Which of these CPUs is most productive?
 

Hello,

I'm thinking of upgrading the CPU on my main PC, and I'm keeping an eye to the various candidates' potential contributions to GIMPS.

I currently have the Pentium Dual CPU E2200. Which of the first three processors on this chart ([URL="http://ark.intel.com/Compare.aspx?ids=42811,41495,33911,37251,33925"]http://ark.intel.com/Compare.aspx?ids=42811,41495,33911,37251,33925,[/URL]) would be the most productive in terms of LL work? I found GIMPS throughput data for some but not others.

The first thing one looks at when comparing is the clock speed, of course, but I know that other factors are involved. So (for instance) is it better to go with the 3.33GHz chip that has a 2MB cache, or the 3.06GHz chip with a 3MB L2 cache? How about the 3.16GHz CPU, nominally slower than the first one but with a 6MB cache and a 1333MHz system bus? I'm not sure how to weigh these various factors against each other.

Thanks for any insight you might provide!

Rodrigo

Probably the one with 6MB cache would be best suited for GIMPS work. LL tests of the size GIMPS generally does are highly cache-bound, so I would expect the significantly extra cache of the 3.16GHz CPU to outweigh the faster clock speeds of the 3.3Ghz.

I'm not sure exactly what effect system bus speed has on LL tests, but at the very least can imagine that more is better in this case. :smile: So the 3.16Ghz CPU definitely sounds like the way to go.

Note that the E8500 currently costs $200 on Newegg, the E7600 $150, and the E6800 $100. For just $100 more than the cost of the E8500, you can build an entire new system based on an AMD Athlon II X4, which, depending on which Core 2 you're comparing it to, could be a little faster or a little slower per-core, but regardless of that, would give you a lot more crunching power because of the two additional cores. (I actually put together such an example system for a friend just yesterday...if you'd like I can post the specs. You can also switch out the X4 for an X3 or X2 in the same configuration, which subtracts about $20 per core sacrificed.)

mdettweiler,

I'd be curious to see the specs on the system you built!

My thinking was in terms of upgrading the CPU, but I'm *almost* at the point where I could try building a PC, and you just might tip me over the edge.

Thanks much for the info on the three chips -- that was very helpful.

Rodrigo

Okay, here's the specs:
[quote]
Processor:
AMD Athlon II X2 240 Regor 2.8GHz 2 x 1MB L2 Cache Socket AM3 65W Dual-Core Processor ADX240OCGQBOX
[URL]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103688[/URL] - $56.99
OR
AMD Athlon II X3 445 Rana 3.1GHz 3 x 512KB L2 Cache Socket AM3 95W Triple-Core Desktop Processor ADX445WFGMBOX
[URL]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103872[/URL] - $77.00
OR
AMD Athlon II X4 635 Propus 2.9GHz 4 x 512KB L2 Cache Socket AM3 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor ADX635WFGIBOX
[URL]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103702[/URL] - $97.99

Motherboard:
BIOSTAR A880G+ AM3 AMD 880G HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
[URL]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138283[/URL] - $54.99

RAM:
GeIL Value PLUS 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10660) Desktop Memory Model GVP34GB1333C9DC
[URL]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820144478[/URL] - $39.99

Hard Drive:
SAMSUNG Spinpoint F4 HD322GJ/U 320GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
[URL]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822152244[/URL] - $42.99

DVD Burner:
LG Black 24X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 16X DVD+R DL 24X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 12X DVD-RAM 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-R 32X CD-RW 48X CD-ROM SATA DVD Burner - Bulk - OEM
[URL]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136177[/URL] - $19.99

Case:
Xigmatek ASGARD II B/O CPC-T45UE-U01 Black / Orange 0.8 mm SECC / Aluminum and Aluminum Mesh Bezel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
[URL]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811815006[/URL] - $29.99

Power Supply:
Linkworld Linkpower ATX-550 LPG12-35-p4 550W ATX 12V REV. 2.01 Power Supply I-7 ready
[URL]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817165041[/URL] - $26.99

----------------------------------
Price with X2 CPU: $271.93
Price with X3 CPU: $291.94
Price with X4 CPU: $312.93

subtract $20 for 2GB RAM
subtract $8 for 160GB hard drive[/quote]The components were chosen to optimize crunching value, yet also for the system to be suitable for everyday use. If it's to be a dedicated crunching machine, you could save $20 by going with 2GB of RAM (though the 4GB could come in handy for P-1 jobs), and another $8 by going with a 160GB hard drive (the cheapest available on Newegg at this time) since a dedicated cruncher doesn't need much hard drive space.

Note also that this configuration is fully GPU-ready: the 550W power supply should be able to handle a GTX 460 pretty well. (This power supply is actually a pretty good deal...you'd only save a few bucks by going with a 400W or 300W. Normally I would be hesitant to recommend such a cheap PSU, but I've had good results with this brand before.)

flash drives
 

I use flash drives rather than hard drives for my dedicated chrunchers, usually a 4 gig is plenty of storage for operating system and data.

:cool:

[QUOTE=mdettweiler;246179]
The components were chosen to optimize crunching value, yet also for the system to be suitable for everyday use. If it's to be a dedicated crunching machine, you could save $20 by going with 2GB of RAM (though the 4GB could come in handy for P-1 jobs), and another $8 by going with a 160GB hard drive (the cheapest available on Newegg at this time) since a dedicated cruncher doesn't need much hard drive space.

Note also that this configuration is fully GPU-ready: the 550W power supply should be able to handle a GTX 460 pretty well. (This power supply is actually a pretty good deal...you'd only save a few bucks by going with a 400W or 300W. Normally I would be hesitant to recommend such a cheap PSU, but I've had good results with this brand before.)[/QUOTE]
mdettweiler,

That is fabulous! I'm tempted to try building my own system. We've been thinking of buying a PC to serve as a DVR ("home theater PC"), and the computer you describe would fit the bill nicely. (Except that I would get a bigger hard drive.) You don't think that running Prime95 surreptitiously alongside the TV tuner and recording functions :wink: would affect performance noticeably, do you?

What OS did you put on it?

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Harvey563;246392]I use flash drives rather than hard drives for my dedicated chrunchers, usually a 4 gig is plenty of storage for operating system and data.

:cool:[/QUOTE]
Harvey,

When you say flash drive, do you mean a solid state drive (SSD), or an actual USB thumb drive? And if it's a thumb drive, if not OS or data then what do you do with (or put on) the hard disk?

I'd be curious to see the specs on this system!

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;246410]mdettweiler,

That is fabulous! I'm tempted to try building my own system. We've been thinking of buying a PC to serve as a DVR ("home theater PC"), and the computer you describe would fit the bill nicely. (Except that I would get a bigger hard drive.) You don't think that running Prime95 surreptitiously alongside the TV tuner and recording functions :wink: would affect performance noticeably, do you?

What OS did you put on it?

Rodrigo[/QUOTE]
I would expect Prime95 to not have any deleterious effect on system performance. Particularly as long as the machine has a dedicated GPU of some sort (which you'd probably want for a home theater PC), Prime95 shouldn't be a problem even under heavy multimedia use.

One thing I forgot to mention earlier is that for about $100 more, you can get a Phenom II X6 CPU (the 1055T is the cheapest, though for just a bit more you can get its more upscale cousins with progressively higher clock speed). Right now, the X6's are really the best "bang for the buck" out there when it comes to crunching power. The only reason why I didn't include it in the above listing is because my goal was to see "how cheap can you build a decent PC for?". If the extra $100 is within your price range, I would definitely swap out the X4 for an X6 (it will also work with the same configuration) considering how much additional power you get.

Regarding OS, FYI I didn't actually build this machine (or even buy any of the parts); I put it together as an entirely hypothetical exercise. :smile: So I didn't give much consideration to the OS. For a dedicated crunching machine, I would recommend Linux (Ubuntu is a good, easy distribution if you're not too familiar with Linux); but for a home theater PC you'd want to go with Windows 7, probably Home Premium version. And, of course, whatever the OS, definitely get a 64-bit version, as nowadays those can do anything a 32-bit version can and they're rather faster on TF (a little faster on LL-like work too, IIRC, though not as much so).

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;246413]Harvey,

When you say flash drive, do you mean a solid state drive (SSD), or an actual USB thumb drive? And if it's a thumb drive, if not OS or data then what do you do with (or put on) the hard disk?

I'd be curious to see the specs on this system!

Rodrigo[/QUOTE]
I'd guess an SSD. Taking a quick look at Newegg, I see that you can get an [url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820139427]8GB SSD[/url] for about the same price as the hard drive in my hypothetical configuration--for a dedicated cruncher, that would definitely be the way to go. (Same price, but MUCH faster, and a dedicated cruncher doesn't need much space.)

Note that most of the cheaper SSDs available have a 2.5" form factor, rather than the standard 3.5" that desktop hard drives usually have, so that they can fit in laptops as well. You'd need to get spacers (you can probably pick them up from your local computer store very cheaply) to fit them into a desktop chassis. The cable connections, though, should be compatible since it's SATA. (If it was IDE, you'd need an adapter as laptops use a different kind of IDE interface.)

[QUOTE=mdettweiler;246414]I would expect Prime95 to not have any deleterious effect on system performance. Particularly as long as the machine has a dedicated GPU of some sort (which you'd probably want for a home theater PC), Prime95 shouldn't be a problem even under heavy multimedia use.

One thing I forgot to mention earlier is that for about $100 more, you can get a Phenom II X6 CPU (the 1055T is the cheapest, though for just a bit more you can get its more upscale cousins with progressively higher clock speed). Right now, the X6's are really the best "bang for the buck" out there when it comes to crunching power. The only reason why I didn't include it in the above listing is because my goal was to see "how cheap can you build a decent PC for?". If the extra $100 is within your price range, I would definitely swap out the X4 for an X6 (it will also work with the same configuration) considering how much additional power you get.

