Need processor advice

[WatcherZero]

Im going to be putting together a fair decent ~£1000 system with good upgrade potential that I will be adding to over the next couple of years.

so what im thinking is:

Striker II extreme 790i Ultra SLI ~ £200
Decent large case with plenty of fans and room for long GFX car ~£70
Overclocked GTX260 ~ £200
2GB DD3 1600 SLI Ready ~£200
Velociraptor 10,000 rpm 300gb SATA II ~£200

Which leaves good potential to add another 2gb ram, a second GTX260 and a creative sound card

Of course one key component missing, processor. I really dont know which intel one to get, the motherboard can support any upto 1600mhz FSB but those are in the £400+ region so 1333, either a core 2 duo or a core 2 quad and overclock them up a bit. £200 left what do people suggest?

[Kalos]

I like the Q9450. It's behaving well in my motherboard, no problems with it. Good stock heatsink too, even for mild overclocking if one was so inclined. Should be about £200 in most places now. If you want, you can wait for the E8600, that's supposed to be quite a powerful dual core at 3.33 Ghz. Nobody has really got thier hands on one for a good set of tests, but one has supposidly reached 6 Ghz through overclocking. I would never think of pressing my processors to such extremes as a full Ghz or more, but it is nice to know they have all that operating slack and the heat clearly is very managable even when exaggerated.

[Tunga]

Okay this isn't going to be particularly positive but it's what I think of it.

I really don't see the justification in a £200 Mobo. What are you actually getting from that?
The Geforce X series are very expensive at the moment, but even if you must go that way SLI generally isn't worth it. In performance:cost ratio you're better off buying a single X280 and just replacing it outright in a year's time.
A £300 hard drive?! Do you really need this? The extra performance a 10k RPM drive offers is not worth the cost, you could dump the extra on the CPU and get a much better performance boost.
4GB of RAM is okay but only if you're going to run 64-bit, and then you may have driver issues. Are you sure you want to run 64-bit?

Don't forget to allow £60-£100 for a PSU.

It just seems like you're focusing on the wrong parts to me.

[Khab]

I would agree. I have a $90 Gigabyte mobo that's just as good as anything else. Sure it doesn't have 10 heatsinks and heatpipes that wrap around but it's amazingly stable for me.

The raptor is tempting, I have one of the older 74GB versions and while it is fast, there are some drives that come pretty close to it now and cost much less.

I prefer to put more of my money into the GPU and CPU. I do run 4GB of ram on a 32bit OS but I have it when I need to switch to 64bit.

[Kalos]

I must admit, the use of DDR3 is quite extraordinary, the very high premium it commands suggests quality but benchmarks that show a great boost in performance over the matured and cheaper DDR2 are few and far between, the higher latencies tend to ruin the benifits of the greater frequencies, just as DDR2 did compared with DDR1 in the first few years until it matured and shot down in price in 2007. It may be worth going with DDR2 to save some money for marginal losses if any, and investing in a high quality PSU. It is a bad thing when a PSU blows and damages components along the line when it does, did it once to a Pentium 4 rig (which was thankfully close to retirement at that point anyhow, didn't nuke it but the PSU only partly blew out, greatly deminished power handling capacity that continued to decline) and it is far from fun when it does.

Of course, it is your money, and if your dead set on certain parts then I'll work to your specifications to try and help, these are the thoughts that come to mind seeing as the conversation has turned away from processor recommendations for the moment. If you were to save more money and put it into the CPU, there's always the Q9550, basically the same as the Q9450 with a higher clock speed, multiply still locked of course but higher than its lesser cousin. Never worked with one, the Q9450 is as far as I've gone with my recent builds, haven't had the need to really.

[WatcherZero]

As I said im building for ther future, both my systems before have been limited by the motherboard because I bought a cheaper one at the time e.g. AGP when PCI-E was just coming out. So this time im starting from that route as the motherboard is the key to future upgradability or obsolesence, only the 790 ultra and X48 support DD3 ram or 1600 FSB, both of which will be common in another year. Tunga if youd read you would have seen I was only buying 2gb ram, and the GTX series have gone down by a 1/4 in the last fortnight since the launch of 4800 series, your SLI performance is a bit outdated too, you get a straight 50% boost from it nowadays up from the older 20% as more bottlenecks are quashed and since gtx280 is only 10% more powerful and costs twice as much its the betetr cost/performance ratio. And where did you get £300 HDD cost from?

[Kalos]

I should warn you that Socket 775 doesn't have a bright future ahead of it. It is going to be more or less dumped at the end of the year, the new Bloomfield/Nehalim processors have an Intergrated Memory Controller, thus needing far more pins and a different chipset that wouldn't have a memory controller on that (most of the North Bridge's function basically); so after five years socket 775 is going to go down the plug within twelve months or so, with no schedualed releases of futher high end families apart from a few isolated processors. The frontside bus will also be relegated by the new serial connection system known as Quickpath Interconnect, much like AMD's Hypertransport linkage system; both of these changes are pretty significant. It won't be too upgradable in that respect. Also, it should be possible to get P35 chipsets that take DDR3, it was designed for that function in mind, it's just the trouble of finding one as most were built for DDR2.

[Tunga]

As I said im building for ther future, both my systems before have been limited by the motherboard because I bought a cheaper one at the time e.g. AGP when PCI-E was just coming out. So this time im starting from that route as the motherboard is the key to future upgradability or obsolesence, only the 790 ultra and X48 support DD3 ram or 1600 FSB, both of which will be common in another year.So you will buy a £200 motherboard now so that it might support the various new sockets/connections/technologies that we have in two years time, instead of buying a £60-80 now which will give you the exact same performance and then replacing it with a new £60-80 board in two years and getting equivalent performance (i.e. a lot better) for that point in time and all the new slots that you need. This just makes no sense to me.

The RAM was more of a warning since you mentioned the possibility of adding another 2GB.

The HDD price was a typo, obviously I meant £200, the point still stands.

your SLI performance is a bit outdated too, you get a straight 50% boost from it nowadays up from the older 20% as more bottlenecks are quashed and since gtx280 is only 10% more powerful and costs twice as much its the betetr cost/performance ratioSLI has improved, but it's still far from perfect. You also have to consider the price increase on the motherboard. I'm struggling to find any decent benchmarks for these cards but I'm seeing a ~25% speed increase for a ~40% price increase between the X260 and X280. Now compare that to a 50% speed increase for a 100% price increase between one X260 and two X260s in SLI. Now add that SLI requires a more expensive motherboard, has higher power requirements and limits your upgrade potential and you'll see why I think it's a complete waste of money.

Now based on what you said about the RAM I think you're talking about the potential to add another X260 at a later date. By that time you'd almost certainly be better off outright replacing it with a newer card and saving yourself money on the motherboard now.

And add what Kalos said since he's more up to date with CPU sockets than me. There are definitely P35 DDR3 boards around, here's six from a year ago (http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pipe-dreams-p35-ddr3-motherboards-compared,1616.html) - in fact there are some with both DDR2 and DDR3 slots so you can upgrade to DDR3 once it's actually worth the cost.

If you want this machine then it's not going to be a bad machine, but in my eyes it's a waste of money because you've divided your budget poorly. Spending £200 on each component is not how you get the best performance for a given price.

[WatcherZero]

Nehalem has a consumer release date of q3 2009 and I dont see it making a significant impact much earlier than a year later when prices come down a bit. The processor really wont be an issue then, hell you can still buy pentiums now. Theyve reached the point where theirs little real world gain in performance beyond the current level. You talk about this computer being out of date in 5 years and I agree, im building this to last 3 years with a possibility of extending its life a bit beyond. My current computer 6600GT has actually been keeping up with the latest releases until this year, Can run everything short of Crysis in max settings ~30fps by turning off shadows and only using 2xAA. That computer was a mid range 5 years ago.

[Kalos]

The Nehalim architecture is launching this year. Gainstown launchs next quater, Q3 2008, while Bloomfield being the main high end desktop variant of Nehalim is being launched Q4 2008. I agree the main wave of them is a year away, but they're already shifting the high end over this very year; I just don't think your decision to aim for futureproofing has made it very compatible for the future at all. With a highend shift this year and the mainstream following next, there won't be any new families beyond what is out right now on 775. Of course this could be a disagreement over definition, futureproofing in the sense that I usually go by is having a platform with a future of interchangable and advancing parts.

[Tunga]

Theyve reached the point where theirs little real world gain in performance beyond the current level.Are you suggesting that CPUs have stopped getting faster?

Umm...okay then.

To answer your original question, I'd suggest you buy the most expensive CPU you can afford with the most buzzwords and the latest acronyms attached. That seems to be how you've designed this machine in general so you may as well carry it through to the CPU too.

Harsh? Maybe. I'm really struggling to comprehend the reasons for most of these components and your priorities make no real sense to me. As such I don't feel qualified to advise you on what would be best for this machine so I won't bother suggesting any specific CPUs.

