Ideal Workstation Configuration

[Elliot]

Hello

 

I know this is a controversial subject AMD vs INTEL. However, after reviewing many of the issues on this and other forums I have decided on my configuration. I build these workstations while trying to get 2 or 3 years out of them. The last big one I did was 3 years ago and it is still working OK.

 

Components:

 

Supermicro X6DA8-G2 Motherboard with 7525 Turmwater Chipset

http://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/Xeon800/?chp=E7525

 

Super Workstation 7044A-82 Case (645 watts Power Supply)

http://www.supermicro.com/products/system/4U/7044/SYS-7044A-82.cfm

http://www.supermicro.com/products/chassis/4U/743/SC743S1-645.cfm

 

Dual 3.6 ghz 800 FSB Xeon with 1 Mb

 

4gb of DDR2 Ram @ 533mhz (I understand they are not available at 800mhz)

 

SCCI Raid 0 with two 73gb 15,000 RPM Seagates Cheeta's

 

One 300gb general storage drive possibly SATA

 

PNY Quadro 3400 with PCI Express (The Quadro 4400 is not available)

 

52x CDRW

16x DVD CDRW

 

NIC Card

 

2 Monitor LCD Viewsonic 17 inches

 

Does anybody has advise on this configuration? Is Raid 0 the way to go to optimize speed? Is the Supermicro 7044A-82 case a quiet and cool one. My last workstation sounds like a hurricane. Seriously, it is so noisy that is distracting and bothers everybody next to the computer. I am afraid of using water to cool down the Xeon's.

 

If I do some serious shopping around my local area and buy the different components from different vendors I could bring the price to around $5,800.00 to $6,200.00 If I buy from one single source (locally) it will go for about $6,500.00 plus 6% tax (no shipping).

 

Last time I had problems with some of the suppliers. One of them shipped (twice) the processors with broken pins. I took three weeks to get them to replace. Now I understand this is a common practice. Another vendor held my money for 3 weeks before he shipped the memory. I am afraid of buying over the internet to a fellow I don't know anyhting about. I once bought two laptops from an outfit in New Jersey (very expensive) they never worked right. The owner basically evaded all his responsibilities until he got me tired and I gave up. He was nice but his English was very poor, maybe that was a self defense mechanism.

 

There is an outfit called PC's for Every One in Cambridge, Mass. that will put it together for $6,900.00 plus 70.00 for freight and insurance and no tax and a one year warranty. I enjoy putting these things together, but I am getting too old and I am inclined to have them assemble the box.... Additionally the savings is not that much and somewhat offset by the warranty. Has anybody heard about this company? I understand their parent company is Source Code Computers or something similar. I searched the internet and found some average comments.

 

BOXX wants about $8,900.00 for the same thing. Dell can not even make it. A local guy can assemble for $6,500.00 but with 3.4ghz chips and a 550 watts power supply, everything else the same. Allienware claims not having access to the 3.6ghz and want about $8,000.00 with the 3.2ghz and a smaller power supply.

 

Any comments will be greatly appreciated. I used to be OK on all these things but now I am not very up too the technology. I am confused, for example, memory. They tell me the way to go is with DDR2. Supposedly the DDR2 fools the machines into thinking that it has more memory... or some story like that....

 

One of the tech's claims the AMD 64's is superior. Three years ago when I did the main workstation, I was so confused with the AMD vs INTEL issue that I did two workstations. One Intel and the other one AMD. I think the AMD was a little bit faster. However, my software seemed to crash more often with the AMD. This is not a scientific evaluation, it is based on my feeling. My nephew has that computer and it is still working perfect. SHould I buy the expensive video card or do what the ganers are doing, two video card link with some sort of attachment.

 

Thanks

Elliot

[bigcahunak]

Looks like you are building a rocket there (NASA watchout...)

You only forgot to mention which programs you gonna be using with it...

AMD Opterons are faster (acording to reviews) with all programs accept MAX. Stability is on the Xeon side so that makes the decission for me.

If you arent doing video editing I dont see a reason for the expensive SCSI (HDDS and motherboard). Save yourself the loud noise and money.

