no VM's.

I have to choose whether to Browse for data research or run VM's or Run Auto Cad Or Run Adobe or Compile code in Visual Studio Pro and so on and so on.

I NEED to be able to Multi Task on ONE Computer and do it FAST for less than $4,000.00 right now.

I don't like using KVM's so I either use RealVNC or pysically switch over to the other boxes which takes up time.

I was looking to be getting a CPU that would be running all cores at 4.0ghz minimum. I canned the AMD FX 8350 option when I found the MB selection with ECC support was slim pick'ns. The new Opteron's aren't much better from what I've seen either.

I started with Intel and then went to AMD for quite a few years and was planning on staying with them. But, it looks like the entry level Xeon's are more affordable now and also faster.

I had looked at the Xeon E5 2620 since it is around $400 and 6 cores with HT. But at only 2.0 Ghz and turbo to 2.5 the E3 1275V2 4 core with HT at 3.5GHz with turbo to 3.9 is more appealing and makes a real world time difference.

Intel put out a report on over clocking their LOCKED Sandy Bridge CPU's. The Buss is basically Split so that you can adjust ONLY the CPU and Ram voltages without messing with with the other I/O lanes on the board. (The Sandy Bridge Architecture carried over to the Ivy Bridge.) It's a complicated formula, but supposedly it's easier to O.C. than you get with UEFI BIOS Over Clocks on unlocked CPU's. Go figure.

Some links on it:

http://www.techpowerup.com/152578/H...ed-New-Sandy-Bridge-E-Processor-By-Intel.html

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2011/09/20/how-to-overclock-sandy-bridge-e/1

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r26...Overclock-a-Locked-New-Sandy-Bridge-E-Process




Here's the Intel Extreme Tuning Utility Tool. The Download Link. The Update Link.


I built my first system in 1989 with an Intel 386 25MHz CPU a Math Co-Processor (Bought and Installed separately.) 4 MB of EXPANDED RAM because Auto Cad required it and would not use Extended RAM. Extended RAM replaced it of course. When I had my 40MB HD ordered they asked what kind of NETWORK I was going to run. I said I just needed it for Auto Cad. I still have my Kurta 12 x12 Digitizer in the closet.


The point of the "Reminiscing" was to point out that from the beginning I was getting more computer than what others thought I needed at the time.


I'm asking here if the components I picked out will WORK together. And, as DSF pointed out to me, is there something I could be doing better with the build.

As it stand now, the Xeon E3 1275 V2 Build is the one I will be focusing on.


Thanks again for your replies.

Sincerely,

David

 

[Sporinator]

I just looked up through the thread.

I do APOLOGIZE!!!

Those are some LONG WINDED ramblings I've thrown up there.

I've been up for 27 hours now and still won't hit the hay for at least another 4 to 5 hours.

I have so much statistical crap in my head right now from all the reviews I've been going over and no one here at the Condo to discuss them with.

I apologize for just DUMPING it all at you guys/Gals.

I understand if it's TL;DR!! Lulz


Thanks again.

 

[Torn Mind]

Actually, the Crucial M500 is what I had in mind because it has a small capacitor array to help avoid power loss data corruption.

Web browsing is indeed a RAM hungry task.

Sandforce is not Sandisk. Two different companies.

I still use a single core P4 rig from time-to-time.

 

[Sporinator]

Actually, the Crucial M500 is what I had in mind because it has a small capacitor array to help avoid power loss data corruption.

Web browsing is indeed a RAM hungry task.

Sandforce is not Sandisk. Two different companies.

I still use a single core P4 rig from time-to-time.

Hi Torn Mind.

Thank you for the correction. I do know that Sandisk is not Sandforce. Sandforce Licenses their controller and other technologies to other companies like Sandisk. My bad for not proof reading that this morning.

The fall out I spoke of was Intel and their 3 year agreement. Sandforce was too keep the Intel Spec'd controller and Firmware updates ONLY available for the Cherryville SSD's that they were providing only to Intel.

