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Now what do i do?

C

coolred

Diamond Member
Well for the past while I had been trying to decide if dual CPU's were right for my next rig, and if so if I should go broke buying opterons or go real cheap and overclock dual modded XP mobiles. Well just for grins and giggles I went ahead and bid on an opteron 246 on ebay. I put in a max bid of 265, which I didn't even expect to stick at that point, well turns out 255.00 was good enough, but there were still 3 days left, so I knew it would get taken for a higher bid. Then to my surprise the auction ends and I now have an opteron 246 on the way for 255.00 shipped. I wasn't quite ready to start buying parts yet, mainly cause I wans't sure which way I was going, plus I was kinding waiting for august to see if the 90nm opterons come out and drop the price of the current ones.

So what I had planned on doing was moving my current rig to a new case(antec overture) and making an HTPC/SageTV box out of it, then putting something new in my current rig to act as my main machine. But for now it looks like the hTPC may have to wait, as I was thinking of just getting exactly what I need to run this single opteron for now with most of my current parts and letting the rest sit till more money comes around.

SO what do I need???? The way I see it, I need a new motherboard, new RAM, and obviously the CPU, which should be here soon. I am using an ANtec SX 1030B right now, which if memory serves me correctly uses a 300watt PS, would have to check to confirm though. I know when I load up the system and add a second processor that I will need mroe power, but you think the 300 watt one will hold up to a single opteron, 1 stick of RAM, video card(for now my radeon 8500DV), sound card, at least 1 optical drive, and a few hard drives???

Heres what I am thinking, I have been leaning heavily toward the MSI K8T Master Far2(currently OOS at newegg though)its decently priced and includes heatsinks, so no need to buy those. Then I guess that just leaves me with memory. The 246 opteron supports PC3200 and needs registered/ECC memory right? I eventually want to have a gig of ram, but will suffice with 512 for now, should I get 1 512MB stick or 2 256MB sticks, and what kind. I am looking to go cheap here money wise, but not quality wise, as long as it is stable at stock speeds and is from a retuable memory manufacturer, thats about all I need. I don't need it to overclock or whatever else. I see on MSI site that they have validated samsung and only samsung memory for the board, obviously others will work, but I have heard others say good thing abotu the samsung, just nto sure where to find any or how much it normally runs. ANy suggestions????
 
Cliffnotes:
Opteron 246 en route. he needs new
- motherboard (MSI K8T Master Far2?), .
- RAM (reputable manufactuer & stable but cheap, considering Samsung; 512mb will do, would like 1gb; ECC??),
- Current PSU (antec) only 300w, need new one?
 
Thanks for the cliffnotes, I always forget people here are to lazy to read a big post LOL. All that and still no answers though.
 
MSI motherboard - from what I have heard, this is perhaps the best of the "budget" dual Opteron boards

RAM - has to be registered/ECC - it's best to run two sticks of memory, so that you get the benefits of dual-channel goodness. However, I believe the MSI board will still run just fine with one stick in single channel mode - If your goal is to eventually have 1gb of memory, I would suggest that you just get one stick of 512mb for now, so that you only have to get one more later. If you go with 2x256mb now, you will either have to get 2 more sticks later to make 1gb (and thus fill up all of your memory slots, making the addition of more memory in the future more of a PITA), or go through the hassle of selling your 256mb RAM modules if you want to help recoup the cost of 2x512mb sticks. Something like this should work just fine.

PSU - not for certain, but I believe you will need an "EPS" power supply for this board - I know there are a few Opteron boards that can use standard ATX PSU's, but I'm not sure if the MSI board is one - since you are going to have to get a beefier PSU anyway, I would advise you to get a proper unit from the start - alot of folks with this board seem to like the Antec EPS 550w PSU or the Fortron EPS 550w PSU - I'm using the Fortron unit, and it's been rock-solid stable

Lastly, I don't know if you have seen it, but here is the "official" MSI Master2 FAR thread. You can post any questions you have there, and get better answers than I can give you since alot of those guys are alot more knowledgeable than I.
 
Thanks Mloot, I did know abotu the threa don 2cpu, I have read pretty much every post and also posted their, but they aren't the most active bunch over there. As for the power supply, from what I understand the MSI board will work with the EPS power supplys, but it shoudl also work with a standard PS. From what I understand while it has the connectiosn for the EPS PS(24pin and 8 pin, i think) it has 4 of the holes on each connector covered by a sticker, so not to confuse those using a reqular ATX PS. What does the EPS type supplies offer, and what do they run. I will have to start looking, but I was trying to keep cost as little as I can for right now.

Also, is 550 watts really needed? I mean I am running quite abit of stuff now on my 300 watt PS, all I would be adding is a bit more ram, another CPU and a mor epowerful video card. Does all that really warrant an extra 250watts? I mean I know you don't want to skimp in the PS department, and I am willing to pay for a good quality one, but no sense paying for extra power I may not need.
 
Mloot, I see over at 2cpu that someone had a problem with that buffalo ram on the MSI board, wondering if its good or not, what about the gigaram on newegg, it also uses samsung chips and is value priced, or should I just pony up the dough for the corsair or mushkin, whatever is next ont he list for like 20-20 bucks more.
 
Coolred, I honestly don't know about the Buffalo or Gigaram (never heard of the latter) in the MSI board, but from what I've heard they make decent quality RAM for regular systems. I use OCZ pc3200 in my MSI board.

In regards to the PSU, I can only go by what others at 2CPU.com have done also. Alot of folks have a 550w PSU with their duallies, and I've seen a few that have used 480w PSU's with no problem. It's true that 550w may be overkill, depending on how much (and what kind of) hardware you have, but I would rather have too much power than not enough.

Heh, that probably doesn't help you out much, but it's all I've got for now. 😱
 
Thats cool, thanks. I have never heard of gigaram either, but it uses the same samsung chips as the buffalo. I guess I will have to keep looking. In the end I will likely go with the antec 550 watt PS, but I may still try to see if I can work with my 300 watt one for now.
 
Well I may just have to try out that gigaram, its cheap and according to the few(4-5) reviews I have found, seems to be great. I haven't found a review of the registered ECC memory I need, but have seen several dealing with the unbuffered 3200 dimms, and from what I get out the website, gigaram was started in 1996, but its engineers have over 12 years experience in the field. While they are still unknown in the enthusiast market, they seem to have been making memory for apple, Sun, Toshiba and soem other big name companies for quite some time. Now just gotta find a motherboard, hopefully newegg will get the MSI back in stock.
 
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