Regarding OS, FYI I didn't actually build this machine (or even buy any of the parts); I put it together as an entirely hypothetical exercise. :smile: So I didn't give much consideration to the OS. For a dedicated crunching machine, I would recommend Linux (Ubuntu is a good, easy distribution if you're not too familiar with Linux); but for a home theater PC you'd want to go with Windows 7, probably Home Premium version. And, of course, whatever the OS, definitely get a 64-bit version, as nowadays those can do anything a 32-bit version can and they're rather faster on TF (a little faster on LL-like work too, IIRC, though not as much so).[/QUOTE]
Thanks mdettweiler, you've given me a lot to chew on... plus a fun long session browsing on Newegg! :smile:

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;246413]When you say flash drive, do you mean a solid state drive (SSD), or an actual USB thumb drive? And if it's a thumb drive, if not OS or data then what do you do with (or put on) the hard disk?[/QUOTE]A USB thumb drive. Most modern BIOS'es can boot from the thumb. They are way cheaper than a mechanical and use less power. If the machine is networked the critical data can be backed up easy. If you can boot from LAN, then you don't need that either. PrimeMonster used to boot a *nix from LAN and ran it from a RAM drive. Each node had a spot on the server's HDD for data storage.

[QUOTE=mdettweiler;246416]I'd guess an SSD. Taking a quick look at Newegg, I see that you can get an [URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820139427"]8GB SSD[/URL] for about the same price as the hard drive in my hypothetical configuration--for a dedicated cruncher, that would definitely be the way to go. (Same price, but MUCH faster, and a dedicated cruncher doesn't need much space.)
[/QUOTE]
Wow, I did not realize that SSD's came in such tiny sizes. And presumably the OS would have to be a small Linux version rather than Windows. (OK, maybe Windows 98.)

A quick question -- how does using an SSD speed up crunching? Maybe I've got it wrong, but I thought that the drive is involved only every so often as Prime95 saves the last X minutes' worth of work.

Thanks again!

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;246423]Wow, I did not realize that SSD's came in such tiny sizes. And presumably the OS would have to be a small Linux version rather than Windows. (OK, maybe Windows 98.)

A quick question -- how does using an SSD speed up crunching? Maybe I've got it wrong, but I thought that the drive is involved only every so often as Prime95 saves the last X minutes' worth of work.

Thanks again!

Rodrigo[/QUOTE]
8 GB should actually be plenty for most modern Linux distributions; even Windows 7 should be able to fit (I have a Windows 7 Enterprise trial version installed on a virtual machine and it only takes up ~5.5 GB).

The main advantage of SSDs is that they speed up the boot process, which is very disk-bound. For this reason, people will sometimes put their operating system and programs on an SSD (if you're going to use it for programs, you'd want at least a 16GB), and put their data on a much larger hard drive. The difference as far as crunching speed goes would be nominal, but it would make general operation of the system MUCH faster.

[QUOTE=Uncwilly;246422]A USB thumb drive. Most modern BIOS'es can boot from the thumb. They are way cheaper than a mechanical and use less power. If the machine is networked the critical data can be backed up easy. If you can boot from LAN, then you don't need that either. PrimeMonster used to boot a *nix from LAN and ran it from a RAM drive. Each node had a spot on the server's HDD for data storage.[/QUOTE]
Uncwilly,

So, until we hear back from Harvey, would it be reasonable to guess that he has a nearly bare-bones system (CPU + RAM and no HDD, floppy, or optical drive) used solely for crunching? That would be kinda neat.

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;246423]A quick question -- how does using an SSD speed up crunching? Maybe I've got it wrong, but I thought that the drive is involved only every so often as Prime95 saves the last X minutes' worth of work.[/QUOTE][QUOTE=mdettweiler;246425]The main advantage of SSDs is that they speed up the boot process, which is very disk-bound.[/QUOTE]The main advantage of using a USB drive is that one can get a 3 pack of 4GB for ~$15, out the door (after taxes, etc.) That is certainly cheaper than one can buy an SSD or HDD. More crunching bang per $. Why pay for a case if you don't need one, or a keyboard, mouse, display, optical drive, etc.? GHz/days per $ can be influenced heavily by cutting the $ per node. Use linux not Win, save enough to buy another node after building about 6.

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;246427]So, until we hear back from Harvey, would it be reasonable to guess that he has a nearly bare-bones system (CPU + RAM and no HDD, floppy, or optical drive) used solely for crunching?[/QUOTE]It is quite common. I was trying to dig up the link to some monsters/farms.

[QUOTE=mdettweiler;246425]8 GB should actually be plenty for most modern Linux distributions; even Windows 7 should be able to fit (I have a Windows 7 Enterprise trial version installed on a virtual machine and it only takes up ~5.5 GB).
[/QUOTE]
mdettweiler,

I guess that the Windows bloat isn't as great as I'd thought. It's good to know that you can actually run a current MS system on a thumb drive.

Learned a lot tonight, thank you!

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Uncwilly;246431]The main advantage of using a USB drive is that one can get a 3 pack of 4GB for ~$15, out the door (after taxes, etc.) That is certainly cheaper than one can buy an SSD or HDD. More crunching bang per $. Why pay for a case if you don't need one, or a keyboard, mouse, display, optical drive, etc.? GHz/days per $ can be influenced heavily by cutting the $ per node. Use linux not Win, save enough to buy another node after building about 6.

It is quite common. I was trying to dig up the link to some monsters/farms.[/QUOTE]
Uncwilly,

Hmm, this is a new concept for me. So then these computers run off a LAN? Without a display, a mouse, or even a keyboard (and not even a case?!), I can't imagine how else one would input commands or even know what they're up to at a given moment.

Rodrigo

Here is a link to an old project that someone did.
[URL="http://web.archive.org/web/20030622100933/http://ws9.jobnegotiator.com/index.html"]http://web.archive.org/web/20030622100933/http://ws9.jobnegotiator.com/index.html[/URL]

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;246433]Uncwilly,

Hmm, this is a new concept for me. So then these computers run off a LAN? Without a display, a mouse, or even a keyboard (and not even a case?!), I can't imagine how else one would input commands or even know what they're up to at a given moment.

Rodrigo[/QUOTE]
Generally, such a rig is controlled remotely (usually by SSH if it's running Linux, which is usually the case).

The OS could be booted from either a USB drive or from the LAN. With a USB drive, it would be like a live CD setup, except customized such that it automatically starts up with the appropriate computer name and (possibly) automatically starts prime-crunching clients as appropriate. A LAN netboot is more complex: you'd need to set up a netboot server somewhere on your network (a "real" computer with special server software running on it) which would keep stored OS images, again in the same vein as a customized live CD. The individual nodes' BIOSes would be configured to boot off the network, i.e. the first thing they do when they power up is start searching the network for a compatible netboot server. When one is found, the node downloads the OS image from it, boots up, and runs whatever programs the image is configured to load at startup. (Again, these could be accessed remotely by SSH if any direct configuration is needed.)

A netboot setup is probably only worthwhile if you have a lot of dedicated crunching nodes, due to the complexity of the setup. Probably a better bet for the more casual cruncher is to go the route of a bootable USB drive.

Note that even with a dedicated crunching box, you may want to have an actual disk (SSD or hard drive) to give added flexibility. For instance, a friend of mine on this forum has a "small" farm of 10 dedicated crunching machines, which I consulted on the setup of. Since he's not too particularly tech-savvy, we ended up forgoing the more exotic possibilities (netboot, USB, etc.) and built complete, but nonetheless Spartan computers. Each box has a CD drive, hard drive, and case, but we picked the cheapest ones availalble at the time. From there, we could have still made the boxes headless (no monitor/keyboard/mouse) but he wasn't comfortable with going all-command-line so we ended up installing Ubuntu Desktop. He has them all in his basement with three or four monitors shared between a few boxes each via KVM switches.

In my friend's case, we've sometimes put the computers to dual use as servers for the prime search project we co-admin ([url=http://www.mersenneforum.org/forumdisplay.php?f=82]No Prime Left Behind[/url], in the Prime Search Projects section of the forum) in addition to crunching. (Last year he got another box with slightly higher-grade parts and a larger hard drive to serve as a dedicated server; nonetheless it still crunches on 3 of its 4 cores on the side. :smile:) He's also used the boxes at various times to back up files from some of his other computers. This flexibility wouldn't have been possible if the boxes didn't have disk drives (though to some degree it might have worked with USB drives if they were large enough).

If you want a GUI, you can set all the computers up using a monitor, keyboard and mouse, but then unplug them when you're done. This way the machines don't take up a huge amount of room, and you don't need to buy lots of monitors, keyboards and mice. All they should need is power and a network cable (I GREATLY prefer wired over wireless).

Then you can VNC into them from your main desktop PC. There are lots of VNC applications, many of them free and open source, they work on all kinds of different platforms so you can VNC into a Linux box from a Windows PC no problem.

VNC allows you to see what would be on their screen, if they had one attached (or even if they do have one attached but you're too lazy to go there :big grin:).

From my experience - if you start a linux box without monitor attached then you won't be able to use VNC. I have found solution [URL="http://www.nomachine.com/download.php"]here[/URL].

usb drives, etc
 

Sorry to take so long to get back to the thread. I just use a regular thumb drive loaded with linux. No hard drives, no SSDs. I just use kvm switches to slave multiple machines to one monitor and keyboard, which is easier than networking, although not as elegant.

:grin:

[QUOTE=lavalamp;246493]If you want a GUI, you can set all the computers up using a monitor, keyboard and mouse, but then unplug them when you're done. This way the machines don't take up a huge amount of room, and you don't need to buy lots of monitors, keyboards and mice. All they should need is power and a network cable (I GREATLY prefer wired over wireless).

Then you can VNC into them from your main desktop PC. There are lots of VNC applications, many of them free and open source, they work on all kinds of different platforms so you can VNC into a Linux box from a Windows PC no problem.