Well, with all the controller problems Sandforce was having across the board with their technology in OTHER MFG's drives Intel's Cherryvilles were doing quite well and selling for a premium.

Then somehow Sandforce released a firmware update that stabilized all the other SSD drives like the OCZ and Sandisk SSD's so that they no longer have the reliability issues.

This cut DEEP into the Intel SSD market share so they decided NOT to renew the contract with Sanforce. This is why it's tough to find the Intel Cherryville 480MB SSD drives. "I" don't think they are being made anymore. The smaller capacity 520 series SSD's can be found. But not the larger one.

Also, Intel is now looking to develop and use their own in house controller from here on forward like Samsung is doing.


BTW, I got a Sandisk thumb drive as part of a promotion awhile back. It wasn't even close to the speed of my equivalent cheap Vebatim stick. I now use Mushkin Mulholland sticks and will NEED to pick up a few more of them in the USB 3.0 models now that I'll have a computer than can make use of the USB 3.0. I get real world writes of around 25mbs with the Mushkin 2.0's and 18 to 20mbs with Verbatim. The Sandisk is only about 8 to 12 mbs.


The Crucial M500..Hmmm...960GB at $600 which is only $100 to $150 more than the 840 Pro 512GB. Though the writes are 100mbs slower, the reads are almost the same.

I'll have to do some digging into their controller and this "Small Capacitor Array" you speak of. Nice catch & GOOD call, as it was just released earlier this month.

Thank you again. I had written Crucial off my list with their M4 models. It just couldn't touch the Samsung Pro series in my mind. I need both read and write to be quick. I know, most of what is done is small file 4k and under where there really isn't much difference between drives.


I still have an E-Monster by eMachines in the closet with a P3 in it and 192MB of RAM that I pull out from time to time to connect online and update the XP Install I have on it. It has a "VooDoo" video card in it!!! ROFL


Thank you again VERY MUCH, the more I think about that 960GB Crucial the more I'm chomping at the bit to go research it!! LOL


Sincerely,

David

P.S. Just checked Newegg and of course the Crucial M500 960GB is the ONLY model they are out of stock on!! Signed up for auto notify. lol

 

[mfenn]

I think you have a few fundamental misconceptions that I want to clear up.

Here's the crux of it, I was all set to get an i7 3770k (I can't justify the cost difference to go up to the socket 2011 i7 3930k right now.) and then found that the VT-D and VT-X are not enabled in the socket 1155 i7 K series CPU's.

VT-x most certainly is enabled on all i3, i5, and i7 CPUs.

VT-d is not enabled on the K series chips, but that doesn't really matter for consumer or light workstation gear. You can still remap PCI devices or VRFs without VT-d. What VT-d gives you is:

(a) hardware enforcement of DMA address ranges. This matters if you're Amazon and running a multi-tenant cloud, not so much when you control all VMs.

(b) hardware acceleration of direct-mapped I/O devices. This matters if you have 20K IOPs or several GB/s of throughput on tap, but software works totally fine for a typical desktop machine.

I'm STICKING to using ONLY 2TB and below drives for any Windows OS. I'm fine in EXt4 using above 2 TB's though.

NTFS can handle volumes greater than 2TB very easily, (as can any newer Linux filesystem). The sticking point is really the partition table, not the filesystem. Windows 7 and Ivy Bridge chipsets with UEFI are totally fine with booting from GPT, as is any GRUB 2 system.

That being said, your boot volume will be much less than 2TB anyway since you will be booting from an SSD. Everything handles GPT data disks without a hitch.

I keep talking about the ECC ram. To "me" the only REAL ECC ram is Registered/Buffered. Not this Unbuffered/Unregistered stuff.

But, it's better than NOT having ECC at all and I suppose it is a clock cycle or two faster.

This doesn't really make any sense. High density DIMMs have many DRAM chips on them, which in a normal unbuffered scenario are directly wired to the memory bus. At some point, the capacitance from all of these components being directly tied to the same bus makes designing an effective bus difficult. Registered/buffered DIMMs add another chip to the DIMM which serves to isolated the DRAM from the memory bus, thus reducing capacitive load (and of course incurring a performance penalty).

