New rig Sandy Bridge vs. Gulftown?

MJOMJO Denmark New
edited September 2011 in Hardware
I am putting together a new rig, and for the first time since the Pentium 233 MMX I am looking at an intel based system. :eek2:
(I do have a laptop with a Core 2 Duo Penryn though but other than that it has been AMD all the way.)
I have narrowed it down to these two:
Core i7 Gulftown 970 3.2 Ghz vs. Core i7 2600K Sandy Bridge, the 980X is ridiculously overpriced. :hair:

The Gulftown will be used with an Asus Rampage III Extreme and the Sandy Bridge with an Asus Maximus IV Extreme
I am going to choose a Radeon 6990 4 GB as the graphics card would any of the above processors be the better choice with such a card?

The Rampage III is the most interesting of the two boards since I would really like to have a PCI port. It is for my Asus Xonar sound card.
That is not present on the Maximus IV, unfortunately.
Furthermore I am a bit pressured time-wise I have to order the rig at the end of next week at the latest. That means that I cannot wait for a 6-core Sandy Bridge that should be out soon. This will require another socket so I cannot upgrade later on without swapping the MB as well.

I am mostly satisfied with my current rig, but a couple of things is not good.
First of all it has to little memory in it. 4 GB isn't what it used to be. :)
I'm am looking at 12 GB for the new rig.
And then there is my dying graphics card. I toss it in the oven every 6 months give or take. After this treatment it works again.
But I do know that some day it will die I cannot keep doing it forever. ;D
And it would be a big investment anyway to buy a new card then I might as well get an entire rig. :bigggrin:
I will be ordering it through my workplace that means that the price will be a bit lower than standard. But you have to order a complete rig.

Comments

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    Core i7-2600k is faster than Core i7-990X in everything but select media-encoding apps.
    Nice choices on everything else.
  • shwaipshwaip bluffin' with my muffin Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    It's up to you if you think you need more than 8GB. I never get close to needing more than that unless I'm doing memory intensive stuff in matlab.

    You can also pick up a pci-e xonar card for $70, if you'd rather have the board without the pci slot.
  • MJOMJO Denmark New
    edited June 2011
    How about the memory bandwidth using sandy bridge vs. Gulftown?
    It is dual channel vs. triple channel if I am not mistaken.
    That should result in a lower throughput but does that effect real life performance?
    I was looking at 12 GB of memory since I am quite fond of having several browsers etc. open at the same time. But a 12 GB kit is hard to find when looking a dual channel.
    Maybe 2x6 GB kits, but that is more expensive. :)
  • Cliff_ForsterCliff_Forster Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    FX-8150 is where its gonna be at..... just sayin....
  • ErrorNullTurnipErrorNullTurnip Illinois Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    I'd seriously doubt you'd need 12 GB with just browsers. How much RAM are you actually using now?
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    MJO wrote:
    How about the memory bandwidth using sandy bridge vs. Gulftown?
    It is dual channel vs. triple channel if I am not mistaken.
    That should result in a lower throughput but does that effect real life performance?
    I was looking at 12 GB of memory since I am quite fond of having several browsers etc. open at the same time. But a 12 GB kit is hard to find when looking a dual channel.
    Maybe 2x6 GB kits, but that is more expensive. :)

    Dual for triple really doesn't mean anything. The memory bandwidth of both platforms is already so high that going to a third channel is trivial.

    You also don't need 12GB if your main concern is "multiple browsers at the same time." 8GB will do just fine for that.
  • MJOMJO Denmark New
    edited June 2011
    Thx for the replies, I think I will be going for the Sandy Bridge then.
    Both sockets are dead end technologies especially when the socket 2011 comes.
    (I hate that Intel changes sockets all the time)
    The Sandy Bridge is cheaper and faster at the same frequency except in very specific areas.
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    FWIW it looks like socket 2011 will (somehow) also have support for LGA1366 CPUs (Gulftown/Bloomfield).
  • MJOMJO Denmark New
    edited June 2011
    Here is the final rig, revision 5. There might be more changes, you'll never know. :D

    Due to circumstances I cannot change I have used a configurator with a limited selection. In some aspects.
    That means that in most cases I cannot swap a part for another brand etc.
    I would have liked to have picked every single component myself, but that is not possible. I can swap components myself later on but that is another story. :tongue:
    I am not that happy with the selected memory. Would have liked Corsair Dominator instead. And I would have liked 2x4 GB in favor of 4x2 GB that would have made it easier to upgrade later on.

    Processor: Intel Core i7 2600K 3.40 Ghz (should be able to OC it to ~4.4 GHz with a good HSF)
    Motherboard: Maximus IV Extreme Sandy Bridge
    Memory: Kingston DDR3 - 1600 Mhz - 8 GB (4 x 2 GB) HyperX
    Graphics Card: Asus EAH6990 3DI4S 4GB
    Hard drive: Western Digital VelociRaptor 600GB (2x 300GB
    Hard drive: Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB
    Optical drive: Plextor DVD recorder / Blu-ray drive
    Case: Antec Nine Hundred Two Midi Tower or Corsair Obsidian 650D (dunno if it is possible to get a hold of the Corsair)
    PSU: Corsair 1000 Watt Modular

    EDIT: Oh dear I forgot the nVidia 590 GTX 3 GB. Would that be a better choice compared to the 6990?
    Both of them are supposed to sound like a mix between a washing machine and a leaf blower under load.
    The nvidia card is a little bit cheaper but not much.
    And it's got CUDA and PhysX... hmm one problem solved another appears. :D
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    The 6990 is faster in virtually every game.

    Only a small handful of titles use PhysX, and nothing you do uses CUDA, I guarantee it.
  • TushonTushon I'm scared, Coach Alexandria, VA Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    Folding works better through CUDA, just saying. :P Eventually Pande Labs will get their AMD stuff working. Awesome looking machine you'll have there.
  • MJOMJO Denmark New
    edited June 2011
    Thrax wrote:
    The 6990 is faster in virtually every game.

    Only a small handful of titles use PhysX, and nothing you do uses CUDA, I guarantee it.

    Well I did fold a bit using CUDA, but it didn't amount to much. :)
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    If you use Adobe Creative Suite, NVIDIA is the right way to go until Adobe releases a new version that supports OpenCL.
  • TushonTushon I'm scared, Coach Alexandria, VA Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    MJO wrote:
    Well I did fold a bit using CUDA, but it didn't amount to much. :)

    Fix that! Fold more nao!
  • MJOMJO Denmark New
    edited June 2011
    If you use Adobe Creative Suite, NVIDIA is the right way to go until Adobe releases a new version that supports OpenCL.

    I only really use Photoshop once in a while.
    Would it make any difference there?
    I am not using Premiere, Illustrator etc.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited June 2011
    Not really. Biggest difference is with Adobe Premiere
  • SuperStrifeSuperStrife Florida
    edited June 2011
    I like to throw this down at anyone looking at the i7-2600K vs the i5-2500k.
    That extra 100$ goes a ways towards that second 590 in SLI.

    http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu,2971-4.html
  • MJOMJO Denmark New
    edited September 2011
    Just a quick update on my new rig.
    At long last it has arrived. I got my hands on it a couple of days ago.

    The long waiting time was due to the fact that the Radeon 6990 practicaly doesn't exist?. After having waited for a very loooong time I swapped it for two Radeon 6970 instead. Can't say I'm unhappy about that descision. :)

    The final config ended up with these components.
    Intel Sandy Bridge i7-2600K
    Asus Maximus IV Extreme
    8 GB Kingston HyperX 1600 MHz DDR3.
    2x Asus Radeon 6970
    Corsair HX 1000 W PSU
    2x 600 GB WD Raptors in Raid-0
    2 TB WD Caviar Green for storage
    Plextor PX-B320SA optical drive.
    Coolermaster V8 HSF (that got damaged during shipping. I am waiting for a replacement. That means I am stuck with stock fan for now :rolleyes:)
    All housed in a Antec 902. I might swap that for a Corsair Obsidian later. :thumbup

    I will be getting a decent sound card later as well. Probably the Asus Xonar D2 with PCI-E interface.
    The onboard sound is horrible. :hair:;D
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