Help me decide between 2 processors

[thelvman]

I'm looking to build a new pc mainly for software development. I use National Instruments LabVIEW, and for anyone who has used it, it can be a resource hog. I may also use it for the occasional game, but nothing too serious. I've narrowed my choices for cpu to AMD 1055t and Intel core i5 750.

I know the i5 750 is the clear choice for gaming. It also seems better suited for applications that are not heavily threaded. The 6 cores of the 1055t appleals to me as I'm a heavy multi-tasker and I usually have quite a few application open at a time.

I also plan on putting 8Gigs of ram in the system. I'll probably throw an SSD in there as well.

Any thoughts?

Sorry I realized I should have put this in the processors section. Not sure how to move it.

 

[mfenn]

Open applications != need for hexacore. If you apps are mostly just sitting around waiting for your input, the cores aren't going to help. I don't know anybody who runs multiple simulations at once or anything like that.

 

[thelvman]

Open applications != need for hexacore. If you apps are mostly just sitting around waiting for your input, the cores aren't going to help. I don't know anybody who runs multiple simulations at once or anything like that.

It would not be unusual for me to be running my custom application (data acquisition, control, etc...) that would be constantly be eating up cpu cycles. Having said that, I would never release an app that would eat up more than 10% of my cpu, so this is probably not a factor.

It also looks like the Intels are more power efficient, which is never a bad thing. I guess my top priority is that the system remains responsive even when I have multiple programs running. These apps would be:
1- LabVIEW 2009, Real time and FPGA
2- MS Outlook (3Gb pst file), Word, Excel, Onenote
3- 2 or 3 instances of Chrome with an average of 5 tabs open on each
4- Virtual Box. Either testing or doing development
5- SVN Server
6- Carbonite online backup
7- MS security essentials
8- Itunes

I currently do all my development on a Intel Core 2 Duo T7500 laptop. Actually it's not too bad, but I was thinking of putting together a PC just to make things a bit snappier.

 

[mfenn]

You really just need something with a lop of memory and a fast disk (i.e. SSD) then. Go with the i5 750.

 

[MisterDonut]

Why not with the SR2 and two Xeon 5680's? 48GB should be sufficient. .

Definitely go with the SSD recommendation. You'll see a hell of a lot of snappy...