Bargain Hardware Thread

[Ken_g6]

Originally Posted by petrw1

Does the Video Card I have listed look like it is capable of similar thruput?

That was my estimate for the GT240. I divided Oliver's GTX 275 performance by 2.77. Edit: But maybe it should have been 2.89. If you want an estimate of the 8400's performance, divide the GT240's by eighteen!

[petrw1]

Originally Posted by Batalov

Tiny. Hard to cool it well in that tiny spot.
What's wrong with a GA-H55-USB3 (and 4 memory slots, better spacing around the CPU and other goodies)?

Hmm nothing wrong with that one; just missed it; thanks

[petrw1]

Originally Posted by Ken_g6

That was my estimate for the GT240. I divided Oliver's GTX 275 performance by 2.77. Edit: But maybe it should have been 2.89. If you want an estimate of the 8400's performance, divide the GT240's by eighteen!

I did update my order to have the GT240....whew can they get pricey above that.

For mfaktc speed which of these (all? other?) parms are the most important:
Core Clock: 625MHz
Shader Clock: 1360MHz
Stream Processors: 48

I see these two for example similar parms but one is twice the cost of the other.

ZOTAC ZT-20203-10L GeForce GT 220 1GB 128-bit DDR2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready Video Card 
 GeForce GT 220 1GB DDR2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Chipset Manufacturer: NVIDIA
Core Clock: 625MHz
Shader Clock: 1360MHz
Stream Processors: 48 
Model #: ZT-20203-10L 
Item #: N82E16814500130 
Return Policy: VGA Standard Return Policy 
Now: $55.99

ZOTAC AMP! ZT-20405-10L GeForce GT 240 512MB 128-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready Video Card 
 GeForce GT 240 512MB GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Chipset Manufacturer: NVIDIA
Core Clock: 600MHz
Shader Clock: 1460MHz
Stream Processors: 96 
Model #: ZT-20405-10L 
Item #: N82E16814500146 
Now: $93.99

[lavalamp]

You simply don't need a CPU cooler that expensive, there are many other high performance coolers for a much lower price. You can then either pocket the difference or spend it on making the machine even better.

There are many upgrade paths, more RAM, faster CPU, a better graphics card etc (hint: the last one). You don't need expensive cooling unless you plan on madly overclocking the CPU. I agree that an after market cooler would be a good idea, especially as you'll likely be running it under full load all the time, but you don't need to go that pricey.

This is a cooler very similar to the one you picked out, but $50 cheaper:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16835233082

Here is another, this time $62 cheaper:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16835103064

Both of the above coolers can use two fans, the first 120mm, the second 92mm, however both coolers will be more than adequate even with the single fan they come with.

For the PSU, I'd get something with a little more headroom. This PSU can supply more juice, has an extra PCIe power connector, is slightly more efficient and costs only $8 more:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16817371035

Be aware that it doesn't come with a power lead though, (and that this is classified as a feature, lol).

The place to really stretch the budget is the graphics card. The GT240 cards are what are known as "weak sauce". I know that the GTX460 cards are a significant jump in cost, but you'll get a significant jump in performance too. A 460 has 3.5 times the number of cores at a slightly higher clock speed, that's four times the raw computer power (assuming the applications running on them scale linearly, which they more or less do I believe), it's just no contest between them.

Here is the cheapest GTX460 I can find on Newegg, it's $71 more, but you can get a lot of that back from getting a cheaper CPU cooler instead:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16814121390

Edit: Note that this graphics card requires two 6 pin PCIe power connectors, and the PSU I linked to has two 6 pin PCIe power connectors. The PSU you listed earlier has only one such connector, something to bear in mind.

[TheJudger]

Hi petrw1,

Originally Posted by petrw1

For mfaktc speed which of these (all? other?) parms are the most important:
Core Clock: 625MHz
Shader Clock: 1360MHz
Stream Processors: 48

For compute capability 1.x GPU on mfaktc you can just compare <shader clock> * <stream processors>, it scales very fine with those two paramters.
Memory clock / memory bandwidth doesn't matter at all. My GTX 470 needs ~2GB/sec on graphics memory while running mfaktc.

IF your primary target for your GPU is mfaktc try to get a GPU with compute capability 2.x!
My GTX 470 (compute capability 2.0, 448 cores, 1215MHz) is up to 4 times faster than my GTX 275 (compute capability 1.3, 240 cores, 1458MHz). Currently compute capability 2.0 is best for mfaktc, 2.1 is a little bit slower but still much faster than 1.x.
To compare mfaktc performance on nvidia GPU compute
<shader clock> * <stream processors> * <correction factor>
correction factor for
- compute capability 1.x GPUs: 1.0
- compute capability 2.0 GPUs: 2.0...2.5
- compute capability 2.1 GPUs: 1.5...2.0
The correction factor is just a rough estimate, it dependes on the exponent and factor size...

So perhaps look for a GT 430:

relative performance estimate
GT 220: 1360 * 48 * 1.0 = ~65k
GT 430: 1400 * 96 * 1.5 = ~202k

A GT 430 should be ~3 times faster than a GT 220 in mfaktc.

Oliver

P.S.
keep in mind that
- mfaktc isn't very comfortable, you'll need to use the manual testings forms
- the GUI on your OS might become more or less unusable while running mfaktc (very laggy, especially on slower GPUs)
- you'll still need on core your CPU dedicated to mfaktc (two or three cores for GPU beasts like GTX 470/480/580...

P.P.S.
GPUs based on GF100 or GF110 chip: compute capability 2.0
GPUs based on GF10x except GF100: compute capability 2.1

[petrw1]

I am a little overwhelmed or maybe just torn.

Getting a GPU that can factor like crazy is very tempting ...

but then getting a ton of factor progress/credit isn't the prime (pun intended) goal of mine. I enjoy dabbling in all work types for a variety of reasons; so losing at least one whole core in support of mfaktc along with spending an extra $100 to get a "worthy" GPU is a consideration....

I'll think on it for a day or two; cause I do want to get my order in this month.

Thanks again

... maybe not an EXTRA $100. This GT430 is under $100.
ZOTAC ZT-40601-20L GeForce GT 430 (Fermi) Zone Edition 1GB 128-bit DDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready Video Card
GeForce GT 430 (Fermi) 1GB DDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Chipset Manufacturer: NVIDIA
Core Clock: 700MHz
Shader Clock: 1400MHz
Stream Processors: 96
Model #: ZT-40601-20L
Now: $84.99
$10.74 Shipping


OTOH your 470 is in the $250 to $350 range

[RMAC9.5]

Hi petrw1,
Here is another suggestion for you to chew on!
Your Intel CPU, Intel Gigabyte MB, and after market CPU cooler costs $397.97.
If you substitute a retail boxed AMD Phenom II X6 CPU (includes heat sink/fan) and an AMD Gigabyte MB with MB video, you can save enough to pay for a really nice video card to run CUDALucas on. (Hint, hook your monitor up to the MB video and dedicate the CUDALucas video card to Prime95.)
Here are some Newegg prices for you as of 11/20/10:
Phenom X6 1090T 3.2 GHz with H/F $229.00 + free shipping
Phenom X6 1075T 3.0 GHz with H/F $199.99 + F/S
Phenom X6 1055T 2.8 GHz with H/F $179.00 + F/S
Gigabyte GA-880GM-UD2H micro ATX $89.99 + $2.99 shipping
Gigabyte GA-880GMA-UD2H micro ATX $99.99 + $2.99 shipping
Gigabyte GA-880GMA-UD3H ATX $109.99 + $2.99 shipping.

I should also mention that you may want to wait until January 5th [when Intel formally announces their next CPU family (code named Sandy Bridge)] to make your final decision as this new CPU family is expected to significantly outperform Intel's current i5 and i7 CPU family.

[ET_]

I was tempted by the GTX 460.

GTX 430 will cost a half of GTX 460: are the specs halved as well?

Luigi

[mdettweiler]

Originally Posted by RMAC9.5

(Hint, hook your monitor up to the MB video and dedicate the CUDALucas video card to Prime95.)

FYI: this can sometimes require tweaking a BIOS setting to make it work. Some BIOSes will only turn on the grahpics card if there's a monitor plugged into it (and likewise, only turn on the integrated video if there's a monitor plugged into it). To run both, you will probably need to go into the BIOS. (Not too bad if you're familiar with this stuff, but figured you should know anyway...)

I've had the opportunity to try CUDALucas on a friend's GTX 460 via remote access and I was rather surprised to see that it didn't slow down the GUI at all. We were similarly shocked that ppsieve and tpsieve didn't slow it down either. I have not tried mfaktc, so it may behave differently. (I've heard reports of ppsieve/tpsieve slowing others' GUIs to a crawl, so it's possible that this behavior is unique to the GTX 460, and that it's really just a fast enough GPU to handle both at the same time.)

[lavalamp]

Originally Posted by ET_

GTX 430 will cost a half of GTX 460: are the specs halved as well?

GT 240 - 96 cores, 550 MHz, 78 CAD
GT 430 - 96 cores, 700 MHz, 70 CAD, Paradoxical ain't it.
GTX 460 - 336 cores, 700 MHz, 134 CAD, I linked to a more expensive ASUS card (165 CAD) before 'cause honestly I've never heard of Galaxy and the default is not to trust them.

GTX 460 has 3.5 times the number of cores of a GT 430. Clock speeds will vary a bit between manufacturer as they try to distinguish themselves from the competition, but these are typical examples. Also included are the minimum prices I found on newegg.ca.

For nVidia nomenclature:
GTX > GTS >>> GT

But of course it gets tricky when you want to compare between different generations of card. Luckily you can readily find information about the number of cores or "stream processors", and the core clock speed, which gives a much more apples to apples comparison.

[Prime95]

Originally Posted by RMAC9.5

Sandy Bridge ... as this new CPU family is expected to significantly outperform Intel's current i5 and i7 CPU family.

It will only outperform once new FFT software is written. This will take several months.