For better performance the Asus NCCH-DL (with 6 SATA connectors) and Iwill DH800 (both at around $330) will be a better pick if you aren't going to be using SCSI and stay with no more than 4Gb of ram. They are both based on the P4 875 chipset which makes it cheaper. If you still prefer the 7525 chipset - Supermicro has the X6DAL-G for around $330 as well.

Good luck.

[Elliot]

Itzik,

 

Thanks for your response. I build these boxes like every two to three years and I try to make them in a way they will last. This time I am more confused than ever trying to decide. Too many options and too many opinions.

 

The reason for the SCCI is because I already have several big SCCI drives on my existing machine. I use Solidworks and Viz. I do some small video editing and a lot of Photoshop and Indesign.

 

Of the last 6 machines I built, some of them have regular Intel's, some Xeons and two of them with AMD's. I feel that Xeon's are a little bit more stable. Maybee this is just a feeling.

 

My favorite motherboard is MSI. Their support is excellent as far as I am concerned. I also got results with Supermicro. Their support is also good. At least these have been my experiences. This maybe the main reason for the board selection.

 

However, my primary area of concern is that I may be overdoing this. I have read several reports that claim the dual Xeon's are better for the people doing renderings. On the other hand I have some single processor machines and the difference is not that much. I have a laptop that works very good and I would say it is acceptable for renderings. Is all this reporting - analysis and over blown hype by the marketing and sales people to get the average user to spend more on machines. Are these machines needed because people like Discreet and Microsoft are turning out power hungry software.

 

I wonder if we do and in-house survey of our people on this forum.... How many of us are using double processor High end Machines versus single processor machines. On the average I can get the same results on all my machines. The difference is just a little bit of speed advantage. Do I need this speed.... I don't know..... if the awnser is that too get this speed I have to put 5 to 8 thousand dollars every 2.5 years.... it is simple.... No I don't need the speed.

 

I have several architectural firms as clients, from small to medium size. The main reason why the principals are turned off against 3D Virtual Reality is because the constant upgrades on software and machines. Of course they are also concerned at the specialize staffing and the lack of use os 3D reality as a contractual documment that will assign responsibilities to the contractors. On all the projects I am working these contractor - owner - architect relationship is a big issue. Renderings are not important too many of these people. Yes, they al like the renderings but the main focus is on cost overuns and change orders. This is the big time issue. If on top of the real life situations we throw the up-keep of the virtual reality needs their decisions are predictable.

 

Do wee need these machines, do we need this software? Does Discreet and the industry rely on our up-dates so Bill Gate keeps doing more. Can a skilled person do most of the work on a average computer using Viz 3. Do we trust the magazines and their reports. I am working on Realviz, how customer un-friendly group! However, the magizine reporters and "editorial experst" claim they are good. Most of their competitors sell programs with similar capabilities for 25% of the cost. There is even one German that makes a better product and gives it away free of charge. I guess a similar story with Radiance.

 

How many of you are using single machines....????? Should we keep funding the industry....? Like Discreet.... look at how many dollars we have spent on them, they launch un-finished buggy software requiring expensive machines to do renderings not entirely appreciated by the industry and on top they charge us when we call with questions about their inefficient programs.

 

Thanks

Elliot

[mbr]

Don't get me started on Discreet! Yes, I think it's criminal of them to not offere a down save so that an entire office has to up grade at the same time. I will be reevaluating what I use in the near future, especially with fR being offered for Maya (not that I like Maya, but I like choices - maybe they'll make if for Cinema?).

 

Your machines sounds wonderful! I agree it could be overkill, though, if you aren't doing a lot of rendering (but I don't know too much - I stick with Dell and rely on warranties, 3 years there, and I've used them to much success).

[Elliot]

Markus

 

Thanks for the response. I have been working on Lightscape and Viz for 8 years. If you look at the progress they have done with these software it is minimum. Basically there is not much difference on what you can do with the new version vs the old versions of the programs.

 

With each upgrade there is new hardware requirements in order to make use of the improvements in technology. There is new learning curves... Then the solution to cure the inefficiency of Discreet is to purchase Plug-ins.