VNC allows you to see what would be on their screen, if they had one attached (or even if they do have one attached but you're too lazy to go there :big grin:).[/QUOTE]
Yeah, this is kind of what my friend does. He has VNC set up on all the machines to access them while he's out of town (as he goes on frequent business trips). However, while in town, he generally uses the consoles--probably since they're faster and, after all, they're just downstairs. From what I understand, he thusfar has had plenty of room in his basement and hasn't had much need to conserve space, so having three or four old CRTs laying around hasn't been a problem.

Nonetheless, indeed, you can do a lot with VNC...I access his machines on a regular basis from halfway across the U.S. and while it's a little slow, it's not too bad. What we do is have one machine (the server box) which is exposed to the internet via SSH, and all VNC access is tunneled through SSH to the server. (I wrote up a script for my friend so that he can do this easily without having to type any of the tunneling commands.)

[QUOTE=mdettweiler;246425]8 GB should actually be plenty for most modern Linux distributions; even Windows 7 should be able to fit (I have a Windows 7 Enterprise trial version installed on a virtual machine and it only takes up ~5.5 GB).[/QUOTE]
That's small. Have updates etc been installed? My windows directory alone is 17 GB. Unless you are putting program files on another drive I wouldn't suggest getting even a 80GB drive for a well used pc. 80GB should do a cruncher 40GB would be pushing it for even a cruncher. I currently am using 72 GB out of 100 GB partition. I ran out of space on a 80 GB partition cleaned it up and expanded it recently. I have ubuntu on that disk as well.

[QUOTE=henryzz;246604]That's small. Have updates etc been installed? My windows directory alone is 17 GB. Unless you are putting program files on another drive I wouldn't suggest getting even a 80GB drive for a well used pc. 80GB should do a cruncher 40GB would be pushing it for even a cruncher. I currently am using 72 GB out of 100 GB partition. I ran out of space on a 80 GB partition cleaned it up and expanded it recently. I have ubuntu on that disk as well.[/QUOTE]
Hmm, I see. My virtual machine is pretty much brand-new (with some Windows updates installed I believe, but no additional programs). I didn't realize Windows updates made the Windows directory grow in size...I always assumed they just replaced whatever part they were fixing. (Though I suppose it makes sense that all their installers are being kept around somewhere, in case they need to be uninstalled.)

Agreed, though, that 8 GB would be very small for Windows 7. It probably [i]could[/i] work in a pinch, but would run into problems quickly. 8 GB should, however, be plenty for Ubuntu or most other Linux distributions if you're not planning to install many programs (like on a crunching box).

You want small? Try minix...but someone like me will need to get the USB drive boot part working...and do the Prime95 port....you can't buy a drive that won't swallow it..

[QUOTE=mdettweiler;246438]Note that even with a dedicated crunching box, you may want to have an actual disk (SSD or hard drive) to give added flexibility. For instance, a friend of mine on this forum has a "small" farm of 10 dedicated crunching machines, which I consulted on the setup of. Since he's not too particularly tech-savvy, we ended up forgoing the more exotic possibilities (netboot, USB, etc.) and built complete, but nonetheless Spartan computers. Each box has a CD drive, hard drive, and case, but we picked the cheapest ones availalble at the time. From there, we could have still made the boxes headless (no monitor/keyboard/mouse) but he wasn't comfortable with going all-command-line so we ended up installing Ubuntu Desktop. He has them all in his basement with three or four monitors shared between a few boxes each via KVM switches.
[/QUOTE]

mdettweiler,

Consider my mind officially blown. It's amazing what one can do with computers after mixing inventiveness with knowledge.

Here I am thinking about putting together a home powerline network (a notion that already makes my friends' eyes glaze over) so that we can work out in the gym while watching a show that was recorded in the family room... and then I hear about the setup you created, which is more exotic by a degree of magnitude. :exclaim:

Fabulous!

Rodrigo

I worked a bit on OFDM powerline chips some years back....now you can find them in Best buy, all packaged up and ready to go....I like the KVM solution, being really straightforward.

Mdettweiler...Can you consult on the best CPU (not quite headless; I'll browse and stuff on it) for between $500 and a Grand or so? I'm going to buy a pre-working system, newish, and put it to work on Prime95 and possibly NSF@home. I know that I can get a Core Quad for that price...wondering if Phenom II x6 is better...

[QUOTE=Christenson;246909]Mdettweiler...Can you consult on the best CPU (not quite headless; I'll browse and stuff on it) for between $500 and a Grand or so? I'm going to buy a pre-working system, newish, and put it to work on Prime95 and possibly NSF@home. I know that I can get a Core Quad for that price...wondering if Phenom II x6 is better...[/QUOTE]
Hmm...not much available in the $500-$1000 range* any more (since most CPUs have dropped in price to below that point) though if cost isn't a big limiting factor, the i7-970 and i7-980X would be the most powerful CPUs you can get right now. They've got 6 cores (with hyperthreading) and are faster per-core than the fastest AMD X6--though at a price ([URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115066"]$899[/URL] and [URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115223"]$999[/URL] respectively).

However, for only a small performance hit, you can get a top-of-the-line AMD X6 (the [URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103913"]1100T[/URL]) for just $269. At that price, you can get two or maybe even three machines for the price of one Intel. That may or may not be an option in your case (if, say, you only have space for and/or can afford the power costs of one machine), but it's worth considering even if you're only getting one machine since it will save you a LOT of money.

Another possibility to consider is the new Intel Sandy Bridge CPUs, but note that they aren't available in 6-core models yet, and even at 25% faster per-core than a previous-generation i7 (that seems to be the amount of speedup people are getting on Prime95), you get 4*.25=1 additional core equivalent--which while close, is still not quite enough to top the total computational power of an AMD X6.

*Note: I'm assuming here that you mean for the [I]CPU[/I] to cost between $500-$1000. Did you by chance mean you're looking to spend that much on the entire system (not just the CPU)? If so, then you'll definitely want to go with the X6--no contest since the only Intels that can compete in terms of total computational power are the i7 6-cores, which as mentioned above cost at least $900 in and of themselves.

Christenson, I'm not mdettweiler, but here are two systems, one Sandy Bridge Intel and one 6 core AMD, only the CPUs and motherboards differ and they both have the exact same price, $510.93 before tax and shipping.

I have included a hard drive, but not a DVD drive. You can install windows 7, and a lot of Linux distro's too I believe, from a USB pen drive. Or if you have a DVD drive to spare, you could temporarily hook it up to install the OS. Or just add a DVD drive to the parts list, but I was trying to keep the cost down while keeping the highest performing system.

[code][color=blue][b]Intel:[/b][/color]
[url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115074]Intel Core i5-2400 Sandy Bridge 3.1GHz (3.4GHz Turbo Boost) 4 x 256KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor BX80623I52400[/url]
$194.99

[url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128459]GIGABYTE GA-H67M-D2 LGA 1155 Intel H67 SATA 6Gb/s Micro ATX Intel Motherboard[/url]
$94.99


[color=green][b]AMD:[/b][/color]
[url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103849]AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition Thuban 3.2GHz 6 x 512KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache Socket AM3 125W Six-Core Desktop Processor HDT90ZFBGRBOX[/url]
$229.99

[url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157199]ASRock 880GM-LE AM3 AMD 880G Micro ATX AMD Motherboard[/url]
$59.99


[color=black][b]Rest of system:[/b][/color]
[url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820144477]GeIL Value PLUS 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model GVP38GB1600C9DC[/url]
$98.99

[url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103065]COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 Plus RR-B10-212P-G1 "Heatpipe Direct Contact" Long Life Sleeve 120mm CPU Cooler Compatible Intel Core i5 & Intel Core i7[/url]
$29.99

[url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151077]SeaSonic SS-350ET Bronze 350W ATX12V V2.31 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply - OEM[/url]
$42.99

[url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811147111]Rosewill R102-P-BK 120mm Fan MicroATX Mid Tower Computer Case[/url]
$29.99

[url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136813]Western Digital AV RFHWD1600AVBS 160GB 7200 RPM 2MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal AV Hard Drive -Bare Drive[/url]
$18.99[/code]

Key points:[list][*] Brand new quad core from Intel (without hyperthreading) vs. high end hex core from AMD. Personally I don't think there's much in it, so I'd probably go with the Intel. Note that the AMD has an unlocked multiplier, so it has more freedom to overclock.[*] PS/2 keyboard AND mouse inputs, as well as VGA output. Deliberately picked motherboards with these antiquated ports on since most KVM switches still use PS/2 and VGA, the USB + DVI KVM switches seem to cost a lot more.[*] 8 GB of RAM in case you want to do RAM heavy stuff, can drop this to 4 GB, 2 GB or even 1 GB to save some more money if it's not needed.[*] Beefy aftermarket CPU cooler to cool whichever system is under it, supports sockets AM3 and LGA 1155.[*] 350 W Seasonic 80 Plus PSU, good brand but a little weak if you want to be adding a graphics card for crunching too. Think about moving to 500 W if you will be.[*] Dirt cheap POS case, not exactly robust, but great for a compute box that is basically left alone all the time.[*] Cheapest SATA HDD on Newegg, MUCH larger capacity than needed, but who cares?[/list]Finally, since you seem to have a grand to blow, why not get them both and you can give us a full comparison? :wink:

Note, overclocking Sandy Bridge CPUs with the base clock is not possible. Instead you must use the CPU multiplier, which means you need a chip that isn't locked. These are denoted by the letter K, and the cheapest is the i5-2500K for $30 more than the i5-2400 in the parts list above.

