Need help with a build...

[KayGee]

Hopefully, the following information will be useful. Thanks in advance for the help.

1. What YOUR PC will be used for :
NOT FOR GAMING, mostly number crunching. Some programs that I will be running are Matlab/Simulink, Labview (hardware connected through USB), Dymola (simulation software), NPSS (simulation software, run using the command prompt), ADAMS (simulation/analysis software), FAST (wind turbine code, run using the command prompt), etc. Also, regular software like Firefox, Office, etc.

2. What YOUR budget is :
Around $1500.

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from :
USA, probably Newegg.

4. IF YOU have a brand preference :
Preferably Intel's i7 and WD hard drives.

5. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are :
No, buying everything new.

6. IF YOU have searched and/or read similar threads :
Yeah, but I'd still appreciate any advice.

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds :
Don't plan on overclocking until the warranties expire.

8. WHEN do you plan to build it?
ASAP.

 

[TidusZ]

I7 920, Gigabyte EX58-UD3R, OCZ Gold 6gb 3x2 ddr3-1600, that's just under $600 on newegg atm, and $670 after adding a hsf (Noctua, TRUE, etc). Add a radeon 4830 for $130 or 4650 for $70 if you are serious about no games, Put 60gb OCZ vertex ssd in there for $245, all in a HAF case for $160. ~$100 more for a nice corsair 750w P/S. Add a 1tb caviar black for $115 or 300gb velociraptor for $180 if necessary. I think that'd do just fine, for ~1300-1600 depending on options there. The next jump up in processing power is the 940 which is very little faster and costs $560 itself.

 

[KayGee]

Originally posted by: TidusZ
I7 920, Gigabyte EX58-UD3R, OCZ Gold 6gb 3x2 ddr3-1600, that's just under $600 on newegg atm, and $670 after adding a hsf (Noctua, TRUE, etc). Add a radeon 4830 for $130 or 4650 for $70 if you are serious about no games, Put 60gb OCZ vertex ssd in there for $245, all in a HAF case for $160. ~$100 more for a nice corsair 750w P/S. Add a 1tb caviar black for $115 or 300gb velociraptor for $180 if necessary. I think that'd do just fine, for ~1300-1600 depending on options there. The next jump up in processing power is the 940 which is very little faster and costs $560 itself.

TidusZ, thank you for your input. I just have a few questions/comments though since I haven't been keeping myself updated on hardware recently.

1. What would be the advantages of having a SSD? If it cuts down loading times, do you have any numbers for comparison? I definitely need a lot of space because of the output data from the simulation codes, so the 1 TB WD sounds good.

2. I'm partial towards ASUS mobos and Antec cases and power supplies because I've had good experiences in the past. Are there any compelling reasons to switch? I might not overclock even after warranties expire (never done it in the past either).

3. Do onboard graphics still exist or is that a thing of the past (since this machine will be purely for work)? Although, $70 for a cheap graphics card is not a big deal since almost none of my work needs graphical processing power.

4. I'd prefer to have atleast 12 GB of RAM. I could add more if the SSD isn't a recommended component.

Thanks again for the help. I really appreciate it.

 

[JonnyDough]

Titus has some mediocre advice IMO. No offense Titus.

First off, you don't need a 4830. If you're doing CAD type work you want something beefier. Furthermore, for serious number crunching you may be using parallel computing software in the future, so an NVidia card would make more sense. But practically, it sounds like you'll be doing number crunching on your CPU for right now - so I wouldn't bother with anything but onboard graphics. Just make sure you get a good motherboard with solid state capacitors. You had asked about onboard graphics and that's an interesting question because onboard graphics have gotten a lot better as of late. AMD/ATI put out the 780G (and it's near twin the 790) and we're likely to see more where that came from soon, if we haven't already - I may have missed it. Likewise, NVidia has released their 8200 (8300?) and 8400 onboard GPUs I think. Both are suitable for even some light gaming and do HD video output ok.

MSI makes good boards as well as ASUS, and there are a few companies that I would probably recommend but the final choice is yours.

As cases go, Thermaltake is nice if you go with their own water cooling setups but they seem to have yet to go with wider tubing. I've got a Kandalf, and I like it but if I could do it over again I might choose something else like...

CoolerMaster. Coolermaster cases are a good bang for the buck and they are well laid out and have some nice large cases. Rosewill seems to be coming up more often on NewEgg too.
I suggest that if you have gone with Antec cases in the past you might try a new brand for two reasons:

1) Antec is well established and their cases are nice but nothing particularly great compared to anyone else.

2) Shop around if you have time, see what else is out there. You might find something you're more partial to. Silverstone and LianLi make great cases too but they can be a bit costly - especially for their bigger/better ones.

As far as the SSD I believe that Ananadtech just posted this update article
http://anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3531&p=1

I haven't gotten around to reading it yet, but I believe it says that Intel's flagship SSD is still the fastest. I'm still using dual raptors.