 

I noticed most of us in this forum are small companies. Basically a few employees, in most of cases 1 or 2 employees at the most. Now look at the impact:

 

1. Almost every year an upgrade.....$$$$$

 

2. With each software upgrade there is a hardware upgrade needed...$$$$

 

3. Lately, a million plug-ins. Some of them with complicated licensing gimmicks.... Time $$$$$$

 

4. Cost of the learning curve because they don't stick to a certain workflow system..... Time $$$$$$$

 

5. Don't call them for advice. Last time I called Discreet it was about 70 dollars to talk with a kid that knew less than me. She was just asking me questions to me and reading out of a book with pre-made responses. If I would take her out of her sequence, she would leave on the phone for 10 minutes while reseaching for the anwser. Time $$$$$

 

6. Last time I called Microsoft with a problem with my E Mail and a virus, I spent 250.00 to hear that the solution was to re-format. To top it off they sent to me a questionaire. The guy wanted me to rate him......Time - Frustration $$$$$

 

 

Time - Time - Time - $$$$ - $$$$ - $$$$

 

This new machine that I need will not produce images that much different than what I used to produce with Lightscape in 1997 or 1998.

 

I think most people have had a similar experiences, I guess we are all hostages to Microsoft and others.

 

Thanks

Elliot

[bigcahunak]

Elliot.

I wont be getting into the philosophic discussion of "should we be sponsoring firms like autodesk..." as I also tend to get somewhat pissed...

If we need those duals vs. singles - 95% of the time we DON'T, but during those 5% when you do your materials and lighting test over and over again... it is much nicer.

The single CPU chipset are always more powerfull. whatever works there (technology wise) finds its way to the workstation arena. A 4GHZ XEON will most likely be released months after a single P4 at that speed.

But for your topic:

For Solidworks I dont know but I assume it doesnt really matter.

For VIZ Xeons are better, but thats about the only program which is faster on xeons vs. opterons. Opterons also scale better than Xeons. Adding a second Opteron to the first one in a system would result in an avarage 22% performance bost, While Xeons are around 17% (accept for MAX/VIZ).

What is very important about duals vs. singles and cant be benchmarked is the feel. Multitasking becomes a breeze, and doing Photoshop work while VIZ renders doesnt feel like something is gonna freeze or crash on you... Its that confident feedback you get from your machine when you put your load on it.

I still think you can shave a lot of $$$ from that list you had at the top, and still stay with Xeons which I think is a good pick.

[Allen]

I've been thinking about this issue quite a bit also. Come to the conclusion to buy 2 machines with a KVM switch so I can control 2 machines with one monitor, keyboard, mouse.

For the same price as one duel machine, I believe the increase in performance will be much better.

Obviously the box for modeling will need to have a nice video card, the one for rendering can get by with a very inexpensive card.

Just a thought - just remember this is a business - a 30% increase in cost for a 15% increase in performance may not make too much sense.

My 2 cents.

(to be honest - think I'm frustrated enough with the windows world - I'm about ready for an Apple G5 - with one of the 23"lcds)

Good luck.

[Elliot]

Itzik,

 

Thanks.... Solidworks requires a powerfull machine. It has its own rendering software. It is for mechanical 3D Modeling.

 

Yes about Discreet and all those guys. I know some of them on a personal level and they are good guys. However, they have business bosses to respond too. These guys (developers) are frustrated as we are... I guess it is the business environment that makes them behave in that manner.

 

Now, about the computer. Are you suggesting I get rid of the case..... The case alone is almost $600.00. Yesterday I visited a local guy and he showed to me the size of these Xeons. They are different and require a different case. The local guys has designed a special plate to mount between the motherboard and the aluminum case.

 

One of the Xeon guys I called in California said that he has given up on standard cases and will only use the special cases for the new Xeons. Another guys insisted the power supply of 645 watts is just too much power. He thinks a 550 watts will do it. Between the Power Supply and the case there is almost a $900.00 difference. Then the next big reduction comes out of the video card. The local guys suggest we use the Quadro 1300 (PCI Express). That is a difference of about 600.00.