Unfortunately there are some knock on effects then. It's not all bad news, I actually found some cheaper parts, but I'll spare you the details, here is an updated parts list:

[code][COLOR=blue][B]Intel:[/B][/COLOR]
[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115074"]Intel Core i5-2400 Sandy Bridge 3.1GHz (3.4GHz Turbo Boost) 4 x 256KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor BX80623I52400[/URL]
$194.99

[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128459"]GIGABYTE GA-H67M-D2 LGA 1155 Intel H67 SATA 6Gb/s Micro ATX Intel Motherboard[/URL]
$94.99


[COLOR=blue][B]Overclockable Intel:[/B][/COLOR]
[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115072"]Intel Core i5-2500K Sandy Bridge 3.3GHz (3.7GHz Turbo Boost) 4 x 256KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor BX80623I52500K[/URL]
$224.99

[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157222"]ASRock P67 PRO3 LGA 1155 Intel P67 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard[/URL]
$123.99

[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103065"]COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 Plus RR-B10-212P-G1 "Heatpipe Direct Contact" Long Life Sleeve 120mm CPU Cooler Compatible Intel Core i5 & Intel Core i7[/URL]
$29.99

[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150498"]XFX PVT86SWHLG GeForce 8400 GS 256MB 64-bit DDR2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Video Card[/URL]
$24.99


[COLOR=green][B]AMD:[/B][/COLOR]
[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103849"]AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition Thuban 3.2GHz 6 x 512KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache Socket AM3 125W Six-Core Desktop Processor HDT90ZFBGRBOX[/URL]
$229.99

[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157199"]ASRock 880GM-LE AM3 AMD 880G Micro ATX AMD Motherboard[/URL]
$59.99

[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103065"]COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 Plus RR-B10-212P-G1 "Heatpipe Direct Contact" Long Life Sleeve 120mm CPU Cooler Compatible Intel Core i5 & Intel Core i7[/URL]
$29.99


[COLOR=black][B]Rest of system:[/B][/COLOR]
[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820144477"]GeIL Value PLUS 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model GVP38GB1600C9DC[/URL]
$98.99

[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371033"]Antec EarthWatts Green EA-380D Green 380W Continuous power ATX12V v2.3 / EPS12V 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply[/URL]
$39.99

[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811233067"]GIGABYTE GZ-KF03B Black SGCC ATX Mid Tower Computer Case[/URL]
$19.99

[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136813"]Western Digital AV RFHWD1600AVBS 160GB 7200 RPM 2MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal AV Hard Drive -Bare Drive[/URL]
$18.99[/code]Prices:
Intel system $467.94
Overclockable Intel system $581.92
AMD system $497.93

Changelog:[LIST][*] Basic Intel system relies on stock cooler, since it can't be overclocked, may as well save money and stick with it.[*] Overclockable Intel system requires a discrete graphics card since it does not have onboard graphics.[*] Cheaper, but still good brand and 80 Plus, PSU on the list.[*] Cheaper case, and it supports full ATX motherboards too.[/LIST]It's a shame that Intel now want to force you to pay more for overclocking, especially when overclocking is supposed to bring extra performance for free. However, overclocking itself should be easier, since everything has it's own separate multiplier and the motherboard has little, if any, effect.

The CPU on the parts list for the AMD system is also an unlocked chip, however there are two other 6 core chips that are $30 and $50 cheaper that are locked. If you want to save money by switching to those, you will still be able to overclock them by adjusting the FSB, it'll just be harder.

lavalamp,

Great rundown. Thanks for gathering up the parts info.

I looked up the AMD six-cores. I didn't know about the overclocking capability (or lack of it), but FWIW besides the price they also seem to have different clock speeds (3.2/3.0/2.8 GHz). I'm not sure how much of a difference that would make for the purposes of GIMPS.

One question: When setting out to build one's own computer, is there a trick to matching up the motherboard with the case, or is it a case (sorry) of any mobo working with any case, so long as you have the right sizes (ATX, micro ATX, and so on)?

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;247012]One question: When setting out to build one's own computer, is there a trick to matching up the motherboard with the case, or is it a case (sorry) of any mobo working with any case, so long as you have the right sizes (ATX, micro ATX, and so on)?[/QUOTE]

The mobo and other components fitting is the main requirement for choosing a case. Secondary requirements are what USB/audio ports it may have on the front, how it looks, etc., nothing else too closely related to the mobo (unless you consider case as case+power supply, a common bundle; in that case, you're really asking about the power supply).

Basically, you pick the motherboard you want first, then you worry about a case. If you pick a μATX motherboard then you have the option of also picking a smaller case. You can pick the case first of course, but if you pick a small one it limits your choice of components.

For desktops the main two motherboard form factors you're likely to run into are ATX and Micro ATX (aka μATX or uATX). If a case is large enough to accomodate an ATX motherboard, it can also accomodate a μATX motherboard, and they share many of the same mounting points. The reverse is not necessarily true though.

μATX boards have three fewer expansion slots on the bottom, so they are physically shorter. Some very large cases can also accomodate larger EATX motherboards, but these are generally server or skulltrail boards (the skulltrail platform is essentially a server platform dressed up to appeal to gamers). You can get some non-server/skulltrail motherboards that are EATX, but they are very expensive.

Intel tried to push BTX a while back, it's pretty similar to ATX but with a few tweaks, and it seems to have died now.

There are also many small form factors like mini/nano/pico-ITX, DTX etc. These are pretty small, just a glance at them is enough to see how small, the ports on the back barely fit along the edge. If you're building a system with one of these in then you need to pay a lot more attention to what form factors the case can support.

The power supply can also be a tricky one, you have to make sure you know exactly what power sockets your motherboard has. This is usually a large 24 pin ATX connector, and then either a 4 pin or 8 pin connector near the CPU. Beefy graphics cards also have special power sockets on them, 6 pin, 8 pin, two 6 pin or 6 pin and 8pin are all common configurations. You MUST make sure your power supply has the right plugs for the job and actually has enough overhead to supply the juice.

@Mini-Geek
@lavalamp

It sounds like matching up a motherboard with a case is not as complicated as I'd thought. Thanks for filling me in!

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;247012]I looked up the AMD six-cores. I didn't know about the overclocking capability (or lack of it), but FWIW besides the price they also seem to have different clock speeds (3.2/3.0/2.8 GHz). I'm not sure how much of a difference that would make for the purposes of GIMPS.[/QUOTE]
It can be a little hard to compare clock speed between AMDs and Intels; also, while clock speed definitely does have an effect with GIMPS, cache size is also quite important. So what I did for each CPU I've discussed above is look it (or a similar model if the exact one is not listed) up on the PrimeNet benchmarks site to see how well they do on LL iteration timings.

Unfortunately, there aren't many Sandy Bridge benchmarks up on PrimeNet yet, so it's a little hard to compare there. However, assuming a 25% speed boost over a comparable previous-generation i5 or i7 (respectively), since that's what people have been reporting in other threads, it would still not be enough to make one Sandy Bridge quad equal one Phenom II X6.

Also depends on how much things overclock, if you are going down that route.
(Forgive me if that has been covered, I didn't read all the thread. :smile:)

[QUOTE=mdettweiler;247030]assuming a 25% speed boost over a comparable previous-generation i5 or i7 (respectively), since that's what people have been reporting in other threads, it would still not be enough to make one Sandy Bridge quad equal one Phenom II X6.[/QUOTE]
mdettweiler,

That is truly remarkable -- despite a "new generation" of ballyhooed Sandy Bridge processors, it sounds like AMD still cleans Intel's clock (so to speak) when it comes to GIMPS.

AMD is looking more and more attractive for my next system! I've always had "Intel inside," but it's getting harder to justify it.

We'll see what the upcoming AMD chips have to offer in the way of productivity.

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;247133]That is truly remarkable -- despite a "new generation" of ballyhooed Sandy Bridge processors, it sounds like AMD still cleans Intel's clock (so to speak) when it comes to GIMPS[/QUOTE]

apples-to-oranges. six cores vs 4. and once p95 is rewritten using avx, the performance could potentially double for sandy bridge (although, in practice, you might see another 30% improvement?) -- keep that in mind.

Lava Lamp and Dettweiler, thank you both. I'm at the point of buying my next compute box. I'm not terribly interested in fooling with the overclocking, much more interested in basic reliability and more or less maintenance-free operation.

If I buy a pre-assembled box, I'm thinking the Phenom II x6 is the way to go, with each core doing a worker thread for Prime95. But the pricing on assembling my own box is pretty interesting....but I'm not familiar with how to get Windoesn't onto a new system like this, and am having trouble making a backup hard drive of an old copy of XP at the moment. And if you want two systems under my desk for that grand, I'll want to do it with just one copy of Windoesn't..the other will run Linux once it's up. So, help with getting Windoesn't onto the new system, please....and thanks...

[QUOTE=axn;247136]apples-to-oranges. six cores vs 4. and once p95 is rewritten using avx, the performance could potentially double for sandy bridge (although, in practice, you might see another 30% improvement?) -- keep that in mind.[/QUOTE]
Hmm, interesting...I didn't realize the performance boost from AVX would be quite that much. In that case, the additional 30%*4 cores would end up giving you "another core" (effectively) compared to the AMD, and the Sandy Bridge would beat the X6 by a little bit in terms of overall throughput. (That's assuming the 30% improvement that you estimated...though as you said it could potentially be greater.)

I'd still go with the X6 right now since they would be about the same in the long run, and other applications (not just Prime95) could reap the benefits of the increased throughput as well. But it does look like it will be more of a tossup in the future.

What will be particularly interesting is when AMD's Bulldozer 8-core processors come out...from the way things are shaping up, I'd say there's a fairly good chance that AMD will once again take the lead in overall-throughput-per-$ considerations. The big question will be how cheaply they start them out at, and how quickly the prices drop from release levels. Intel rather interestingly worked the Sandy Bridge processors into its existing i5/i7 price tiering quite seamlessly, such that there was no "initial price spike"--perhaps AMD will do the same to compete.
[QUOTE=Christenson;247138]If I buy a pre-assembled box, I'm thinking the Phenom II x6 is the way to go, with each core doing a worker thread for Prime95. But the pricing on assembling my own box is pretty interesting....but I'm not familiar with how to get Windoesn't onto a new system like this, and am having trouble making a backup hard drive of an old copy of XP at the moment. And if you want two systems under my desk for that grand, I'll want to do it with just one copy of Windoesn't..the other will run Linux once it's up. So, help with getting Windoesn't onto the new system, please....and thanks...[/QUOTE]
Installing Windows on a new system is pretty simple. Just buy the install DVD (you can get an OEM copy on Newegg for [url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116754]$100[/url]), and once you've built/bought the computer, boot it up and pop the disc in the drive. (You'll want to do this quickly, before the BIOS checks the CD drive and finds nothing there...but even if that happens before you get to finish putting in the CD, just turn it off and back on again.) It will boot directly into the installer, which is pretty straightforward.