If you need a "lot of space" I would consider Western Digital's Terabyte Green Drives perhaps. There are a number of storage articles around, I suggest you check into them. They have 2GB drives out now I believe on three platters. I forget who the maker is, Toshiba perhaps?

If you want to use an SSD in the future with Windows 7 I would recommend waiting. I think SSDs will be better supported then, not to mention cheaper and faster. In fact, if you can wait a half a year to build a system I would. USB 3.0, SATA 6GBPS, and Windows 7 are just a few reasons to wait, although I'm not sure when "SATA 3" will be coming out.

If your budget is fairly robust and you want to keep your data safe then RAID-5 might be a good way to go. Get a few huge drives and spread your data across them. Get a good card, like the one that Gary Key blogs about here:

http://anandtech.com/weblog/showpost.aspx?i=582

The OCZ Gold can be substituted by any DDR3 RAM with larger capacity. Find a good set for a good price and for God's sakes stay away from MIRs. We don't need to be supporting consumer rip-off departments.

I'm no expert, these are just my thoughts and if I'm wrong anywhere I'm sure someone will set me straight.

 

[MykC]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16819115202 LGA 1366 i7 920 $290 (fastest number cruncher out there without paying way too much)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813128375 Giga UD3R x58 $210 - $15MIR (cheapest decent x58 board)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...2E16811129025&Tpk=P182 Antec P182 case $150 (nice looking case, really quite)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16817194031 Enermax Modu82+ (modular, bronze efficeny, silent)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16820231225 G.Skill DDR3 1600 3x2GB $100
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16820231225 G.Skill DDR3 1600 3x2GB $100 (decent price, good brand, good timings)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16822136284 WD 1TB FALS $115 (fast and reliable)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16835233029 Xigma Dark Knight $40 (Intel) (whether you OC or not, this will keep your CPU quiet and extend its life)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16835186020 Artic MX-2 Thermal Compound $7
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...yCodeValue=679%3A44045 512MB 4670 $80 - $30MIR (basic gpu)

I didn't read anything about CAD, but if you have anything that will use your GPU then upgrade you GPU accordingly.

 

[TidusZ]

Originally posted by: JonnyDough
Titus has some mediocre advice IMO. No offense Titus.

First off, you don't need a 4830. If you're doing CAD type work you want something beefier. Furthermore, for serious number crunching you may be using parallel computing software in the future, so an NVidia card would make more sense. But practically, it sounds like you'll be doing number crunching on your CPU for right now - so I wouldn't bother with anything but onboard graphics. Just make sure you get a good motherboard with solid state capacitors. You had asked about onboard graphics and that's an interesting question because onboard graphics have gotten a lot better as of late. AMD/ATI put out the 780G (and it's near twin the 790) and we're likely to see more where that came from soon, if we haven't already - I may have missed it. Likewise, NVidia has released their 8200 (8300?) and 8400 onboard GPUs I think. Both are suitable for even some light gaming and do HD video output ok.

MSI makes good boards as well as ASUS, and there are a few companies that I would probably recommend but the final choice is yours.

As cases go, Thermaltake is nice if you go with their own water cooling setups but they seem to have yet to go with wider tubing. I've got a Kandalf, and I like it but if I could do it over again I might choose something else like...

CoolerMaster. Coolermaster cases are a good bang for the buck and they are well laid out and have some nice large cases. Rosewill seems to be coming up more often on NewEgg too.
I suggest that if you have gone with Antec cases in the past you might try a new brand for two reasons:

1) Antec is well established and their cases are nice but nothing particularly great compared to anyone else.

2) Shop around if you have time, see what else is out there. You might find something you're more partial to. Silverstone and LianLi make great cases too but they can be a bit costly - especially for their bigger/better ones.

As far as the SSD I believe that Ananadtech just posted this update article
http://anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3531&p=1

I haven't gotten around to reading it yet, but I believe it says that Intel's flagship SSD is still the fastest. I'm still using dual raptors.

If you need a "lot of space" I would consider Western Digital's Terabyte Green Drives perhaps. There are a number of storage articles around, I suggest you check into them. They have 2GB drives out now I believe on three platters. I forget who the maker is, Toshiba perhaps?

If you want to use an SSD in the future with Windows 7 I would recommend waiting. I think SSDs will be better supported then, not to mention cheaper and faster. In fact, if you can wait a half a year to build a system I would. USB 3.0, SATA 6GBPS, and Windows 7 are just a few reasons to wait, although I'm not sure when "SATA 3" will be coming out.

If your budget is fairly robust and you want to keep your data safe then RAID-5 might be a good way to go. Get a few huge drives and spread your data across them. Get a good card, like the one that Gary Key blogs about here:

http://anandtech.com/weblog/showpost.aspx?i=582

The OCZ Gold can be substituted by any DDR3 RAM with larger capacity. Find a good set for a good price and for God's sakes stay away from MIRs. We don't need to be supporting consumer rip-off departments.

