Help with build for multi-media creation, no gaming (or minimal)

[Rachel Forma]

Hi all. I am new to post on the Anandtech Forums but I love to read up when I get ready to put together a new machine. I have looked through all the old posts but have a few questions still and wondering if you could help. Here is the situtation:

I need to build a new desktop computer to replace my ancient socket A Athalon that is almost dead. I have an old Lian-Li pc60 case (8yrs old) which I would like to keep if possible/worth it but everything else needs upgrading including the power supply. I still have a decent monitor/keyboard/mouse etc. My budget is around $2,000 max a less would be great.

I need to be able to run all programs in the Adobe CS4 suite and multitask between programs open at the same time. I will also be doing video processing, and processing many large Illustrator files and sorting tons of quality digital images. The possibility of working in Maya in the future would be awesome. I am a newbie at overclocking but would like to take advantage of anything I can on air that can stay relatively quiet and be on all the time without hurting components. My next upgrade wouldn't be for another 3years or so. I won't be gaming much if any. No need for SLI or Xfire.

I have looked into the Intel Core i7 as a possibility but am open to anything AMD if you think it is warranted. I am worried about the i7 upgrade path though with the new i5's coming out. Also is SATA 3 worth waiting for? I need a computer by the end of July at the latest. What graphics cards work best with the CS4 suite that aren't insanely expensive, or will anything be alright? Would investment in SSD be good or would I get penalized for early adoption? Any suggestions on any 1TB drives for video/media storage? I also want a quality power supply that is modular and effecient but I don't know what wattage I am looking at. Lastly, and I don't know if this is too much to ask but to run a certain as you say "fruit inspired" operating system too would be amazing. I do want a 64bit operating system so the main operating system would be Windows 7 (hopefully they don't mess that one up, looks promising though).

Thanks so much for your help! (sorry if the post is too long.)

Rachel

 

[Lunyone]

Well I'm not a video editing master or user, so I can't answer all of your questions, but here ya go!
* I'd consider the i7/AMD Phenom II x4 CPU's. I don't think i5 is going to affect too many things, but I haven't done enough research to say for sure. I would recommend sticking with at least the Quad core systems, since they would serve you well.
* I don't think SATA 3 is going to be out by the time you need to purchase this system, so waiting probably isn't going to be an option. I'd consider getting a mobo with eSATA though, so you can off load any of your work a bit faster than just the standard USB 2.0 speed.
* As far as HD's are concerned: I'd consider getting 1 small drive (320 gb or so) for your OS and programs, and one larger drive (1 TB or so) for your scratch drive. This will allow your work to be performed on the larger drive, but still have the other drive running your programs. IIRC this is an optimal setup for people using video files and such. I'm not sure getting an SSD is needed just yet, but I haven't researched them much and don't want to sway you one way or the other without proper reseach.
* The PSU being modular is a nice idea. I personally don't really want to spend 20-40% more for a modular PSU, but that is just me. I'd consider any PSU made by Antec/Corsair/PCP&C/Seasonic/FSP to be of good quality. Based on your current build I'd recommend at least a 450w or more from the previously stated brands. Your not going to need a very high wattage PSU with what your wanting to do. Depending on which GPU you want to get, you could only need a quality 350-400w PSU. Personally I'd probably get the Corsair 400cx/450vx/550vx/650tx for what you want to do. The 400cx is going for $50 - $10 MIR = $40 at Newegg. I'd probably recommend the 650tx right now, becasue it's a good solid PSU and doesn't break the bank. It has 52A on the 12v rail, so you'll have plenty of power for a high-end GPU, if you decide you want one later. Here's how I'd break down PSU options:
**Modular**
Corsair 520hx/620hx
FSP 500w/700w
Seasonic 430w/500w/600w
Antec 850w
Here's all of those listed at Newegg.com
** Not Modular **
Corsair 400cx/450vx/550vx/650tx/750tx
Antec 380w Earthwatts/430w EW/500w EW
Seasonic 400w/500w/550w
PCP&C 370w/420w/500w/610w/750w
List of most of the PSU's listed above.
Hopefully some of this has helped with your buying decisions.