They actually have a video walkthrough of the install on the Newegg product page I linked to--not sure how useful that would be but it might help.

[QUOTE=Christenson;247138]
If I buy a pre-assembled box, I'm thinking the Phenom II x6 is the way to go, with each core doing a worker thread for Prime95. But the pricing on assembling my own box is pretty interesting....but I'm not familiar with how to get Windoesn't onto a new system like this, and am having trouble making a backup hard drive of an old copy of XP at the moment. And if you want two systems under my desk for that grand, I'll want to do it with just one copy of Windoesn't..the other will run Linux once it's up. So, help with getting Windoesn't onto the new system, please....and thanks...[/QUOTE]
Christenson,

If you don't have an XP installation disc, you might try creating an image of your existing installation for the purpose of porting it to a new HDD. But you also report having trouble making a backup. Do you know what's going on with the drive? Is it a problem with the drive itself? In that case, a program like SpinRite (paid, sorry) [U]might[/U] be able to help you to save the disk, at least for long enough to image it.

These links might also help with installing XP:
[URL]http://ask-leo.com/i_dont_have_an_installation_cd_for_windows_xp_what_if_i_need_one.html[/URL]
[URL]http://www.brighthub.com/computing/windows-platform/articles/50115.aspx[/URL]

Good luck. I agree with you that the AMD Phenom II X6 is looking pretty interesting.

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;247143]Christenson,

If you don't have an XP installation disc, you might try creating an image of your existing installation for the purpose of porting it to a new HDD. But you also report having trouble making a backup. Do you know what's going on with the drive? Is it a problem with the drive itself? In that case, a program like SpinRite (paid, sorry) [U]might[/U] be able to help you to save the disk, at least for long enough to image it.

These links might also help with installing XP:
[URL]http://ask-leo.com/i_dont_have_an_installation_cd_for_windows_xp_what_if_i_need_one.html[/URL]
[URL]http://www.brighthub.com/computing/windows-platform/articles/50115.aspx[/URL]

Good luck. I agree with you that the AMD Phenom II X6 is looking pretty interesting.

Rodrigo[/QUOTE]
Hmm...it seems that those links mainly refer to reinstalling XP on a system that already has it installed when you don't have a CD on hand. The procedure documented therein would not work for a computer with no operating system. (Though it might work if the computer had an earlier version of Windows installed...it might be a little messy but it would still work. Come to think of it, I did something similar when I upgraded a laptop from 98 to 2000 a while back. It worked, but I ended up with a weird same-partion dual-boot setup. :huh:)

As far as copying a drive image of an existing XP setup, that will only work if the new hard drive is to be used in the same computer (or a nearly-identical one): Windows will give a BSOD on bootup if the hard drive controller it's running on is not the one it was intalled with. (In other words, if you have a different model motherboard.)

Christenson, your best bet will probably be to get a new Windows installation CD for the new computer and install that (as I described in my last post). If you have a retail copy of Windows XP sitting around somewhere that's not installed on any computers, you can use its CD and license key to install XP on the new computer. (Note that OEM, i.e. manufacturer-preinstalled, Windows licenses cannot be transferred from the computer they came with, so a reinstall CD for another prebuilt computer will probably not be any good.)

mdettweiler,

Good points all.

We would need more information from Christenson as to his situation in order to provide better guidance. I offered those links in case they were relevant to his circumstances.

No question that the best solution is to buy an XP CD if he doesn't have one already, although I gather that he's trying to limit the expenses on the new builds.

He said that he's trying to back up a hard drive with an old copy of XP, which I'm guessing is how he would like to get that operating system. XP isn't the OS I'm most familiar with, but I have reinstalled Windows 98 fresh onto new hard disks. Win98 has a .CAB file folder with all the installation files: It sounds like that i386 folder with the winnt32.exe file might be the analogous resource for an XP installation, in which case he may be able to copy that and use it.

But of course I could be wrong. (Correct me, please!) Anyway, my idea was that if the situation is that Christenson has XP on a failing hard drive, then he might be able to salvage that installation folder and do a fresh installation off it. Once again, though, we could use more details.

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;247150]
He said that he's trying to back up a hard drive with an old copy of XP, which I'm guessing is how he would like to get that operating system. XP isn't the OS I'm most familiar with, but I have reinstalled Windows 98 fresh onto new hard disks. Win98 has a .CAB file folder with all the installation files: It sounds like that i386 folder with the winnt32.exe file might be the analogous resource for an XP installation, in which case he may be able to copy that and use it.

But of course I could be wrong. (Correct me, please!) Anyway, my idea was that if the situation is that Christenson has XP on a failing hard drive, then he might be able to salvage that installation folder and do a fresh installation off it. Once again, though, we could use more details.[/QUOTE]
Say, I think you're on to something. I was at first thinking that you'd need an existing Windows installation (of some kind, any version should do) from which to launch the winnt32.exe program. That's how I did it on the Win98 laptop I mentioned before to install 2000. However, I recalled this snippet from the first link you posted:
[quote]
To find out if the CD-ROM image is on your machine, search for a folder named I386. There may be several but the one we care about will contain close to 7,000 files, two of which will be winnt.exe and winnt32.exe. The I386 directory is typically one of the top-level directories on the distribution CD-ROM but most importantly it is the directory that contains the distributed copy of Windows XP. Winnt.exe and winnt32.exe are the DOS and protected mode setup programs, respectively. (You'd only need those if you were planning to re-install Windows XP from scratch - I use them here as an easy way to identify that we have the right directory.)[/quote]
He mentions that winnt.exe is the DOS mode setup program for Windows XP. After burning the contents of the i386 directory to a (non-bootable) CD, one could theoretically boot the new computer from a DOS floppy, pop in the CD, and run winnt.exe from the command line. The trick is to get a DOS floppy with CD drive support included; IIRC images for such are available all over the web, so it shouldn't be too hard to obtain. And, of course, the new computer has to have a floppy drive, though it's probably not too hard to find one of those laying around (at least not in my house, at any rate :smile:).

The process would be undoubtedly a little abstruse (between the boot floppy acrobatics and the text-mode XP installer) to someone who hasn't done a Windows install before, but it is theoretically quite doable.

If you want to put XP on a new computer, make sure that is it the 64 bit version, otherwise you'll be throwing away performance.

You may also find it pretty hard to buy a computer pre-assembled with no operating system on it, and in any case it would be cheaper to buy the parts and assemble it yourself, then install whatever you want on it.

Assembly isn't as hard as you think!

Gentlemen:
You speculate too much, just ask!!! I got distracted last night...the situation is that I have an old computer that works, runs WinXP, but has a bad case of molasses (slow) with Prime95. I want to ensure it keeps working, and so want to take the OS and all and image the existing, working hard drive onto a new hard drive that I already have. At that point, I should have two hard drives that can boot the machine, and can afford to do things like repartition the old one. The personal data on these machines is small enough it can be backed up separately. As the operation stands right now, all user files are on a USB external disk with no hope of booting and there's a new EIDE disk with the image that won't quite boot -- I think what I need to do is boot Linux, freedos, or something and do the copy without Windoesn't in the way -- basically, cp /dev/hda1 /dev/hda2 with appropriate switches, which will grab the boot sector(s) as well as the file system.

It's a separate problem from the new machine, except as spending on it impacts the budget. I'll certainly break down and purchase Win7 at $100 for the new machine; there's a few calendar weeks of fooling around it's going to cost me with getting it running any other way and it's not worth it.

I'm about ready to follow Lava Lamp's suggestion and get the PhenomII x6 CPU, except that my chosen KVM switch has a single USB output for keyboard and mouse ([url]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817403056[/url]), wondering if USB KB and mouse will complicate that first bootup compared to PS/2.

With the sort of help you guys have given me, $50 one way or the other isn't going to matter -- the question is now, do I get just the Phenom II x6 system, or do I put out and also get the Intel system lava lamp suggests and do the head-to-head comparison over the next few months on Primenet before I have to pay for AC and maybe get the air conditioner to remove the heat? (Right now, the waste heat from the computer replaces electric baseboard heat, so the electricity part is quite cheap at the moment)

Having read the thread I would recommend the intel. The amd might be a tad faster now but once AVX is up and running the intel should beat the amd hands down.

Another thing to throw into the mix.:smile: All of the new sandy bridges can have thier multiplier [URL="http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/sandy-bridge-core-i7-2600k-core-i5-2500k,review-32090-9.html"]increased[/URL] by 4 above the max turbo setting on a P67 motherboard. A high percentage of desktop systems should be completly stable with that sort of limited overclock. It also should take the intel above the amd x6(plus 4 cores is easier to manage than 6).

[QUOTE=Christenson;247182]I'm about ready to follow Lava Lamp's suggestion and get the PhenomII x6 CPU[/QUOTE]I priced up an AMD system for comparison since mdettweiler said you could get, "two or maybe even three machines for the price of one Intel". I hope I have sufficiently shown that that is not the case. My suggestion is still to buy the Sandy Bridge system. :wink:

The Phenom II has the same amount of L3 cache as the Sandy Bridge chips, but it has to divide it up between 6 cores instead of 4 when it's fully loaded, this will have a performance hit associated with it. Additionally, Sandy Bridge performs 25% better than the i7 clock-for-clock, without any code being optimised for it, and a single i7 core was already better than a single Phenom II core (again, clock-for-clock).