 

When you add these two items there is a difference of $1,400.00. However, should I be concerned at the cooling and it's respective noise? The Supermicro case is supposed to be a little bit more quiet, but some of the reviews I have read they claim the opposit. If I go down to 3.4ghz then there is another $600.00 and then difference becomes 2K. Everytime I do these machines I want to buy as much as possible so they will last longer. This time I think I will be just throwing money away.

 

There is a 2,000.00 quiet case with no fans. It is a a motherboard attached to a giant heatsink with air circulation. The processors are also some how connected to the heat sink. Supposedly it is approved by Intel. This case comes from a Taiwan shop in California. I don't know much it cost.

 

I agree with you about the rendering and the light testing. Lately I have not been involved in 3D that much. But on this end the 3D comes in cycles. Sometimes I go for a month or two and then I get a lot of things to do. Those are the times that I get mad for not having up-graded. I do a lot of photoshop. I am doing all the brochures for our company as well as the video presentations. I have been also doing QTVR's to show the clients the before and after. These QTVR programs also do rendering and they are power hungry.

 

I feel like you.... Do it the right way.... but in a cost effective manner!!

 

Thanks for your time in getting back to me. I am not up with the technology anymore and all these things require research to make the correct decisions.

 

 

Thanks

Elliot

[vizwhiz]

hi There

 

Eliiot

 

here is my Thinking, "Randy's Rule of Thumb"

 

upgrade = downtime

 

**

 

upgrading is a cost that needs to be factored into all business estimates

There are people doing exquisitve 3d rendering on PIII's with 256 mb ram

 

but i guess it just Takes a little byte longer

 

**

 

Randy

[Elliot]

Randy,

 

I agree with you. My present system is 3 years old and it still works OK. I am still doing the research.

 

Here is a good article:

 

http://www.gamepc.com/labs/view_content.asp?id=noconaopteron&page=1

 

See you

Elliot

[Elliot]

Allen,

 

Somehow I have not noticed your response until tonight. I also agree with you. We are a small company and we are just wasting too much money on technology. Our clients, architects and mechanical engineering firms, are also complaning of the same cost for keeping up with technology.

 

I looked at the Apple's today. They certainly look impressive. But, What do I do with the thousands on PC software.....

 

Thanks

Elliot

[bigcahunak]

Elliot.

I definitely agree with that $1400 saving.

everythinh you listed could be a good saving and still very powerfull for your needs.

I'll send you some quite heatsinks links later.

Itzik

[Elliot]

Itzik,

 

Thanks again for your comment. After reading a lot about the special space and cooling requirements I started leaning towards the Supermicro case. However, last night I read 2 reports stating that this case is very noisy. If there is one thing I want to make sure it is not repeated on this workstation is the noise level produced by the last one.

 

Upon reading a lot of reviews I am still leaning on the Xeon's. Greg Hess is right. The chip may be better but apparently there is no motheboard platform to support it correctly. No motherboard to use PCI express or DDR2. AMD followers claim DDR2 is not good and they rather wait for DDR3. Some smart reviewer claims the latency on DDR2 it is not caused by the memory but by the lack of on board memory controller like on the AMD Opteron.

 

After reading the techno kid reviews I am starting to think that the difference between the two chips is in the order of trillions of a second....Hi Hi At the end it is just a marketing hype......!

 

If you have information on the heatsinks it would be greatly appreciated. One of the main issues is how to cool these chips in a quiet manner.

 

Thanks

Elliot

[bigcahunak]

Heatsinks... yeah its all about noise...

check the new Cooler Master Heatsink model E3W-NPTXS-04 on http://ecd.coolermaster.com/product/index.php?page=2&cat_id=3

Its a passive copper heat pipes with aluminum fins surrounding the pipes with no fans (passive, right...). You can read a review on http://www.ctechnet.com/hardware/Coolermaster/Cooler/coolermaster_e3w-nptxs-04.htm

And, as far as I know the only store that sells them is http://www.orbitmicro.com/products/accessories/cpu%20fans/E3W-NPTXS-04.htm for $41.60 each. I tried to get them here, as I'm currently building a xeon system as well, but its imposible and shipping from orbitmicro is double the price of the goods (I checked...)

FYI: I got the Antec 1080 case. I love this case.