 

[Rachel Forma]

Thank you Lunyone! Great help with the PSU's. I have a question about effeciency/wattage maybe you or someone might know. Can I get say a 650watt PSU and if I am not using that much wattage during computing would it be "less efficient" then a 500watt all other things being equal? I'd like to be green if possible without losing major computing ability. I guess modular really isn't necessary, I thought they were higher quality but the list you gave me of none mod is great!

I think a quad core would be the minimum cpu. Is i7 that much more powerful than PhenomII? To me 5-10% difference is not worth it. I can't seem to tell when I read reviews if they are enthusiasts geeking out over a few percentage points or if its markedly better (>20%). Also, I think that I will start with around 6gb of ram (12 if people think it will warrant the return in performance and not break the bank), but would like to through in as much as needed so I want a mainboard that has that capacity.

One other question, and this maybe stupid but what is dual gigabit lan for? I want one but why would I need two?

Thanks so much for the help!
Rachel

 

[Lunyone]

* Most PSU's run the most efficient around the 50% of load, so if you have a system that generally runs around 200-250w of power a 450-550w PSU would be optimal energy wise.
* The i7 is a good CPU, but the Phenom II is no slouch and is pretty competetive with the i7. When you look at benchmarks the i7 generally wins, but in real world applications it's a bit closer, so don't be fooled by all of the hype. I think the PhII x4 940 or 955 would be a good purchase. The 940 is an AM2+ chip and the 955 is an AM3 chip. This can make a difference when you go order a compatible mobo for either chip. Not a real big deal, but something to consider when/if you go with a PhII build.
* As far as the gigabyte LAN is concerned, I believe the extra LAN connection is there so you can make your system a server of types, IIRC. I don't use that option and haven't researched it, so I'm just guessing on that one. I only use one LAN connection myself so use that for what it's worth.

 

[Hacp]

Originally posted by: Lunyone
* Most PSU's run the most efficient around the 50% of load, so if you have a system that generally runs around 200-250w of power a 450-550w PSU would be optimal energy wise.

What are you talking about??

 

[Lunyone]

Originally posted by: Hacp

Originally posted by: Lunyone
* Most PSU's run the most efficient around the 50% of load, so if you have a system that generally runs around 200-250w of power a 450-550w PSU would be optimal energy wise.

What are you talking about??

I've included a link to an efficiency chart of the Corsair 650tx PSU. If you look at the chart, the PSU runs the most efficient at 50% of it's full load ~300w or so.
Link to efficiency chart for Corsair 650tx

 

[Hacp]

Originally posted by: Lunyone

Originally posted by: Hacp

Originally posted by: Lunyone
* Most PSU's run the most efficient around the 50% of load, so if you have a system that generally runs around 200-250w of power a 450-550w PSU would be optimal energy wise.

What are you talking about??

I've included a link to an efficiency chart of the Corsair 650tx PSU. If you look at the chart, the PSU runs the most efficient at 50% of it's full load ~300w or so.
Link to efficiency chart for Corsair 650tx

That just means that at 300w, you'll save a few cents on your power bill...

 

[Lunyone]

Originally posted by: Hacp

Originally posted by: Lunyone

Originally posted by: Hacp

Originally posted by: Lunyone
* Most PSU's run the most efficient around the 50% of load, so if you have a system that generally runs around 200-250w of power a 450-550w PSU would be optimal energy wise.

What are you talking about??

I've included a link to an efficiency chart of the Corsair 650tx PSU. If you look at the chart, the PSU runs the most efficient at 50% of it's full load ~300w or so.
Link to efficiency chart for Corsair 650tx

That just means that at 300w, you'll save a few cents on your power bill...

Yes it does, but that is what the OP was looking for, so I was trying to explain it for her/him.

 

[Hacp]

Originally posted by: Lunyone

Originally posted by: Hacp

Originally posted by: Lunyone

Originally posted by: Hacp

Originally posted by: Lunyone
* Most PSU's run the most efficient around the 50% of load, so if you have a system that generally runs around 200-250w of power a 450-550w PSU would be optimal energy wise.