So despite the two extra cores of the Phenom II, as I said, I don't think there's much in it. Of course, you will have the option of overclocking the AMD system, but if you don't plan to you can avoid buying the $29.99 CPU cooler.

Also, be aware that some time this year AMD plan on releasing new chips based on the Bulldozer core. If you're going to buy an AMD system, it might be better to wait and see what the price/performance of the new chips is like. At the very least it means the current CPUs will drop in price. Since they are non-specific about the month, or even the quarter, they will be released in, it's probably towards the end of the year and may slide into 2012.

[QUOTE=Christenson;247182]my chosen KVM switch has a single USB output for keyboard and mouse ([URL]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817403056[/URL]), wondering if USB KB and mouse will complicate that first bootup compared to PS/2.[/QUOTE]That shouldn't be a problem, however there are cheaper 4 port PS/2 KVMs available.

[QUOTE=Christenson;247182]the question is now, do I get just the Phenom II x6 system, or do I put out and also get the Intel system lava lamp suggests and do the head-to-head comparison over the next few months[/QUOTE]Heh, I was only joking when I said get one of each. However, if you do actually want two machines, getting both wouldn't necessarily be complete madness. Depending on the type of crunching work you intend to do on them, you may find that some is more efficient on the AMD system, and some is more efficient on the Intel system. It would also make for an interesting comparison between the two systems if you were to post your findings.

If you do intend to buy the USB KVM, and the non-overclockable Intel system, then I recommend switching motherboards to this:
[URL="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157220"]ASRock H67M LGA 1155 Intel H67 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard[/URL]

It's $6 cheaper, and $4.57 less for delivery, you lose a PS/2 mouse port, but gain two USB3 ports, you lose one of the PCIe x16 slots, but gain a ye olde PCI slot (which are still useful for certain things).

Before you buy the components though, make sure you understand their strengths and weaknesses, and consider any future upgrades you may wish to make, or roles you want them to fill.

For instance, with both systems you only get two RAM slots which will both be filled, that means upgrading the RAM capacity requires replacing the current RAM rather than adding to it. On the other hand, I put 8 GB of RAM on the spec, which is a lot. If you don't use much RAM you can knock that down and save some more money.

If in future you wanted a media centre PC, an Intel system with the above ASRock motherboard would be ideal, it has HDMI output and two additional digital audio outputs. Incidentally, there's no reason it couldn't be both a media centre and a compute box, I have one that performs these dual roles very well. Windows Media Centre is built into Windows 7, buy a TV card and maybe a bigger hard drive and you'll be all set to watch and record TV on your computer. Add a blu-ray drive and you can watch HD films from it too.

[QUOTE=lavalamp;247215]I priced up an AMD system for comparison since mdettweiler said you could get, "two or maybe even three machines for the price of one Intel". I hope I have sufficiently shown that that is not the case. My suggestion is still to buy the Sandy Bridge system. :wink:[/QUOTE]
Quick clarification: that remark was intending to compare the Phenom II X6 to the 6-core i7's. Compared to a four-core Sandy Bridge, indeed, the price difference is much smaller.

Ah, well in that case then, you are talking about $1300 for a system, so that's accurate.

[QUOTE=mdettweiler;247147]...(Note that OEM, i.e. manufacturer-preinstalled, Windows licenses cannot be transferred from the computer they came with, so a reinstall CD for another prebuilt computer will probably not be any good.)[/QUOTE]

I had a computer out of action for some months and ended up building a new one. To my surprise, Windows XP accepted the (totally different) hardware without fuss when I registered. This was an OEM copy. Maybe after a while of no internet access everything is reset?

[QUOTE=Flatlander;247250]I had a computer out of action for some months and ended up building a new one. To my surprise, Windows XP accepted the (totally different) hardware without fuss when I registered. This was an OEM copy. Maybe after a while of no internet access everything is reset?[/QUOTE]

AFAIK
XP is not anal about changes in h/w. It started with Vista and continues on to Win 7. But all of them are anal about "Genuine Windows Advantage" license thing.
/AFAIK

[QUOTE=Flatlander;247250]I had a computer out of action for some months and ended up building a new one. To my surprise, Windows XP accepted the (totally different) hardware without fuss when I registered. This was an OEM copy. Maybe after a while of no internet access everything is reset?[/QUOTE]
As axn said--an OEM XP license is "technically" not supposed to be transferrable, but it does it happily enough anyway if you try. You should be legally OK with that too, since Microsoft somewhat fell through on communicating this consistently. For Vista and 7, though, transferral provisions are enforced much more strictly and you can only transfer a retail license.

Stupid board ate my post!!!

When I looked at what I could get for around $600, I am not joking about two systems, just not both in the same week. The Phenom II x6 has a decent chance of beating the four-core Sandy bridge, especially if it is doing a little more than GIMPs, such as RAM-intensive NFS sieving or a desktop on one of the cores, which aren't cache-bound in the same way. It should run rings around everything I currently own in any case.

Stupid noob question: Is a DVD reader on the far side of the USB port going to be enough to load Windows, or do I need to get a DVD drive on the PATA or SATA socket on these motherboards? Do they do USB flash drive boots?

Time to get a flat panel monitor, which I need anyway.

[QUOTE=Christenson;247298]Is a DVD reader on the far side of the USB port going to be enough to load Windows, or do I need to get a DVD drive on the PATA or SATA socket on these motherboards? Do they do USB flash drive boots?[/QUOTE]
The DVD reader attached via USB should be okay. A DVD drive on PATA/SATA would work also, but shouldn't be strictly necessary. And a USB flash drive should work too!

I own a 1090T, and I won't be purchasing another 6 core AMD. The performance (and especially performance/watt) of Sandy Bridge is more compelling.
Now if AMD produces 8 core Phenom IIs at 1090T prices, I will need to rethink my position.
For some data, I did a [URL="https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AqpmCkfx1ywadHk2NnY3aGRyM2l6Nks2REtpRExiM1E&hl=en&authkey=CLTqrBg#gid=0"]Google Docs spreadsheet[/URL] a while back.

[QUOTE=mdettweiler;247147]Come to think of it, I did something similar when I upgraded a laptop from 98 to 2000 a while back. It worked, but I ended up with a weird same-partion dual-boot setup. :huh:
[/QUOTE]
mdettweiler,
I meant to say before that this was a very, umm... unexpected outcome! :flyingpig:

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;247341]mdettweiler,
I meant to say before that this was a very, umm... unexpected outcome! :flyingpig:

Rodrigo[/QUOTE]
Hmm...now that I think about it, I believe it gave me the choice of whether to keep the existing Windows install (thus creating a dual-boot setup) or replace it. I chose to keep it because I was a little curious how it would turn out. :smile: (In the end, I'm glad I did, since the computer really had too little RAM to run Windows 2000 very well, so I ended up going back to 98 much of the time because it at least wasn't constantly crawling along while it thrashed the hard disk trying to frantically move stuff in and out of the pagefile.) Anyway, indeed, you're right, this is not normally the way it would turn out.

Now the case that was suggested has, like most electronic components, gone out of stock...possibly permanently.
Why would I want the PFC "green" power supply over a case with a standard power supply already inside at 450W?

Because you want a good power supply. If you buy a cheap case+PSU combo, they'll both have been made for absolute peanuts.

Such PSUs are liable to be noisier, supply dirty power*, fail sooner and/or cause other components to fail prematurely or when the PSU fails (ie: it'll take them with it).

*By dirty power, I mean things such as:[list][*] more AC ripple in the voltages, you want as flat and as steady a voltage as possible[*] more prone to swings in voltage when the load changes[*] further away from the desired voltages (12V, 5V, 3.3V).[/list]The ATX specification allows for 5% deviation in 12, 5 and 3.3 V lines, and these are where almost the entire load of the PC hangs from. Good PSUs will deliver voltages that are pretty much bang on, even under varying loads and at high temperatures, lesser PSUs may not.

Every component in your case depends on the power from the PSU, which is why it's important to choose a solid brand.

If the case happens to have a good PSU in, then there's no problem, but the vast majority of bundled PSUs are absolutely pants.

[QUOTE=lavalamp;247544]By dirty power, I mean things such as:[LIST][*]more AC ripple in the voltages, you want as flat and as steady a voltage as possible[*]more prone to swings in voltage when the load changes[*]further away from the desired voltages (12V, 5V, 3.3V).[/LIST]The ATX specification allows for 5% deviation in 12, 5 and 3.3 V lines, and these are where almost the entire load of the PC hangs from. Good PSUs will deliver voltages that are pretty much bang on, even under varying loads and at high temperatures, lesser PSUs may not.
[/QUOTE]
lavalamp,

I don' thave much experience (all right, none) putting together a system. Suppose that I were going to. In that case, is there a way to research this voltage variability issue for a particular PSU model that one might be considering, or is it better to go by the brand?

Rodrigo

I tend to just go by brand, Seasonic, Enermax, Tagan, and a few others.

However, before buying a particular PSU (or any component really), I do google around for reviews. Try and find an actually useful review if you can, this article explains what a non-useful review is:
[url]http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/410[/url]

The same site has a list of power related articles, many of them reviews:
[url]http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/page/power[/url]

Honestly I wouldn't sweat it too much though, if you stick to the name brands you should be fine. The standard of PSUs has GREATLY improved since about 2005/6 when Tom's Hardware did some full load 24/7 PSU stress tests and several of them died.

Thanks for the tips, lavalamp.

BTW, fantastic website you pointed me to -- I've added it to my Favorites!

Rodrigo

Lava, thanks...

Went ahead and ordered a case with a fan, the good PSU, and the 6-core Phenom II, motherboard, memory, heatsink is on the way, with some additional parts....heat sink grease (though I have the plain stuff and the x2 stuff at work), screen (biggest $$), and network parts.

Left out the Windows disk...I'm going to see if I can make this box live under Ubuntu; the boot CD just popped out of the burner. You will know I've succeeded when my ECM rank starts improving dramatically.

Decided to buy two of the cheap HDs, one for later or if the first one is DOA. I may get that second box yet...

P.S. Newegg policy is to only accept "non-useful" reviews...see the notes in terms of service about direct comparisons to competitors....

Alright, should be a fun time this weekend assembling it all.

Take some pictures! Those parts will never be that shiny again. :smile:

I don't think it will quite be here this weekend...I only paid for 3-day shipping...but hopefully I'll get that old machine booted on Ubuntu and booting off both hard drives. I also have to spend Saturday outdoors, staining the lips red with the juice of the saphu that sets the mind in motion....

And odd...I don't have any pictures of my computers...nor are any of mine ever shiny...polish is an internal thing...and I don't call my machines by any kind of animate name, either...just "DC7900 SFF PC" or "So-and-so's old PC"...

I assume that means you will be drinking wine of some sort. I googled and found only references to Dune.

My PCs are named after layers of the atmosphere, and my main PC is natually exosphere. I'd like a new naming scheme but nothing cliché like Greek/Roman gods, and they have to be reasonably short because I tend to type them a lot. Maybe I could start picking off letters of the NATO alphabet.

Anyway, when all the stuff is delivered, remember that you will need to mount the CPU cooler to the motherboard BEFORE it goes into the case, which also means putting the CPU in before installing the cooler. This then means you'll need to put the PSU in the case before installing the motherboard, otherwise the beefy cooler will be in the way. Something else you'll need to put in first is the motherboard backplate, also called the I/O shield, it fits in a cut out at the back of the case (though there will be a generic I/O shield to remove first).

There is a video of how to install the cooler on Newegg, I suggest you watch that, but be a LOT more careful than the guy in the video and rest components on their anti-static bags. His mishandling of the components borders on contempt for the hardware, but perhaps he is just trying to be quick for the video.

Here are a selection of pictures from some past builds. I highly recommend a good Phillips screwdriver like the one in the top right corner of 200812-3.jpg. Small enough to wield easily, but chunky enough to get some torque behind if you need to.

[url]http://david.hddkillers.com/PCs/[/url]

[QUOTE=lavalamp;247837]I highly recommend a good Phillips screwdriver ...[/QUOTE]I would highly recommend staying very far away from using a Phillips screwdriver of any type, for anything. Instead use Posi-drive. And make sure you use the right sized tip for the screw. There is no such thing as one size fits all. Indeed, buy three different sized posi-drive screwdrivers. You can use them everywhere and you will never have to worry about stripping the screw heads ever again.

And where do i pick up my set of Pozidrivs, in the midst of the american suburban wastelands? I unfortuneately have a collection of phillips drivers....

Also, from discussion of this case, I suspect that too much torque on any of these screws is going strip threads easily...so maybe that loss of torque isn't such a problem.

And thanks for the pictures...though it sounds like assembly order will be PSU, I/O shield, Motherboard with CPU and cooler and fan, then drives...hopefully ubuntu will have partitioned and been loaded on the hard drive first...the big uncertainty is on that Rosewill case...

One other thing I saw in the pics, that might have helped Prime95...one of the motherboards said it had a triple DDR3 channel, and the one we are working only has a dual...seems like # of DDR3 channels might have a significant effect on performance. Ideas for next time?

I don't think I've seen any PC screws that are Pozidriv, and using a Pozidriv screwdriver for a Phillips screw sounds counter-productive:[quote=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_screw_drives#Pozidriv]The marker lines on a Pozidriv screwdriver will not fit a Phillips screw correctly, and are likely to slip or tear out the screw head.[/quote]I've honestly never had a problem with Phillips screws though, yes some tend to wear down if you keep taking them in and out, but I've always had abundantly many PC screws to spare if need be (all Phillips). Most often when I get a stubborn screw I just apply more force to keep the screwdriver in contact, allowing me to apply the right amount of torque.

Even though PC screws are small, they do have a nice deep head on them, and you don't need to tighten them up so much anyway. If you do them up too tight, it's usually the threads on the case (or whatever else you're screwing them into) that go before the screw heads.

Edit: Yeah, all those i7 systems had triple channel RAM, but so far all of the Sandy Bridge chips use dual channel RAM, and I don't think any desktop AMD systems have ever been above 2 channels. It shouldn't hurt performance, there's still a lot of bandwidth there (1600 * 8 * 2 = 25,600 MB/s). That's not going to stop Intel from moving to quad channel RAM for the high end 6 and 8 core chips though. Some time down the road I've got my eye on an 8 core system with 16 GB RAM.

[QUOTE=lavalamp;247837]My PCs are named after layers of the atmosphere, and my main PC is natually exosphere. I'd like a new naming scheme but nothing cliché like Greek/Roman gods, and they have to be reasonably short because I tend to type them a lot. Maybe I could start picking off letters of the NATO alphabet.[U][/U][/QUOTE]Mine are generally Egyptian gods or honorary gods. The current main machine is Anubis, the previous one Imhotep, the Win7 laptop is Ptah. The Sun file server is, of course, Ra.

Back when I was still in Oxford I tried to get the research group to use infectious diseases --- anthrax, bilharzia, cholera, dengue, and so on --- but they chose Shakesperian characters instead.


Paul

Dune, yes...but only drinking red Gatorade...I'll be hiking in Shenandoah National Park, getting exercise to keep the blood moving to the brain and the rest of the body...this helps set the mind in motion.....does Ubuntu side-by-side install allow installation on a separate hard drive? (The old PC seems not to want to boot from anything besides floppy or HD, and I don't have any floppies in my life anymore...)

Ubuntu seems to have screwed up the boot on the old machine, now I have to get it a floppy to make it boot the CD. (Whines -- think I have that solved, but it *is* a complication)

At this point, I'll smoke test the new machine tomorrow. There were two complications to assembly, one being the heatsink latch on the CPU, the other being the multiple size screws for the Rosewill case and some of them requiring a very short screwdriver. I assume it's OK to have the indicator LEDs in backwards polarity.
All parts are in, but we forgot a power cord (I scavenged this), and I have extra SATA cables. I left the stock cooler on the CPU, until I look at it with the thermal camera from work and see how it runs. I'm busy getting ubunth CDs; I wasn't able to make one at work today as the download was almost as slow as dialup.

Also have another machine contributing ECM factoring cycles for me tonight; we'll see how that goes -- it's gonna cost me writing some serious JAVA code as payment.

[QUOTE=Christenson;249261]... I assume it's OK to have the indicator LEDs in backwards polarity. ...[/QUOTE]
Definitely [i]not[/i], I'm afraid. LEDs, unlike regular light bulbs, will only work if the polarity is correct. (Not to worry, though--if it goes the wrong way, which is easy to do on some less-clearly-labeled motherboards, the lights simply won't light up--you won't bust anything. Just flip 'em around and try again.)

I was just too lazy to get out a resistor and check the polarity with the bench power supply....the problem isn't the motherboard, it's the cabling from the case...I was only worried about damage, knowing full well they weren't likely back-to-back LEDs.

On the ends of the plugs for the front panel connectors, it should say what each does, but even if it doesn't you can tell by the colour of the cabling what the polarity is. Most are a colour and a white wire, the white is -ve (or ground actually), the colour is +ve. The motherboard is also colour coded and should also say what each of the pins do in REALLY small writing, but it's written bigger in the motherboard manual.

[QUOTE=lavalamp;249278]On the ends of the plugs for the front panel connectors, it should say what each does, but even if it doesn't you can tell by the colour of the cabling what the polarity is. Most are a colour and a white wire, the white is -ve (or ground actually), the colour is +ve. The motherboard is also colour coded and should also say what each of the pins do in REALLY small writing, but it's written bigger in the motherboard manual.[/QUOTE]
Note that sometimes even the manual is not too helpful (as they are sometimes not clearly translated from the Chinese)--my computer's motherboard came with such a manual and even though I believe it included a diagram, I (nor a relative with electrician experience who was observing) couldn't make heads or tails of which way it went. Of course, in that event, trial and error should still do the trick as always.

In my case, as it turned out, I must have plugged it in backwards since neither the power or HDD light on the front of the case works...I never actually bothered to try it the other way since the computer is in my bedroom and it's actually a little nicer to not have a little flickering HDD light shining in my face all through the night. :rolleyes:

Indeed, I do not have my power or HDD activity lights plugged in. For some reason they decided to use the brightest blue LEDs available. It's like being in the film Skyline.

In any case, the ASRock motherboard manual seems reasonable enough:
[url]http://download.asrock.com/manual/880GM-LE.pdf[/url]

Front audio, LED and power/reset pinouts are given on page 25 of the manual, and the speaker pinout is given at the top of the next page. I heartily recommend not plugging the speaker in though, it's just annoying.

As I said, the question was about the polarity of the front panel LEDs, not the motherboard half.

The smoke test isn't going well...I guessed correctly that the common color on the front panel cable (white) was negative, so the power on LED works. But I get nothing on the VGA port, and no indication of activity from the known working USB CD drive with known working Ubuntu basic boot CD, with or without the SATA hard drive plugged in. Fans also work. A proper keyboard is plugged in the PS/2 connector on the back; it's LEDs all blink on when the switch on the power supply is flipped.

What to do next? Do I need to put a boot floppy together? Clear the CMOS memory? Do these things not like it if the CMOS battery isn't working? (A coin cell is there, and I don't see a little pull-out tab to turn it on, but I could be wrong) Unplugging the reset jumper doesn't work. Or was I supposed to stand the motherboard off from the case a bit, rather than screw it directly in?

[QUOTE=Christenson;249873]... Or was I supposed to stand the motherboard off from the case a bit, rather than screw it directly in?[/QUOTE]
Ah, that would do it. If the mobo is in direct contact with the case there is probably something shorting out. (Hopefully nothing was damaged by this... :ermm:) The mobo should have come with a little bag of brass standoffs and screws. You need one standoff for each screw hole on the mobo. (The case should have plenty of holes to put them in, to fit a variety of mobo configurations. Sometimes the case will not have a hole for one or, more rarely, two of the mobo's screw holes; in that case, just leave that one out.)