[WatcherZero]

No, that programs no longer benefit from faster processors.

but yes in a way they have, core 2 reached a peak then they switched to quad core and lowered the maximum clocks by 1ghz
(most benchmarks still have the faster clocked core2's outperforming the slower clocked quad core processors)

Nehalem with have a 1.1x performance per cycle of a penryn and 2x of a quad core but will again be limited to 3ghz clocks and will focus on 4,6 and 8 cores. According to the release schedule it will be superceded by westmere in 2010 and sandybridge in 2011 so 3 new architectures that will require on board motherboard support in 3 years, might as well stick with the here and now.

[clevins]

Let me ask a slightly different question - why future proof at all? Why not put together a very good ~ £500 system now... and then sell it for something in 1-2 years and replace it with another £500 system then? The second system will probably be as good as the one you're putting together now and, since you can sell the first system for something, you'll actually spend a bit less than the £1000 you're after.

Futureproofing has never really worked in computers anyway... yes, you can lengthen time between system replacement, but when you calculate time value of money and allow for guessing incorrectly about when various components are released... I think you're better off simply cycling systems through every 18-24 months and selling the old ones to defray costs.

[Tunga]

Futureproofing has never really worked in computers anyway... yes, you can lengthen time between system replacement, but when you calculate time value of money and allow for guessing incorrectly about when various components are released... I think you're better off simply cycling systems through every 18-24 months and selling the old ones to defray costs.Bingo, we have a winner! This is my exact attitude, I replace my main components every 18 months and basically run everything on max spec or close.

[Winslow]

Gainstown is in life testing. There may be some delays getting Nehalem out for Q3,08 as we are have some problems. I setup the thermal testing equipment at Intels development site, so I see the problems on a daily basis.
The socket of the future seem to be LGA1366, as the Nehalem, and Gainstown use this socket. It's much bigger that the LGA775, and much harder for the equipment to handle. Nethalem can have 4 dual cores, thats 8 processors in one package. I'm planning on building a new system with the X58 chip sets this will be one fast WOW machine.

[Kalos]

Gainstown is in life testing. There may be some delays getting Nehalem out for Q3,08 as we are have some problems. I setup the thermal testing equipment at Intels development site, so I see the problems on a daily basis.
The socket of the future seem to be LGA1366, as the Nehalem, and Gainstown use this socket. It's much bigger that the LGA775, and much harder for the equipment to handle. Nethalem can have 4 dual cores, thats 8 processors in one package. I'm planning on building a new system with the X58 chip sets this will be one fast WOW machine.
From what I hear, obviously not as anyone who has any association with Intel, just from what I'm able to read from those who are fortunant to have such links, some of the chip designs (I imagine the eight cores most probably) have a fairly significant TDP on them, and that the cooling systems/mechanisms on the socket itself were more beefy compaired with LGA 775. I understand if you're unable to comment, and I suppose it's just simple necessity when you start using a wider socket with a rectangular shape rather than the squares most flat slots have used. It is interesting, you wouldn't know anythin about the delays that were on the Q9xxx series earlier this year? (assuming this isn't too regarded as sensative)

[Winslow]

From what I hear, obviously not as anyone who has any association with Intel, just from what I'm able to read from those who are fortunant to have such links, some of the chip designs (I imagine the eight cores most probably) have a fairly significant TDP on them, and that the cooling systems/mechanisms on the socket itself were more beefy compaired with LGA 775. I understand if you're unable to comment, and I suppose it's just simple necessity when you start using a wider socket with a rectangular shape rather than the squares most flat slots have used. It is interesting, you wouldn't know anythin about the delays that were on the Q9xxx series earlier this year? (assuming this isn't too regarded as sensative)

Can't comment on any Q9000 work. The LGA1366 socket incorps a back support due to thermal issues. The Nahelem internal Thermal Diode has some changes that improve heat calculations, so cooling is improved. Better, faster, improved cooling systems are still necessary. My Intel contacts parted with a few of the Nahalem CPU's, but still I have nothing to plug them into. I have an order for the Gigabyte 7TESN-RN (X58) mobo but its not released either. Any ideas on how to get a LGA1366 mobo?

[WatcherZero]

Phone intel and say your a hardware reviewer and can you have a reference sample?

[Kalos]

The only way I know how to get ahold of the motherboards with LGA 1336 on them is through Intel themselves sadly, they do provide them on loan to reviewers sometimes. I think some of them are coming from Intel's partners, but at this point they probably aren't to ship them out to anyone apart from Intel. The chipset is supposed to be coming together though, ran stably for the guys over on Tomshardware. Wish I had the access to them, though I have zero chance of getting all the parts needed together after just completing my Q9450 computer last month.

[WatcherZero]

Things dont seem to be going very well for AMD, massive writeoffs and losses :P and Nvidia apparantly is having to set aside $200m because all the 8400m and 8600m processors are defective due the presense of an unidentified substrate that causes big heat retention problems the higher the heat cycles.

[Artad]

As an owner of an S2E board I can say that the inital problems I had with it were huge. For a good month I didn't have a very reliable system when running SLI, it was hot and BSOD'ed all of the time.

After a period of tweaking etc I am happy to say that I have a decent machine that works well with SLI.

As far as your current rig goes.. I really wouldn't waste money on the 200 series cards, yes they are nice BUT you can get the same sort of performance out of a 9800GX2 or a couple of GTX's.

You really won't be future proofing what you have in your system, as soon as you buy it it will be out of date (hell, 3 weeks after getting my 9800GTX's the 200 series cards were out, happy me? not a chance).

The next thing you need to ask yourself is what are you going to be doing with the rig? massive over clocks? are you going to be doing serious number crunching or is this just epeen time? (says the guy with an epeen complex).

If I were you I would look seriously at the x48 series motherboard using DDR2 and getting a couple of 4800 series cards to run in crossfire instead. As it stands at the moment it's unlikely that we will be seeing SLI in the new Nehelim boards due to Nvidia not wanting to license the SLI chipset to Intel and vice versa.

[WatcherZero]

Press release issued today:



NVIDIA today officially announced it will bring SLI technology to the Intel Bloomfield (Nehalem) processor platform. The firm will roll out a new chip called nForce 200 SLI processor. Rumour has it that NVIDIA will charge motherboard makers roughly $30 to use this chip on Intel X58 based motherboards.

PC enthusiasts, manufacturers, and developers around the world have a lot to be excited about today with NVIDIA Corporation's announcement that it will be bringing the power and performance of its SLI multi-GPU technology to Intel's upcoming line of Bloomfield CPUs. With this winning combination, consumers will have an SLI platform designed for current and future graphics-intensive games and applications; these platforms can be powered by one, two, or even three NVIDIA GeForce GPUs, including the new, award-winning GeForce GTX 280 and GTX 260 GPUs.

New SLI motherboards will feature the NVIDIA nForce 200 SLI processor, Intel Bloomfield CPUs, and Tylersburg (X58) chipsets. The nForce 200 SLI processor features patented SLI technology for graphics bandwidth management and multi-GPU peer-to-peer communications, both required to optimize graphics performance.

"With GeForce-based visual computing application, our customers are experiencing exciting new ways to interact with their photos and videos while also experiencing the bone-chilling realism from our latest graphics processors," said Jeff Fisher, senior vice president of GPU business at NVIDIA. "Our SLI technology allows us to combine the power of hundreds of GeForce processing cores in multi-GPU configurations with Intel's latest CPUs for platforms that are sure to excite our customers."
NVIDIA says motherboards and PC systems with the nForce 200 SLI processor will be available from Acer, Asus, Atelco, Coolmod, Dell, Ditech, Falcon Northwest, Founder, Fujitsu-Siemens Computer, Gigabyte, Haier, Hypersonic PC, Iqon/Commodore, K&M, Komplett, Komputronik, Legend, Maingear, Medion, MSI, Multirama, Next, Scan Computers, Sky Electronics, Tongfang, TS, Velocity Micro, Vigor Gaming, and more.

[Artad]

Yup I was about to come change my post with regards to this. Interesting considering both Intel and NV were adamant about it.

[WatcherZero]

from what id heard they wernt as hostile in private as they appeared in public. They had previously done it on the skulltrail of course.

[Winslow]

Things dont seem to be going very well for AMD, massive writeoffs and losses :P and Nvidia apparantly is having to set aside $200m because all the 8400m and 8600m processors are defective due the presense of an unidentified substrate that causes big heat retention problems the higher the heat cycles.

AMD always has cash flow problems. The semiconductor business is very expensive to operate. If the bad processor runs due to unidentified substrates are correct, then AMD still does not have a handle on the process.

I posted a couple photos of my Nehalem processors from Intel. I still need a Modo for these. Maybe Abit will come thru with my order.

[WatcherZero]

The bad run was from nvidia.

But yeah since AMD has been losing so badly in the processor race for the last year theyve wracked up some heavy losses and ATI losing until now in the graphics race hasnt helped either.

On the other side nvidia is preparing a writedown on the 200 series because theyve lowered their sales forecasts.