What are you talking about??

I've included a link to an efficiency chart of the Corsair 650tx PSU. If you look at the chart, the PSU runs the most efficient at 50% of it's full load ~300w or so.
Link to efficiency chart for Corsair 650tx

That just means that at 300w, you'll save a few cents on your power bill...

Yes it does, but that is what the OP was looking for, so I was trying to explain it for her/him.

So you spend 20 dollars extra on a "green" power supply, and you end up saving 10 dollars in power bills over the course of its lifetime 😕 I'm totally confused about going green.

 

[Rachel Forma]

A "her" and thanks for the info. If it really isn't much savings in energy then should a 650 be fine for what I want and not too overkill. I would like to keep it for my next upgrade but I am thinking we should be on a trend to using less power not more in the next few years or is that crazy?

So is PhII pretty close to i7 say within 10%? Everyone seems to push the fact that an i7 920 can easily overclock (for beginners like me), would that make it worth the extra $ and an appropriate air cooler.

Thanks,
Rachel

 

[Rachel Forma]

Ok, I may need a case too. Unless I can find front USB 2.0/ESata/Firewire plate for the front that doen't cost as much as a new case. Do most cases just not come with filters to cut down on the dust, one thing I like about my aging lan-li case.

 

[M0RPH]

You have a pretty healthy budget there. The i7 is not the best bang for the buck (mainly due to overpriced motherboards), but it is the best performer for your application. So really it comes down to how much you are worried about saving money. If you have a Microcenter nearby you can save some money on the CPU. Roughly, here's what your choices look like:

Intel i7 920 $280 + mobo $200 = $480 (knock $50-80 off if MC nearby)
Intel Q9400 $215 + mobo $100 = $315
AMD P2 940 $190 + mobo $100 = $290

I would go Intel because their CPUs are more power efficient and generally considered better for multimedia. The 50% higher price for the i7 gets you maybe 10% more performance in the best cases, so obviously it's not the best deal. But a nice thing about the i7 mobos is that most come with 6 memory slots so with 2GB sticks you'd have the 12GB that you wanted.

As for the i5, it may eventually be a cheaper alternative to the i7 with similar performance. It may give you access to more reasonably-priced upgrade CPUs in the future. But as far as I know it's not coming until Fall, and even then it may take time for motherboard prices to fall in line. Unless you're very patient I don't think that's for you.

Do you plan on doing any gaming? If not, you can save some money on the video card and with your budget you really don't have any problem affording the i7.

As for running MacOSX on your PC, you need to go to the All Things Apple forum and read the Hackintosh guide there. That's something that you really need to commit to from the beginning, because it requires buying specific parts that are known to work. I don't know if there are any i7 mobos that work but you can ask over there. I don't know much about this stuff, I only read the guide and it sounded like more hassle than it was worth.

 

[Rachel Forma]

Thanks MORPH! If I want to chance a hackintosh then intel is the only way to go from looking on the forums. I am not sure if that is worth the hassle or not, and it may be over my head. Trying to get something for nothing never seems to workout like you want. Suggestions for a q9400 board? Can that cpu be on a constant overclock with minimal effort for a beginner that is worth the price of a non-stock cooler. Any of those boards that can handle more than 12gb of ram?

I would like to save money wherever possible. Computer prices have sure come down since I last built one.

Thanks
Rachel

 

[heyheybooboo]

Originally posted by: Rachel Forma
A "her" and thanks for the info. If it really isn't much savings in energy then should a 650 be fine for what I want and not too overkill. I would like to keep it for my next upgrade but I am thinking we should be on a trend to using less power not more in the next few years or is that crazy?

So is PhII pretty close to i7 say within 10%? Everyone seems to push the fact that an i7 920 can easily overclock (for beginners like me), would that make it worth the extra $ and an appropriate air cooler.

Thanks,
Rachel

As the Loony One pointed out attention needs to be given to your disk I/O and setup.

And there is the overriding issue of CS4 v. CS3.