Good luck.

[Elliot]

Itzik,

 

I finally had it with the Intel dealers in the US. All of these dealers that have the Xeon 3.6ghz they are trying to see how much they get you for. They all advertise between 960.00 to 1200.00 per chip. However, when you call they say either out of stock or only sold as part of a system.

 

Friday I had with the last one. He insisted that I send to him 7,400.00 and it will take him 3 weeks to have the machine. If you shop around you can get a nice system for about 6,700.00.

 

Well after reading a lot and listenin to Devin and his experience. I went and bought all of the components and assembled a dual Opteron 250. I gues this is like a Pentium 3.4 to 3.5 Ghz. The main problem for the lower speed as compared to a 3.6ghz Xeon is that there is no motherboard available for these chips that will use the PCI Express. From what I have read before the end of this year there will be a board for the Opterons with PCI Express. I guess at that point I will throw this board away and move the component to the other board.

 

Forget the survey and all these analysis showing trillions of a second of difference. I put together the machine in about 5 hours. No problem. There was a slight delay with the SCCI and the Ultra 320 controller. The store gave me the hardrives wrong.

 

This thing is fast fast fast fast fast..... but it is a NOISY BEAST. In fact so noisy that I will not use it. This problem will have to solved. The Opterons are running so cold that I can touch them with my fingers... But too noisy. Now I am in operation "FAN RESEARCH" trying to see what can be done. I started looking at your last message and reviewed the sites you recommended. Do you have any experience with these passive coolers with no fans.... The sales brochures went short of calling them a Miracle.

 

I placed all the components on a regular standard case.... with the 645 watts Power Supply. The PS is quiet, the problems is the fans supplied by the motherboard manufacturer.

 

Thanks

Elliot

[bigcahunak]

Nope sir, I dont have any personal experience with these passive coolers, yet... but it seems like a trend among other heat sink manufacturers as well. these passive pipes coolers seem to do job just fine, but I heard of ppl mounting a big and quite fan infront of them two cooling towers and that even increases performance while still keeps it very quite.

Good luck with your new toys...

[Elliot]

Itzik,

 

Thanks.... I had not even heard of the passive coolers until last week....! I have to solve the problem with the noise. It is just too much.

 

This motherboard doesn't have that much space and as a result they include their coolers. However since there is not much space, they put a smaller footprint fan and run it a 5,500 RPM.

 

Let see how I progress with this thing. I still have my reservations about the AMD. On true life...... It is fast.....

 

Thanks

Elliot

[Elliot]

Hello,

 

Can anybody help me with a questions about Raid Systems?

 

If I have two 74gb SSCI drives on a RAID 0. What is it that should I see upon booting up the computer. Will I see two hard drives each of 74gb (Drive C & D) or will I see a single drive "C" of 74gb or a single drive "C" of a 148gb....?

 

The last machine I put together had Raid 0,1 that allowed me too see a single "C" drive of 74gb. On the new machine I am using a different controller card and I configured it as Raid 0 without the comma (,) 1. Now I see on this new box two drives each 74gb. The machine is still very fast but I wonder if I am really using the Ultra SSCI at the full 320. Or is it that the machine is seeing just 2 single SSCI drives.

 

I was upon the impression that Raid 0, 1 was stripping with redundancy so you needed two drives and this configuration basically wasted one of the drives. No mirroring safety. Somebody told me to do just plain Raid 0 (without the ,1) and this way, upon saving the information, it was evenly splitted in an almost simultaneous manner between the two drives. This arrangement will speed up the machine by saving on the writing and retrieving time.

 

I am confused at what is it that I am seeing. Since I see two indepent drives of 74gb each, I am wondering if the machines is really on a Raid system. The docummentation on this LSI Ultra 320 controller (last one was an Adaptec 2010s) is very poor for a person like me, with limited computer knowledge. However, the machine is very fast, it is like transitioning from a propeller driven Cessna 150 to a modern jet fighter plane with excess disposable thrust.

 

If my question sounds to simple for you techno-kids, please remember that I am almost 55 years old..... That places me at a time before the invention of TV..... back to the vacuum tube age.... When digital technollogy was invented, Yes, digital technology..... Morse Code..... (di-di-di da-di-da) At any rate I am totally lost on this one.

 

Thanks

Elliot

[Elliot]

Hello,

 

Another question from an old techno kid.... All the computers I have put together ussually bring a software that can read the temperature on the processors. However, only one computer had what I call a sensor (thermocouple) on the base of the processor.

 

This motherboard that I have with dual opteron has not visible thermocouple. But it brings a software that acts as an alarm if it gets too hot. Could there be a thermocouple embeded in between the multiple layers of the motherboard PCB. How is it that they can take a temperature reading without the actual sensor.

 

I asked that question to a "smart" salesman at the local computer store and he told me to get a Thermolake Alarm sensor devise that will let me know the temeprature. This small device brings a thermocouple sensor that is sopposed to be placed between the base of the CPU and the CPU. Then wired into a box that have an LED that reads the temperature. In my old way of seeing things..... this is a sensor....!

 

The software that came with the motherboard has a temperature reading and an alarm setting point. The temperature reading on chip 1 is 40 and on chip 2 it is 42 degrees centigrade..... Is that normal....? Then it has a system temperature reading of 32 degrees centigrade.... Where is it getting that reading from.......?

 

I can touch the CPU bases with my fingers, it is just slightly warm.... The box is just too noisy...... Like flying a jet fighter without the helmet..... if gives you the feeling that you are sitting on top of the turbine....! It is so noisy that I have turn it off to prevent getting a headache.....! (Not exagarating) It is a complain reported on the internet under K8 noise.

 

Any suggestions will be very appreciated..... Does anybody has experiences with the noisless water cooled devices.....?

 

Thanks

Elliot

[William Alexander]

Elliot,

 

How loud are the scsi drives? I have a 10,000rpm that just screams. It's as loud as two cooler fans (one is in front), and a P4 cooling fan. It sounds like you stuck your head into a circa late 1970s TV.

 

As far as noise beyond quiet solutions what about Isolation and Insulation?

 

WDA

[Elliot]

William

 

I just came back from the computer store and got another motherboard. I may change the system to this other motherboard this afternoon.

 

The Opteron 250's are fast..... They are also very stable. My old Xeon's where always flickering or doing something....

 

A hundred years while flying with USAF on the T38 I removed my helmet to use my ham radio walkie talkie..... Young and not too smart.... The noise was loud.... loud..... I never realized the noise insulation that those helmets provided. I had a custom helemet with a custom mask that was very quiet. I hope I could find my old helmet, I know it is storage some where. Well, either I kill the motherboard or I start using the computer with my old helmet....

 

The noise out of this MSI motherboard is incredible....... Simply not acceptable......! There should be a Better Business complain against a company that produces a product that is this noisy. They should loose their license. Now I am switching the whole thing to the Tyan Thunder KW8 motherboard from the MSI K8T Master 2. They say the MSI is better. Some people say the Tyan is better, the eternal SAGA. Amaden say the MSI is better for CAD people... WHo knows.

 

The SSCI's I have are the Seagate's 15,000 rpm 74gb. I think they are acceptable. I think the Western Raptors are more noisy. My back up's are 2 Western Raptors. My Power Supply is also quiet. I have a few of these Seagates. I had one that became like high pitch noisy and started giving me problems with the raid. Finally, like 12 months later it died. I understand the warranty is 5 years. My first ones are about 3 years old. I called Seagate last week to ask some questions about the raid settings and happened to mention that one of my Seagate died. The tech told me to send it back.... I will call this week to get an RMA. I will let you know. However, be aware of noise and possibly inminent failure.

 

I like the speed and the stability of this new system.... it behaves good....! If I can not correct the noise problem.... I will have to discard them. I am too old for this noise level..... Believe me they are noisy....

 

The noise is serious... there is many web sites trying to address the corrections. Here is a link for one of them:

http://www.short-media.com/forum/showthread.php?t=10443&page=1

 

Thanks

Elliot

[Elliot]

Hello,

 

I enabled the quiet fan Bio's on the MSI motherboard. This option will keep the fans at low RPM's until the CPU's get over 55 degrees C. Now my CPU's are running at 57 and 56 vs 46 and 45. However, the fans are not blowing at 6,000 rpm like before, now they are doing like 3,000rpm. The noise must have gone down 3 to 5 db's at the expense of 10 degrees C. Not acceptable on a long range plan.

 

The difference in Temp between the two CPU's is because this motherboard uses different coolers for each individual CPU. It is something that has to do with space limitations. MSI did a poor job with the motherboard layout. I have used MSI board before and I like them. Their customer service / technical support is very good.

 

The unit is quiet for the time being.... but, more hot than acceptable even at the high RPMs. This solution is not acceptable either way. Once again, the problem is not the processor but rather the motherboard. Tonight I will probably switch to the new Tyan motherboard. This Tyan Thunder K8W has a larger footprint and it will allow air pipe and fan cooling system. This will let me run at 38 centigrade while going at 2,800 to 3,000 rpms on the 90mm fan vs an 80mm fan. This Tyan motherboard is using a different chipset that is not as good as the MSI. The AGP pipeline is not as clever as in the MSI.

 

Very soon there will be three new motherboards for the Opteron chip that will have the new chipset developed by Nvidia. This new chipset will use the Quadro based PCI Express video cards at an unprecedented flow capacity.

 

The interesting fact on all this saga that has not even reach the end. The specifications I had developed for the new workstation could not bet met at an acceptable price by Dell, HP, Allienware, Boxx and some of the small clone assembly shops. I think the cost of the system components we have acquired could probably reach $4,800.00. Similar specifications by the big manufacturers where quoted between $5,800.00 to $8,900.00. This allowed me to have extra money in the budget for two LCD 19" inches by Sony (12 ms response time) and still beat the big guys at the cost of the unit.

 

It is not technically difficult to put the components together. It is very simple. The most difficult phase is really learning what each new technology will do to your system. Procurement and purchasing of all the components was the second most time consuming phase. I basically purchased from 3 different vendors. However, if you have the time to shop around you can bring the price under $4,400.00.

 

After a lot of reading I am sure that the reviewing industry has too many experts doing opinions on technical issues. They could be very confusing. The average graphic designer doesn't care if his or her machine is 1 trillions of seconds faster than the other. They just want to have a quick machine that will improve their production throughput. This Opteron is the fastest system I have ever placed together.... but even more than the speed...... So far it looks solid as a rock.... The fastest, more stable, no flickering, crispy clear and glossy graphics out of any of the systems I have put together.

 

I stopped the technical investigation tonight to work on two simple real life projects for tomorrow, I use them to try out the system. I was able to finish my marketing presentation quicker than before without the visual fatigue of looking at the old 17" or 19" glass monitors.

 

If anybody has experience with these air pipe cooling systems or the liquid coolers I would appreciate if you post your findings. These new processors require too much cooling. The noise issue remains to be solved.

 

At the end.... I am super busy, we are a small company and between my partner and I we have to be proactive in trying to meet deadlines at an acceptable cost. My partner is not computer oriented, he thinks we should pay to buy a ready made unit. His 26 year old son who is our IT and I don't agree with him. Although I complain of all the work involved in doing these boxes.... I really enjoy putting them together and knowing that if they go wrong probably I can fix without having to be at the mercy of an expensive tech.

 

Thanks

Elliot

[Elliot]

Hello,

 

I was just engaged in a last minute review of some of the issues that people following this thread have mentioned. Cost and Down time.... was a popular subject. The down time was 48 hours, savings 30 to 40 percent.

 

On a partime basis I researched for a month, then another week for partime price searching. Last Thursday afternoon I purchased most of the components while some last minute changes forced me go out on Friday and acquire additional parts. It took me very little time to put the box together.... Perhaps 4 hours....

 

Tweaking took half of Saturday and it is still not totally finished. For those close to my age group, it was similar to like in the old days putting a Heathkit together.... In reality more simple than putting together a shortwave ham radio transceiver of the early 70's. In those days you had to wire and solder every component on top of a single layer pcb and point to point wiring between sub-assemblies.