Registered/buffered memory exists solely to reduce the capacitive load on the memory bus and enable higher-density configurations. It confers no additional ECC protection.

 

[mfenn]

You've got a pretty beefy configuration in your OP, but they you mention that you "can't afford" a few different things that might be useful (NAS springs to mind). I'm wondering if you could let us know what your budget is?

 

[Sporinator]

You've got a pretty beefy configuration in your OP, but they you mention that you "can't afford" a few different things that might be useful (NAS springs to mind). I'm wondering if you could let us know what your budget is?

I thank you VERY much for taking the TIME to answer some things that I may be out of my depth on.


In post #8 above I stated this, "I NEED to be able to Multi Task on ONE Computer and do it FAST for less than $4,000.00 right now."

I know, I'm kinda Long Winded. I apologize.

The budget started out at $2,500.00. stupid me thought that should be PLENTY including replacing the batteries in the two APC 1500's I have since for the first time in 9 years they are BOTH in need of battery replacement. Warning went of within a week of each other. Last time it was 6 months apart.

As far as Registered vs Unregistered ECC, I just always felt that since the extra controller chip in the Registered RAM was designed to work as a buffer to the system's pipeline for for handling the data that it was/would be more STABLE than Unregistered. My bust.

So, then here's a question for you, do I "REALLY" need to worry about ECC with today's newer DDR3 RAM for a desktop work station? I mean I'll be doing some AutoCad stuff for myself mostly for working out prototypes prior to actually trying them out in the real world. I'll be doing some web design which of course involves the Adobe Suite. It may take me into more Video than I foresee at the moment. As it stands I'm only editing/converting video file formats for now.

I'm being pressured to Learn some Ruby and Python, so I foresee some compiling in my near future.

I spend about 80% of my time searching the Web for information which has me using a minimum of two different browser but usually have 4 running. And like I said in Previous posts, I normally have 100 to 200 tabs open in each of them at any given time. I'll take a snapshot of my FF tabs right now as I'm typing this. Most people think I exaggerate my tab count. Here it is:

This is why I wanted a decent Video Card and RAM. I'd like to have three monitors up so I can get through this stuff quicker.

I also do a bit of P2P file sharing (No Seed Box. I know, I should have one and I'm thinking of turning one of these older box into one after the new build.) and have at least two clients running almot 24/7.

I never turn my boxes off unless I'm leaving the Condo for more than a 24 hours. Which is rare these days. I even hat to shut them down to clan the dust outta the cases from time to time. lol

As far as the NAS Box solution goes, I haven't really looked into them much since to setup a 4 or 6 bay like a Drobo that can take 4TB HDDs starts at around $400 just for the box and then there's the price for the drives also.

Which gets us to my OTHER problem. After finally settling on the Workstation Xeon in my OP, I started to COUNT the SATA connections I'll need.

Let's see.....SSD 3.0, RE4 500GB x2 in a Software RAID 0, RE4 x2 1 for the RAID O & SSD System Drive backup and the other to backup the Seagate Barracuda Storage drive. So that's 6 right there. Oh wait...I had wanted to get a Blu Ray burner to put in it and maybe stick one of my SATA DVD burners in it as well. Ooops!!!! You ONLY have 6 SATA controllers for that C216 chipset!!!!

Even if I went with the Z77 WC board that chipset only has 4 SATA3 controllers on it. They use the Marvell Controller for the RST Raid I think.

Same for the USB 3.0. ONLY 4 Intel controllers. I was Loathing calling Asus to ask about being able to use those two ports for regular drives without RAID.

Their guys on the phone just seem to regurgitate what is posted up on their website and have no REAL knowledge themselves of their own technology or that of those they incorporate into their boards.

Their head Research Tech that does the Youtube video reviews and goes on Newegg to promote and explain the features of their new Motherboards states in the Youtube video TWICE that the Asus P8Z77 WC will DEFINITELY support Unbuffered ECC RAM just like ALL WC boards. He says the same thing in the Newegg video as well. Uh.....it's "my" understanding that neither the Z77 nor H77 chipset support ECC RAM of any kind. Only the Cxxx series chipsets like the 216 and before it do.

So I get 3 different Tech guys on the phone and get 3 different stinkin answers.

I looked at the Super Micro boards also.

If were to go the AMD route with the FX 8350 I could get PLENTY of USB and SATA ports. But NO ECC!!

The new Opterons are just dead Dog SLOW and their board offerings seem to be True Server boards. Not Workstation Boards.

I've seen some video reviews of guys using the i7 3930 6 core without ECC for video editing and compiling and they seem content with it.

I'd just hate to build a system without ECC and then find that I have corrupt data stored around after it's too late.


Well, I'm getting Long Winded AGAIN!! ARGH!! Lulz


Ok, wrap up time then. You said that I really didn't need the Hardware Direct I/O for my VM's. So, does that mean I "could" use a K series CPU for Vmware Workstation 9 (Just got it. Been using 6, 7, and 8 Mostly.) and would do fine so long as I can live without the ECC?

I had kinda thought that if didn't go with the ECC that I would most likely be better off with the i7 3770 since it still has all the VT that the Xeon has with the exception of the Flexible Memory Mapping. (I think.)


Oh, I already pulled the trigger on the Fractal Design Define XL R2. I just couldn't say no to $90 at Newegg. It'll be here next wednesday. Then I can SEE for myself what I have to work with.


I need SPEED and it MUST be stable. I can't take another day of not knowing when I'm going to get a random re-boot while I'm in the middle of like 6 different things and then try to recover and get back to where I was.

It's too frustrating and time consuming. I had to keep copying and pasting and saving this post for fear this thing might lockup on me while writing it.

Thanks again for your TIME and INPUT.



Sincerely,

David

 

[Sporinator]

You've got a pretty beefy configuration in your OP, but they you mention that you "can't afford" a few different things that might be useful (NAS springs to mind). I'm wondering if you could let us know what your budget is?

I'm at around $2,800 for the BOX in the OP and then the Monitors are another $620 if I go with 2 of the U2412M's and use the 1704fpt I have here in Portrait mode for my 3rd. I'm thinking maybe 2 of the U2410's though. (Most likely not.) That would bump 2 up to around $850. Or to just go ahead and get 3 of the U2412's now which would bring it to $930.

Then I still have to replace the batteries for the UPS's. Locally at Batteries Plus that's around $400 for both sets or I can get them online as cheap as $150 for both sets. I'm leaning towards buying them online.


Which of course pretty much takes care of the $4,000.00 budget that started out as $2,500.00. lol

Figured I'd throw this data in since the last post was SO LOOONG again!! :whiste:

Lulz

P.S. It hurt my Soul to change from the Seasonic X 1250 to the Corsair Paltinum 860i. I think I've settled on the SeaSonic 1000 Platinum and will risk their customer service "if" it gives me problems.

 

[Torn Mind]

ECC RAM support is tied to the processor and it also must be supported in the BIOS, I believe. The chipset has nothing to do with it.

 

[Sleepingforest]

Whoa. PSU is totally overkill. For a single card, 500W will do (yes, even a Titan). Also, you are not saving any money by purchasing Platinum over Gold, and the build quality of all Seasonic PSUs are so good that purchasing a higher efficiency PSU isn't changing the chance of breakdown at all.

Look at the 7950 w/Boost benchmark. The power consumption, while in an overclocked X79 testbed, is only 373W at the most; accounting for the PSU's efficiency in the testbed, the parts demanded only 326.275W. The cost of the AX860i is $200 and has about 92% efficiency at that load; a Seasonic G 550 is only $90 and 90.97% efficient at that load. To make up the price difference within 5 years of continual usage, your electricity cost would need to be $0.531 per kWh; to make it up in 10 (again, continual 24/7 usage), your electricity cost would need to be $0.265 per kWh.

 

[mfenn]

This thread reminds me of a classic quote:

“I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.”

― Mark Twain

Let's bring things back to basics. Sporinator, please answer these questions in 25 words or less each (250 words for the whole thing).

As for the ECC vs. no ECC question, ECC is really only one step of the data integrity chain. If you are really serious about data integrity, you have to design a front-to-back solution that goes from the CPU to memory to disk and back again. That is certainly possible, but of course adds expense.

If your storage system is just a normal commodity software RAID (or mobo FakeRAID) setup, then ECC is only providing uptime benefits, it really isn't helping with data integrity all that much.

 

[Sporinator]

This thread reminds me of a classic quote:

“I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.”

― Mark Twain

Let's bring things back to basics. Sporinator, please answer these questions in 25 words or less each (250 words for the whole thing).

As for the ECC vs. no ECC question, ECC is really only one step of the data integrity chain. If you are really serious about data integrity, you have to design a front-to-back solution that goes from the CPU to memory to disk and back again. That is certainly possible, but of course adds expense.

If your storage system is just a normal commodity software RAID (or mobo FakeRAID) setup, then ECC is only providing uptime benefits, it really isn't helping with data integrity all that much.

1. What YOUR PC will be used for. That means what types of tasks you'll be performing.

VMware Workstation, Abobe Creative Sweet, Auto Cad, Web Page Design, DB creation, Some Programming, HEAVY Web Browsing, Movie Watching, Torrenting, Multi Monitor Setup, and Some RPG gaming "maybe". (Ooops, 28 words. lol)

2. What YOUR budget is. A price range is acceptable as long as it's not more than a 20% spread

$2,500.00 I'm comfortable with.

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from.

USA (Do the last two HELP with the 3 word overage of the first question?)

4. IF you're buying parts OUTSIDE the US, please post a link to the vendor you'll be buying from.
We can't be expected to scour the internet on your behalf, chasing down deals in your specific country... Again, help us, help YOU.

Newegg and Amazon. TigerDirect & BestBuy if I "have" to. I have to pay Sales Tax with BestBuy & TigerDirect.

5. IF YOU have a brand preference. That means, are you an Intel-Fanboy, AMD-Fanboy, ATI-Fanboy, nVidia-Fanboy, Seagate-Fanboy, WD-Fanboy, etc.

Intel, Asus, AMD/ATI, WD Enterprise, Seagate Consumer.

6. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are.

(2) WD RE4 500GB SATA II in a Software RAID. (Had wanted to also use (1) WD Black 1 TB and (1) Seagate Barracuda but no MB's have enough) connections.

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds.

If ECC RAM then Stock speeds & stability. If not ECC ram then O.C. to the mid 4's.

8. What resolution, not monitor size, will you be using?

(2) in 1920 x 1200 and (1) in 1200 x 1024. Or 3 in 1920 x 1200 if I get 3 new monitors.

9. WHEN do you plan to build it?
Note that it is usually not cost or time effective to choose your build more than a month before you actually plan to be using it.

In the next two weeks.

X. Do you need to purchase any software to go with the system, such as Windows or Blu Ray playback software?

I'm not certain about the Blu Ray software. I need to see if Nero 11 will work or not. Haven't checked yet.


P.S. My Finacee' is a Writer and will get a chuckle from your Mark Twain quote directed at me. Lulz

 

[Sporinator]

As for the ECC vs. no ECC question, ECC is really only one step of the data integrity chain. If you are really serious about data integrity, you have to design a front-to-back solution that goes from the CPU to memory to disk and back again. That is certainly possible, but of course adds expense.

If your storage system is just a normal commodity software RAID (or mobo FakeRAID) setup, then ECC is only providing uptime benefits, it really isn't helping with data integrity all that much.

I can't put $400 into a Hardware RAID card with Battery backup on board right now. I know a Hardware RAID 1 or RAID 5 would be MUCH better than software FAKE RAID for data integrity.

Hence me getting the WD RE4 2TB to keep daily backups of the system SSD 500 or 950GB and the 1TB Windows software RAID 0. I'm going with RAID 0 for the little extra speed boost to work with the SSD system drive for data transfer.

Then I'll be backing that 2TB up to an external HDD. Once I see what my regular data flow is I'll look into a Cloud back up as well.


The UPTIME is a HUGE concern right now. I'm tired of unexpected BSOD's on these OLD boxes. These boxes were NOT meant to have Windows 7 on them. XP is what they were designed for.

I've been pushing them for too long.

Also, hardware RAID isn't out of the question down the road. But again, I'm limited in my Motherboard choices and have to make compromises based on my budget and what's currently available.

If I could wait until next year to build I would. But, I can't.

Thanks again.

Sincerely,

David

 

[Sporinator]

ECC RAM support is tied to the processor and it also must be supported in the BIOS, I believe. The chipset has nothing to do with it.

You're correct. (Sort of.)

I just found that NONE of the H77, Q77, or Z77 Motherboard offerings available will support ECC ram but ALL Cxxx series chipsets do.

The x77 chipsets will support the Xeon CPU and will take Unbuffered ECC RAM but the ECC functionality will be disabled. So, no point in using it with those chipsets.

If you go to these two links you will see that the Chipset DOES matter though.

http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/chipsets/performance-chipsets/z77-express-chipset.html

http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/chipsets/server-chipsets/server-chipset-c202.html


The Chipset also determines the NATIVE support for things like the number and speed of PCI lanes, USB & SATA ports as well. It is then up to the MB MFG's to utilize the chipset features so the the CPU can be fully utilized.

 

[Sporinator]

Whoa. PSU is totally overkill. For a single card, 500W will do (yes, even a Titan). Also, you are not saving any money by purchasing Platinum over Gold, and the build quality of all Seasonic PSUs are so good that purchasing a higher efficiency PSU isn't changing the chance of breakdown at all.

Look at the 7950 w/Boost benchmark. The power consumption, while in an overclocked X79 testbed, is only 373W at the most; accounting for the PSU's efficiency in the testbed, the parts demanded only 326.275W. The cost of the AX860i is $200 and has about 92% efficiency at that load; a Seasonic G 550 is only $90 and 90.97% efficient at that load. To make up the price difference within 5 years of continual usage, your electricity cost would need to be $0.531 per kWh; to make it up in 10 (again, continual 24/7 usage), your electricity cost would need to be $0.265 per kWh.

I'm not looking at the Platinum for Cost Savings. Only for the BETTER made components and LONGER warranties.

You do make a VERY GOOD point about the SeaSonic Gold series though. I've seen several reviews of the X1250 Gold that said it was just as spec tight as the Platinum 100.

I've been in the habit of getting PSU's that are at least 30 to 50% more than what I need. I still have some Enlight 300watt PSU;s that are over 15 years old and use them for bench testing stuff.


I have seen/had more problems with PSU's that are too close to a system's needs than ones that are WAY over what is needed. Plus, if it was too large for the old build it may still be large enough to make it into a new upgrade build later.

To "me" the PSU is my number one MOST IMPORTANT component in a build second only to a Quality Motherboard.

Thank you for your reply.

Sincerely,

David

Edit:

I don't know how accurate these things are, but just for Grinns & Giggles I went to Newegg's Power Calculator and this what it showed. I entered what I could to be as close to the build I have in mind.

If I add another 7950, which I might down the road to add another 3 monitors, it jumps up to 894 W recommended.

So, in "my" mind the 1000 Watt is not really overkill for future proofing in regards to upgrading without having to buy another PSU.

 

[Sporinator]

If your storage system is just a normal commodity software RAID (or mobo FakeRAID) setup, then ECC is only providing uptime benefits, it really isn't helping with data integrity all that much.

Ok, so now you have me taking a Long Hard Look at this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16816103224 and this http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816118107

lol

I have and prefer using WD RE4 drives already.

Then I'd have to get one of these for the Adaptech http://www.amazon.com/Adaptec-Flash-...82E16816118118 or one of these for the LSI http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816118118

Which puts me at around $550 for a RAID card. I hadn't looked at them for years and now I know why. LOL

Thanks again!!!

 

[mfenn]

I can't put $400 into a Hardware RAID card with Battery backup on board right now. I know a Hardware RAID 1 or RAID 5 would be MUCH better than software FAKE RAID for data integrity.

There you go making assumptions about what you can and cannot afford. A hardware RAID card is well within your reach as long as you spend wisely.

If I add another 7950, which I might down the road to add another 3 monitors, it jumps up to 894 W recommended.

So, in "my" mind the 1000 Watt is not really overkill for future proofing in regards to upgrading without having to buy another PSU.

Never trust a power supply calculator provided by somebody who sells power supplies. 7950 CFX would be perfectly fine on a 750W PSU.

That being said, 7950 CFX (or really a 7950 at all) is completely ludicrous overkill for your needs. You do not need a powerful GPU just to run multi-monitor and play light games from time to time.

 

[mfenn]

1. What YOUR PC will be used for. That means what types of tasks you'll be performing.

VMware Workstation, Abobe Creative Sweet, Auto Cad, Web Page Design, DB creation, Some Programming, HEAVY Web Browsing, Movie Watching, Torrenting, Multi Monitor Setup, and Some RPG gaming "maybe". (Ooops, 28 words. lol)

2. What YOUR budget is. A price range is acceptable as long as it's not more than a 20% spread

$2,500.00 I'm comfortable with.

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from.

USA (Do the last two HELP with the 3 word overage of the first question?)

4. IF you're buying parts OUTSIDE the US, please post a link to the vendor you'll be buying from.
We can't be expected to scour the internet on your behalf, chasing down deals in your specific country... Again, help us, help YOU.

Newegg and Amazon. TigerDirect & BestBuy if I "have" to. I have to pay Sales Tax with BestBuy & TigerDirect.

5. IF YOU have a brand preference. That means, are you an Intel-Fanboy, AMD-Fanboy, ATI-Fanboy, nVidia-Fanboy, Seagate-Fanboy, WD-Fanboy, etc.

Intel, Asus, AMD/ATI, WD Enterprise, Seagate Consumer.

6. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are.

(2) WD RE4 500GB SATA II in a Software RAID. (Had wanted to also use (1) WD Black 1 TB and (1) Seagate Barracuda but no MB's have enough) connections.

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds.

If ECC RAM then Stock speeds & stability. If not ECC ram then O.C. to the mid 4's.

8. What resolution, not monitor size, will you be using?

(2) in 1920 x 1200 and (1) in 1200 x 1024. Or 3 in 1920 x 1200 if I get 3 new monitors.

9. WHEN do you plan to build it?
Note that it is usually not cost or time effective to choose your build more than a month before you actually plan to be using it.

In the next two weeks.

X. Do you need to purchase any software to go with the system, such as Windows or Blu Ray playback software?

I'm not certain about the Blu Ray software. I need to see if Nero 11 will work or not. Haven't checked yet.


P.S. My Finacee' is a Writer and will get a chuckle from your Mark Twain quote directed at me. Lulz

Great, now I can get started! Here's a solid workstation build that packs a lot into less than $2500 and avoids fear-based decision making (e.g. silly tweaker mobos and 1000W PSUs).

Xeon E3-1240V2 $275
ASUS P8C WS $240
Kingson DDR3 1600 UDIMM 32GB $284
AMD FirePro W7000 $360 AP - equivalent to 7870 for gaming
LSI 9260-8i RAID controller $485
SFF-8087 to SATA breakout x2 $40
Samsung 840 Pro 256GB $250
Reuse four existing mech. HDDs (1TB and 500GB RAID 1) $0
LG Blu-Ray burner $60
Seasonic M12II 620W $75 AP
Fractal Design R4 $80 AP
Hyper 212+ $20 AR
Total: $2169 AR AP

There's still enough left in the budget for you to add some 2-3TB drives if you need more storage. Plug the SSD and ODD (i.e. non-RAID drives) into the mobo and the RAIDed HDDs into the LSI.