Premiere will utilize up to 5 independent hard drives - but 3 will make a good start (+1 additional drive for your OS/Apps). There are a number of ways to set up your 'scratch' drives and you will need to find the config which best suits your needs. A drive for capture, independent drives for audio and video rendering, a dedicated storage/data drive, etc.

CS4 is turning out to be quite a resource hawg compared to CS3 so you may want to review what advantages exist for you.

6-8Gb of RAMs will be just dandy. As far as OC'ing the Phenom 'BEs' are as simple as increasing the CPU multiplier - either in the BIOS or through the AMD OverDrive utility.

Now that I've said that ... with your budget have you considered an independent rig for work and a dedicated encoding box? It might work within your budget ...

 

[M0RPH]

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong here, but I believe LGA775 mobos typically have 4 RAM slots and can take up to 16GB, but of course that's with 4GB sticks which are still pricey. The LGA1366 (i7) mobos typically have 6 slots and can take up to 24GB.

But like heyheybooboo says, anything over 8gb is probably overkill.

 

[Rachel Forma]

Thanks heyheybooboo. Suggestions on a dedicated encoding box? I haven't looked into one. The videoguys post this rig:

http://www.videoguys.com/Guide...3ed8f9892355dfda0.aspx

Everywhere else I have read says that CS4 works much better than CS3 on 64bit OS. what resources are being overly taxed in CS4?


MORPH: I guess with the saving in RAM and being able to use more slots the i7 would be better?


It seems that RAM and HD's are where more investment should be put. Is it worth getting a smaller ~250GB or so HD for scratch that is faster (SSD, Raptor) or is that just overkill. Or, should I just get 3 1tb drives like the WD Black for $300?

Yall are helping out a bunch!

Rachel

 

[Rachel Forma]

Ok, I think I will be going with Intel after much research. It is now between i7 or Core2Quad. Mobo suggestions? Does anyone have thoughts about the i5 killing the i7 upgrade path for the future?

 

[elconejito]

CS4 is much more dependent on cores than Ghz. (unlike CS3 which was the other way 'round). The best in terms of performance for your usage (lots of video editing, possible future Maya, illustrator) is probably the i7, then a tie with a Core2Quad vs Phenom II. Morph has a good rundown on the prices.

A few links that may help you decide which one is best based on dollar/performance
AnandTech Photoshop CS4 benchmark which shows the i7 ahead of the pack. Of the Core2Quads, they are all very close in performance and you might take a look at the Q8200 it is the cheapest of the C2Qs and actually does very respectable in PS. Along with middle of the pack results in video encoding (although not Premiere specific), it's a very good value. This would let you spend more $$$ on either RAM or faster/additional hard drives.

A very rough Premiere benchmark on hardocp

If you decided to go for a C2Q a great motherboard is the Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3R. VERY easy to overclock to mild levels, and you can get pretty good overclocks with just a little effort. Max RAM on this board is 16GB (or so they say...), but like has been mentioned 4Gb sticks are very pricey. You can easily run 8GB on this board though. If you need more RAM, then that is a reason to lean more towards the i7 since 12GB is very easy (3 x 2GB).

SATA 3 is NOT worth waiting for. Who knows when it is coming out, and hard drive speeds aren't even close to maxing out SATA2 speeds yet.

Adobe KB - list of tested graphics cards for Photoshop CS4 and Adobe KB - GPU and OpenGL features and Limitations in Photoshop CS4 will help you with the graphics card question. Any of the ones listed have been tested by adobe, but I'd be willing to bet any modern GPU released in the last year or so would be fine. Doesn't matter if it is Nvidia or ATI. Mostly the GPU is used for redrawing things onscreen (like faster zooms, rotateing canvas) so I personally wouldn't spend too much money here. Bridge uses it for previews as well.

To get an SSD or Velociraptor is a tough choice, I think, and ultimately depends on your budget. Those drives are blazing fast, but offer limited storage space and are crazy expensive (IMO). My favorite setup is 3 drives... one OS/apps, one storage, and one scratch disk. That way you should never run into a situation where, for example, the OS page file, PS scratch file, are going on at the same time as you save your file all on the same disk. THAT is slooooow. To keep the budget down, these drives can be Western Digital Caviar Blacks (640GB or 1TB models). If the budget allows, replace one or more of them with an SSD or VR drive. Don't forget to allow for proper backup storage in your budget too.

The WD Caviar Green 1TB (WD10EADS) drives are GREAT for storage. They are reasonably quick and very low power.

For the PSU, get a *quality* PSU around 500w-600w and you should be fine. I measured my power consumption using a kill-a-watt meter and at full load the system in my signature only pulls about 250w (not including monitors or speakers, printers, etc). To answer your question, most PSUs have a peak efficiency. A power supply that is rated "80 Plus" has to remain 80% efficient from at least 20% up to (i think) 100%.

Keeping "green" in mind when you purchase is always a good thing. Less energy consumed is less heat in the house, which helps keep your A/C bill down, etc. And depending on how many hours a day you have your system on and how much you pay per kilowatt, this can really add up. I have a media server and a file server on 24/7 and they total about $20 a month in usage, so I'm trying to bring that number down.

64-bit Vista has been pretty good to me, i expect W7 to be even better.

Dual gigabit LANs are for special cases, like having one computer on two networks (a pain in windows, to be sure) or running a server, and some other things I can't think of right now.

You'll have to look around for cases with filters. It isn't always related to cost, but generally the more expensive cases have more of the "niceties".

 

[M0RPH]

The Gigabyte mobo that elconejito recommended is probably your best bet if you go with the C2Q.

IMO people around here tend to over-recommend when it comes to power supplies. You should be good with a 450W PSU.

Elconejito you mention your power usage but you don't list your video card in your sig. What video card are you running?

 

[Rachel Forma]

Fabulous info Elconjito, I appreciate the thorough reply. I think I am beginning to lean to i7 for the RAM situation.

 

[elconejito]

@ MORPH - I have a very modest 9600GT I bought shortly after it came out to replace a 7600GT. So you can see I'm not incredibly discerning when it comes to video games 🙂 I play occasionally on this machine, usually games that are a few years old (i.e. they cost $20-30 bucks) and usually I can turn the settings up to high and it looks fine to me. I wouldn't know the difference between 30fps and 100fps if it hit me with a two-by-four, but I suspect I actually get really good fps in the games that I play. I've been playing Gears of War (the first one) for over a year now and I'm just now finishing it (i'm on the last level), lol.

I'm sure if I had a GPU with more horsepower that wattage would climb higher real quick. It idles around 150w, at last check. Right now I've got the kill-a-watt hooked up to my mediacenter which I'm trying to reduce power consumption on.

This card has got a pair of 22" 1680x1050 monitors connected to it.

@ Rachel, there's been a run on CS4 threads here lately so I bookmarked a few of the more useful links. The i7 is definitely the best performer. I can't say how the i5 will affect it though, in the CPU and Overclocking forum there is a pretty heated discussion on it. There's good info in there, but enter with caution.

(I feel like a broken record) If you have a Microcenter or Frys near you, make sure and check those out, they sometimes have crazy deals. Microcenter had the i7 920 on sale for $199 for a little while.

 

[Rachel Forma]

Elconejito, unfortunately I don't have Frys or Microcenter even close to where I live. It looks like their online prices are about the same as newegg though.

Thoughts: Newegg has a combo on i7920 and Asus WS Revolution for $574. Is this super overkill. I could use an SAS drive for OS/Apps as it has a controller on it, and have extra PCE2 slots for later on down the road, and just go with a $100-150 graphics card. Although future proofing seems somewhat dubious. Storage and memory are my biggest concerns. I have read articles showing that 12gb Ram really helps out especially with video.

I am feeling somewhat dizzy with the amount of choices for hardware....


Rachel

 

[Rachel Forma]

Does anyone know if the SAS controller on the Asus WS Revolution is comparable in performance with an add-on SAS card? That would be the whole point of getting this mobo to run a 15k enterprise HD.

Rachel