 

Intimidated by the fact of not having kept myself with the progress of computer technology during the last two or three years, until last Thursday I was decided to go with a ready made Intel based unit. Then last minute, after some very frustrating conversations with some Intel dealers, packagers or assembler, I switched to AMD based on a non-technical issue. The bottom line for me, no Intel dealer is going to hold our small business hostage to their price fixing strategies. I have had it....! I talked with many of these dealers and basically they think they have a handle on a hot new processor (Xeon 3.6ghz) and they are speculating to increase profits. Further more, most of their sales people don't even understand what people doing 3D need on their systems.

 

Now curiosity is getting to me and tomorrow we will start researching to build a a Xeon based box. However, I am almost sure of the outcome.... There is not enough difference in speed to justify the 30% to 40% more money these dealers or computer packagers want for their boxes. Our average guy is clever enough to put these machines together. Assembling one of these units it is more simple than learning Viz or Lightscape. If our guys have the patience to read and follow the instructions in any of these 3D graphic software packages, they can too read and follow the instructions to put a machine together.

 

My 20 year old daughter is working with us on a partime basis, she and my 6.5 year old son have witnessed how we put the whole thing together. Today I got a kick, we visited Frys Electronic to look into all these heat dissipation systems, my little son who has been following us for 4 days was very clear in stating his opinions about heat disipation. By the way he thinks we just should change the motherboard to a Tyan board in order to have the additional space needed to fit the pipe coolers.

 

Many years ago when I was about 8 years old I saw an old ham radio operator neighbor of ours putting one of the early single side band trasmitters together. I was just so impresed with the whole 3 months saga that I becamed a licensed ham radio operator when I was 10 years old. Both my daughter and my son play with the computers...... My daughter has been doing 3D's for quite a while she is good. She is an artist since an early age and in college she is doing a degree in fine arts. She can do 3D on the computer but she can also do them on the canvas with oleo paints... She is not highly technical, However I think that both my little son and my daughter can probably put the next box together... Will see....! Hi Hi

 

Like all the people on my age bracket, I was a true believer of Intel. This has been a very interesting learning experience. There is a million different opinions. This machine is fast, fast, fast fast and for less, less, less, less money than a ready made box by any of the big guys.

 

The end of 3 day saga.....!!!!

Thanks...... Roger and Out....

 

Elliot

[bigcahunak]

Elliot

Raid 0 strips your data to two drives that looks like one. So, with 2x74GB HDDs set @ raid 0 you get what looks like a single 148GB single drive. What sets it apart from a single drive is the fact that instead of reading/writing every 1mb of data from a single location it does half of it from two different places on a different channel (cable) and that saves time. Its like paying $50 for a guy to wash both your cars, while he splits it with another friend who helps him, and they finish it twice as fast. To sum it up - on raid 0 you dont lose any potential storage place, you gain speed, have no mirroring for backup, but you take a risk of losing everuthing if any of the HDDs fail.

Temperatures, see if your motherboard supported by "motherboard monitor" http://mbm.livewiredev.com (click on motherboard list in the navbar). If it does - get it. Most times its a much better util than the one motherboard manufacturers provide.

Good luck.

 

*edit*

Elliot, as I mentioned before... both SCSI and raid (any raid) will add performance for your machine but you wont be able to tell untill you use it. And, the only way you would is by non compressed video editing. I dont do any editing, so I got rid of my raid configuration (was a fun ride) saved space, money and the risk.

[Elliot]

Itzik,

 

Thanks again for the response. I definitely have something wrong here. I put the LSI Ultra 320 Controller card and it doesn't want to recgonize my drives. Then I put an Adaptec that was working in one of the computers. However, when I put on the new box is shows two drives as being connected.

 

I checked earlier on the Motherboard Monitor. Everytime I bring it up it shuts down my machine. It looks like the program is set for a lower temp and will turn the box off. It just happens so quickly that I can't get the menu to investigate. The MSI motherboard has utility to read temperature out of sensor diode located in the board.

 

I will check the SSCI issues later on today..... It is 2:35 am here in Atlanta and I am going down.

 

If I can fix the problem.... and if this machine gets any faster it may blow up....Hi Hi.

 

Thanks

Elliot