I'm no expert, these are just my thoughts and if I'm wrong anywhere I'm sure someone will set me straight.

I didn't realize it was entirely a work cpu so $70 for the videocard would be a waste, otherwise I stand by my advice. I'd take a gigabyte board over an Asus or MSI any day of the week, and the HAF932 over antec's 900 or 1200 too. I recommended the OCZ gold cus the price, timings, and rated clocks are all excellent and its on sale. And no offence, but the old wait 6 months cus it'll be faster stronger and better advice is a bit old, literally.

 

[JonnyDough]

Gigabyte is good too. Any of those might be considered "the big 3".

Tyan, Intel, DFI also make good boards, although TYAN boards are usually for servers, DFI is more for enthusiasts looking to OC and Intel has crappy integrated graphics.

The old addage about waiting to upgrade is often used and you're right to say that the advice is a bit old. However, 32nm CPUs will be a lot more energy efficient and Windows 7 may also be worth the wait. As I said, the SSD market will be cheaper, Windows 7 may be faster, DDR3 should be cheaper, newer and faster CPUs will be cheaper (manufacturing tech requires less costly of silicon), USB 3.0 should be here, and if any of these things is important to him and he wants to wait for Christmas this year then it may be well worth it.

 

[KayGee]

JonnyDough, MykC, thank you also for the help. I do not do CAD work. Most of my work involves solving huge systems of differential equations using numerical finite differencing schemes. For example, a few years ago, I was using Matlab on a 3.0 GHz Pentium 4 with 1 GB of RAM and my code took 38 hours to execute (haven't tried running that on a C2D and 4 GB of RAM to see how much of a difference it makes yet). I am also not an expert on parallel computing. Anyway, thank you all for the help so far. I plan to have this up and running within the next couple weeks, so feel free to add any more suggestions.

 

[Denithor]

Xbitlabs: Mathematica 7 results

It really comes down to whether your specific software is multithreaded properly to take advantage of multiple cores or not. Take a look there and you'll that Mathematica 7 really isn't optimized (a dual will never beat a triple/quad if the software properly supports those extra cores). I don't know about Matlab, that's something you know/should find out before deciding on a system to build.

Now, if your software supports multicore cpus I would suggest either a PhII X4 or an i7 920. The PhII setup will offer lower total system cost for several reasons: cheaper chip, motherboard, DDR2 (instead of DDR3) and one thing that may not be as obvious - you can use the integrated graphics (780G or 790GX motherboard) to save yourself about $50 and a fair amount of heat from a discrete GPU.

Of course, you could split the difference: grab an e5200 + G41 motherboard + 4GB DDR2 to upgrade your current system and see how that handles your workload. These parts could be had for probably US$200 and would give you a feel for how a more up-to-date system will handle your workload.

 

[JonnyDough]

You're welcome. I think that you might be going to GPU computing before long, in which case it might not hurt to invest in SLI or Crossfire. AMD has a manufacturing tech advantage but not much of one, about a year and 20nm. NVidia's parallel GP-GPU is more ready for prime time though. If I were you I'd consider getitng an SLI board if you hear any rumors about new upcoming software based on GPUs around work.

 

[KayGee]

Denithor, it's a good thing you mentioned multithreading. Matlab doesn't 100% support multiple cores yet. Anyway, thanks everyone for the help. I ordered the components today from Newegg.

 

[KayGee]

I just had a couple of follow-up questions. I went with the GIGABYTE GA-EX58-UD5 motherboard and the Vigor Monsoon cooler for the i7 920 chip. I've updated the BIOS to the latest stable version (F5, I believe) and I'm reading a chip temperature of 32°C in the BIOS. Is that normal? I'm running XP 64-bit, so are there any recommended temperature monitoring tools? Currently, I'm using the latest Speedfan beta. Thanks in advance.

 

[Denithor]

Originally posted by: KayGee
I just had a couple of follow-up questions. I went with the GIGABYTE GA-EX58-UD5 motherboard and the Vigor Monsoon cooler for the i7 920 chip. I've updated the BIOS to the latest stable version (F5, I believe) and I'm reading a chip temperature of 32°C in the BIOS. Is that normal? I'm running XP 64-bit, so are there any recommended temperature monitoring tools? Currently, I'm using the latest Speedfan beta. Thanks in advance.

What's ambient in your room? 32C at idle is fine, especially under a good cooler. Next use one of the monitoring tools (coretemp, etc) and run OCCT to abuse your CPU. Monitor the temps under load and see how high they go.

 

[KayGee]

Thanks Denithor. Room temperature is around 24°C. I'll stress test it and post back if I notice anything weird.

 

[KayGee]

I ran all the OCCT tests, but I only ran them for one hour. There were no errors and the maximum temperatures reported were about 72°C at 100% CPU load. Is this something I should be worried about? Thanks in advance for the help.