It depends on the case whether you need to use standoffs, if the holes that you need to screw the motherboard to stick out on little humps, then no you don't. The other possibility is that you had a flat plate with screw holes in, and it would be very difficult to attach a motherboard to the case without standoffs. I very much doubt you'd get any activity from the board if you'd managed that, pretty much everything would short out at the same time. Also the ports wouldn't line up with the I/O shield in the back of the case.

First of all, make sure the RAM is in correctly and you've plugged all of the power leads into the motherboard that it requires. These are easy enough things to check before moving on. Another vital component to check is the CPU, but that's a little harder to get at so save that until other avenues have been pursued.

It sounds like the BIOS may be set to output on the other video port by default, so if you have a DVI to VGA converter (probably one came with the motherboard), I'd try using that.

If you happen to have a spare PCI or PCIe graphics card, you may also want to try it in the PC, you may get some video output that way, then you can get into BIOS and alter the settings so it uses the onboard video.

As for clearing CMOS, it wouldn't hurt to try that. You need to unplug the computer, wait for the power to drain from the motherboard (some LED will probably fade out when that happens), then use the clear CMOS jumper just under the button cell battery. Page 22 in the manual details the process a little more, but basically you just move the jumper over, wait, then move it back.

Since you don't have any screen output right now, this is one of the rare occasions when connecting the speaker may actually help. With most boards a single beep means everything is fine. If on the other hand you get some series of long and/or short beeps, that'd be an error code which you'd need to look up.

[QUOTE=lavalamp;249888]It depends on the case whether you need to use standoffs, if the holes that you need to screw the motherboard to stick out on little humps, then no you don't. The other possibility is that you had a flat plate with screw holes in, and it would be very difficult to attach a motherboard to the case without standoffs. I very much doubt you'd get any activity from the board if you'd managed that, pretty much everything would short out at the same time. Also the ports wouldn't line up with the I/O shield in the back of the case.[/QUOTE]
Ah, okay, I didn't know that. All of the cases I've built computers in needed standoffs...though now that I think about it, a couple of older computers that I've dismantled did have the raised screw holes as you mentioned. (I guess it didn't occur to me at the time just [i]why[/i] the screw holes were raised... :rolleyes:)

@Christenson: in that case, if lavalamp's suggestion of checking the other monitor output port (if there is one--most integrated graphics chipsets I've seen only have one VGA output) doesn't work, try it with one of the RAM sticks removed, then the other if it still doesn't work. I once had a DOA RAM stick that caused exactly what you're seeing when I tried to boot up the machine for the first time.

I've been reading and re-reading that manual for the Mobo. It says the Mobo requires a 12V connection and the 24-pin ATX connection...done...but no meter to put on the pins just now. I did dismount the CPU cooler; to my dismay, I pulled the CPU out of the ZIF. To remount I pried the CPU off the heatsink, inspected the pins, re-installed it carefully, and re-mounted the heatsink.

Two sheets of paper under the Mobo for insulation don't work...the case (a Rosewill) has nice little cones that raise the board to the proper height. There are no beeps from the annoying little speaker device. The manual claims that unless you do setup, the VGA and the DVI connector will have the same signal. The new monitor does change state when the power switch changes state or the VGA connector is plugged in.
So, I'll try:
Clearing CMOS
One or the other RAM stick
My "spare" video card is currently tied up in the older PC, which is taking its sweet time with resizing and moving an NTFS partition (it finally recognized the CD drive somehow, so it booted the Ubuntu CD; once the partition is moved I'll get ubuntu installed on the EIDE hard drive; possibly we can use that for a test hard drive -- current ubuntu issue is not recognizing the USB wireless adapter).

This thread has turned into a very useful compendium of practical tips and details and warnings for system builders. If I ever decide to put my own PC together, I will be sure to consult this! :smile:

Rodrigo

Rodrigo: We haven't spoken of ESD protection much here, but it's necessary...and I also ended up spending $10 (US) at the auto store for some really short phillips screwdrivers to get the screws in behind the riveted-in drive bay which will hold the hard drive. I haven't done this yet because I'm still trying to wake up the MoBo.

Pulling out ram sticks doesn't work.
Clearing CMOS means the fans now turn on whenever the power is turned on by the switch on the power supply; it seems system power is now controlled by that switch.
I want a DVI cable to see if one half of the video is dead, but the caps lock didn't seem to work on the keyboard.
Ubuntu is almost installed on the other machine, so I may have a bootable hard drive. I've got it in a state where GPARTED consistently crashes when it scans it, though.

[QUOTE=Christenson;249910]I did dismount the CPU cooler; to my dismay, I pulled the CPU out of the ZIF. To remount I pried the CPU off the heatsink, inspected the pins, re-installed it carefully, and re-mounted the heatsink.[/QUOTE]Wow, that should definately not have happened. Is the thermal paste sticky at all? If so I'd use some other paste.

The CPU does have a zero insertion force when the lever is up, but when it's down it should be held in place extremely tightly. Are you sure you had the lever all the way down?

Did you not get any beeps even when you took all the RAM out? If not take another look to make sure the speaker is connected correctly.

The DVI socket will output an analog signal as well as a digital one, so if you have a DVI to VGA converter you can see if you get an output from there. I'm not sure where caps lock fits in with a DVI cable.

It also sounds like the BIOS is now set to turn on the computer when power is restored, so that could be why it starts booting up when you flick the power back on.

[QUOTE=Christenson;249914]Rodrigo: We haven't spoken of ESD protection much here, but it's necessary...[/QUOTE]
Christenson,

That's an interesting point. In preparation for the brain surgery, I've been watching YouTube videos on how to replace your CPU and fan, and most of the operators aren't using ESD protection.

In my own tinkerings I've never used a wrist strap or anything like that, but I have always been careful to touch other metal right before diving into the PC chassis, just in case.

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;250017]Christenson,

That's an interesting point. In preparation for the brain surgery, I've been watching YouTube videos on how to replace your CPU and fan, and most of the operators aren't using ESD protection.

In my own tinkerings I've never used a wrist strap or anything like that, but I have always been careful to touch other metal right before diving into the PC chassis, just in case.

Rodrigo[/QUOTE]
You should be OK as long as you touch the case's metal frame before touching any of the circuits. That, and if you're building the computer on a carpeted floor (as I have done in the past), don't set the components directly on the carpet, but rather on top of the antistatic bags they came in.

Now I have an anti-static wrist strap to use in such endeavors, but one is definitely not strictly necessary to build a computer. The risk of harming the components is a little higher, but can be minimized if you take the appropriate precautions.

I'm not entirely sure how much an anti-static wrist strap costs (I got mine as a Christmas gift) but I imagine you can get one for pretty cheap from just about any hardware store. It would probably be a wise investment if you can get one, since it will surely be cheaper than the cost of replacing a fried mobo or the like. :smile:

[QUOTE=lavalamp;249278]On the ends of the plugs for the front panel connectors, it should say what each does, but even if it doesn't you can tell by the colour of the cabling what the polarity is. Most are a colour and a white wire, the white is -ve (or ground actually), the colour is +ve. The motherboard is also colour coded and should also say what each of the pins do in REALLY small writing, but it's written bigger in the motherboard manual.[/QUOTE]

Just what I needed to know! :smile:

Stilll no joy...no beeps... reading (recommended by friends who wondered why I didn't build in the first place)
[url]http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/261145-31-perform-steps-posting-boot-video-problems[/url]
have removed RAM, checked for 12V on the CPU power connector.

Wow, where'd I get that avatar? Something for extra compute progress? E-mail from Asrock says pull Mobo out of case, but includes bootable OS HD and a separate PCI video card in the steps and leave in a memory stick. Bedtime, I won't make more progress until tomorrow.

[QUOTE=Christenson;250070]Wow, where'd I get that avatar? Something for extra compute progress? E-mail from Asrock says pull Mobo out of case, but includes bootable OS HD and a separate PCI video card in the steps and leave in a memory stick. Bedtime, I won't make more progress until tomorrow.[/QUOTE]
The avatars are a gift from [strike]Xyzzy[/strike] The Gerbils (well, now the Gerbils are dead and replaced by a Snake--but they're still here in spirit :smile:, see [url=http://www.mersenneforum.org/showthread.php?t=10536]here[/url] for the full story). They usually are bestowed upon someone when they start posting enough to graduate from "total forum newbie" to "someone who might be identifiable by screen name to someone who follows the forum regularly". I actually got mine within just a few posts...seems you have to post a little bit more than that to get an avatar nowadays (the Snake is still learning the ropes of creative avatar selection).

I prefer my avatars from Xyzzy...it sounds better...now to find out if the video card or the HD was required. Am wondering about some cheap parts to help bring up the box until we figure out which one is dead or what we are missing.

[QUOTE=mdettweiler;250072]The avatars are a gift from [strike]Xyzzy[/strike] The Gerbils (well, now the Gerbils are dead and replaced by a Snake--but they're still here in spirit :smile:, see [URL="http://www.mersenneforum.org/showthread.php?t=10536"]here[/URL] for the full story). [/QUOTE]
mdettweiler,

I'm still getting my "new postings" notices from The Gerbils. I didn't know they had passed away. Are they communicating from Beyond? :shock: Xyzzy did say that they had a psychic connection...

Rodrigo

[QUOTE=Rodrigo;250179]mdettweiler,

I'm still getting my "new postings" notices from The Gerbils. I didn't know they had passed away. Are they communicating from Beyond? :shock: Xyzzy did say that they had a psychic connection...

Rodrigo[/QUOTE]
Something like that...see [url=http://www.mersenneforum.org/showthread.php?t=10536#post151701]here[/url]. :smile: