Planning a new system
1 Jan 2013 23:16:53 UTC
Topic 196713
(moderation:
Hi all,
since my i3 gets a new 'home' and will retire from E&H soon I started to look around for a new backup-system which should also be a good cruncher.
My idea is to use one of new AMD AM3+ Vishera CPU's, running @ 4GHz. There are MB available with 2 PCIex16 slots, really running @ x16 and additional PCIe-slots running @ x4, which is still good for MW; this project does not need memory bandwidth.
The thing with the AMD architecture is the 'module' with 2 CPU's but only one FPU.
Does 'feeding the GPU' require an FPU? Is it possible to manage, that one module handles one CPU wu + feeding of one GPU runnning 2 wu's?
Price ist good, ~125 € for the MB and ~180 € for a 8 Core CPU @ 4 GHz, but will that be a flop and the bubble bursts after the first tests?
Would be very nice if the HW-Gurus post there experience here.
Regards,
Alexander
Planning a new system
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You could browse the hosts list to see what other people are using. Also I found a good way to compare systems is to look at my wingmen, and compare the time their systems took against mine.
Here's a couple of hosts with 8350's:
http://einsteinathome.org/host/5589200
http://einsteinathome.org/host/5782023
RE: You could browse the
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I compare my NVidias GTX470 (+Q6600CPU) & GTX 480 (+X9650 CPU(OC'ed) and
AMD/ATIs HD5870s (+I7-2600 CPU), results with my wingmens results.
Compare the almost identical systems, mentioned above, with an AMD FX(tm)-8150
and 2 GTX 560s and one with 1 GTX680.
The first mentioned is clearly OC'ed, resulting in a higher FLOPS count and
uses 2 GTX560 GPUs. Unfortunatly it also produces errors.
The second system, AMD FX(tm)-8150 (stock/factory-setting) and 1 GTX680, has
about the same throughput (GPUs/Binary Radio Pulsar Search (Arecibo) v1.32 (BRP4cuda32nv301), at Einstein and has not produced errors/invalids.
I'd rather use 1 GTX 680, or similar, then 2 GTX 560 or similar, also I never
overclock GPUs as they already are pushed to their limits, displaying
graphics v.s. calculating using CUDA, often 24 x 7 (x 365), isn't really
what they're made for.
Although these FERMI/KEPPLER GPUs, properly cooled, can handle this fine, they
sometimes still produces errors or driver-crashes, when using them to browse
the WEB, or displaying VIDEO files.
A suitable MoBo (+ memory!), P.S.U and case, is equally important.
Just my 2 cents of advice ;-)
Best wishes and health for 2013 to all.
Here is my specs which I just
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Here is my specs which I just built... "with out folding or the sort in mind only gaming but seems to work really well for this"
Motherboard MSI 970A-G46 Processor AMD FX-8350 Core 8 it's overclocked at 4.3GHz GPU NVIDIA GeForce GTX 650 Ti running the lastest driver 310.90 temp 35C maxed and not overclocked Memory is PC3-10700 it also is not overclocked but got 16GB. I am only running 1 GPU as of right now but in the next few months I plan on getting a new 1 this setup was bought just before x-mas at a frys store and cost was about $800 I used my older hard drives and tower case. I also havea liquid cooler for the processor and the cooler says temp is about 38C but processor real temp is about 43C. I have seen better specs than mine but for the money it plays all my games when I want to play which is not more than 4 to 6 hours any given day and not every day... it plays nes, snes, play station 1 and 2 all fine and the sims 3 and I have even played when doing this type of stuff though the game speeds do slow and the work units also slow. Hopes this helps...
PC setup MSI-970A-G46 AMD FX-8350 8 core OC'd 4.45GHz 16GB ram PC3-10700 Geforce GTX 650Ti Windows 7 x64 Einstein@Home
I can't speak too highly of
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I can't speak too highly of the sealed water cooling units from Corsair. I have H-80's on several machines ( bought here ) and they work a treat, keeping the temps some 20 to 30 degrees cooler on average. Notably I've never had an overheat alarm - I set that to the lowest threshold the BIOS will accept at 60 degrees and even that did not trigger on some of our hot days DownUnda recently ( high 30's indoors ). As they are heat exchangers only, not refrigerating, then you can't go below ambient and I reckon that's a great test.
Cheers, Mike.
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal
RE: I can't speak too
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I am running Antec KUHLER Hv(2)O 920 which is doing great only about a month old so far but time will tell all... Hopefully in the next month or so I can get this Antec Twelve Hundred V3 Chassis Full Tower Case
keep on crunching! :)
PC setup MSI-970A-G46 AMD FX-8350 8 core OC'd 4.45GHz 16GB ram PC3-10700 Geforce GTX 650Ti Windows 7 x64 Einstein@Home
RE: Here is my specs which
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Well, yes, it helps a lot.
I compared the results against my old i7 (first generation, @2.8GHz). The AMD is slightly slower, so it's not really an advance.
I'll wait for the new A10, the APU is said to be 30% faster than the current, which brings it in the range of the HD7750. And even a cheap MB has a pci-e x16 slot, really running x16. And a cheap 350W PS should do it.
THX for all the answers, they are welcome!
Alexander
RE: Well, yes, it helps a
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The AMD processor says it can handle up to 5GHz but I don't want to push that hard and 1 of the workers at frys said with the liquid cooler I have I can even push 6GHz without problems but the normal clock I think is 3.4GHz and the 1 sec. overclcok with my board only does up to 4GHz so I only pushed a bit more and it's very stable... I did however push it to 4.6GHz when testing and everything was great except with fah folding... like doing this stuff but I am sure it was either volts setting or memory timing that was off didn't mess with it too much... 4.3GHz is fast enough for me it lets me play my games nes,snes,ps1,ps2 and sims3 lol though I don't play 24/7 only once in a few days for 4 to 6 hours but doing things like this it can handle while not playing :)
Edit:
Oh and the temp is still 38C to 39C which is the liquid temp of the cooler processor is 43C on low fan settings if I want to run fans on high temp comes down to 28C and processor is 32C but I don't want the noise of the fans on high all the time lol
PC setup MSI-970A-G46 AMD FX-8350 8 core OC'd 4.45GHz 16GB ram PC3-10700 Geforce GTX 650Ti Windows 7 x64 Einstein@Home
RE: Hopefully in the next
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I have two of those bad boys, on my main Windows and Linux machines. They are great. Plenty of room, variable fans, awesome cooling, washable/blowable lint filters and cool electric blue lights. I put Corsair HX-750's in, very reliable with modular plugging.
[ The reason the Linux machine has an obscene 32GB of memory is because I develop on that, and gcc is crap with memory management when the C++ STL templates are expanded. So I compile in 3 minutes and not 23 .... ]
[ plus the 2GB GeForce GTX 650 Ti just loves the BRP work, more than a third of my credit total is from that machine ]
Cheers, Mike.
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal