cworkstation Version 2.0 - The Build

chrisWhitechrisWhite Littleton, CO
edited February 2009 in Hardware
I’m really itching to build a new rig that can do some of the things my current workstation sucks at and I’m really hoping I build one that’s as stable as it can get and I don’t have to crack the case open almost ever. These are my objectives, I’ll continue to share I start doing research but suggestions along the way would be awesome.

This is a workstation I want to build, I will do a fair bit of gaming on here but Maya, Fusion, Photoshop, etc. performance comes first.

Here are the things that are really important to me:
  • Stable
  • Fast CPU support
    • Hardware Virtualization
    • OSX86 Compatible
    • I’ve always run AMD CPUs in the past but I think Intel will be better for the hardware virtualization and OSX86 compatibility
    • I want dual-proc so I can go dual quadcores eventually
  • OS will be Server 2008 with VMs, I might try to dual boot with OSX86 as well.
  • Lots of RAM, I’d like eight DIMs available so I can put 16GB of RAM in without hitting the still highly priced 4GB sticks. I’d probably start with eight and add more as I go.
  • NVIDIA based motherboard that could theoretically become a CUDA Jesus Rays in the cloud machine.
  • I want two mid-range Geforces, one crunching on the physics and I’ll plan to update these moderately often, to begin with though, I’ll just use my current 7600GT cards. I’m throwing Quadro’s under the bus here, had nothing but trouble with these ‘pro’ cards.
  • RAID controller to run my system drives for screaming performance, I have two raptors now, I’ll probably get two more.
  • For media/data storage I want to build a LifeZero style RAID. That will probably be built later though.

Some other things I’d love:
  • Onboard Firewire 800 so I don’t need to fill another slot for it.
  • Is there another sound card maker that doesn’t suck and isn’t Creative? I want that one.
  • Two to four nics for the VMs or LAG. Having a Renderfarm is the long term goal.
  • Maybe upgradeable to a NVIDIA Tesla? I don’t know much about it yet but having all that processing power would be amazing.
  • Blu-Ray, probably just read for now.

The parts I’ll initially use because I already have them:
  • 2-4 2GB sticks of RAM (need to test two that were flaky)
  • Two 74GB Raptors
  • 2 7600GT Cards
  • If I did go AMD I might not switch the motherboard (M2N32-SLI Deluxe) but that board just doesn’t do it for me these days with things with compatibility issues.

This box is probably two to three months off so I’m just starting some light research on it at the moment.

Comments

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited February 2009
    Hold off until Intel releases their SMP Nehalems.
  • kryystkryyst Ontario, Canada
    edited February 2009
    Do you have a budget in mind cuz you are specing some serious power there and expecting a lot from one machine. It's not that you can't build a machine to do all that you can. But theres more practical reasons for building seperate machines to do seperate things.

    As for your list...it's like saying this: I want to build a car, I already have 4 tires and a bucket seat.

    I mean for the money you are looking at for that rig why not just by a mac and a gaming rig. Probably cheaper and you'll get more out of it.
  • chrisWhitechrisWhite Littleton, CO
    edited February 2009
    Wow, Ars really went to down on a Nehalems review, 13 pages? That's almost a dprevew. I'll read it after class, is there a timeline for it?
  • chrisWhitechrisWhite Littleton, CO
    edited February 2009
    kryyst wrote:
    Do you have a budget in mind cuz you are specing some serious power there and expecting a lot from one machine. It's not that you can't build a machine to do all that you can. But theres more practical reasons for building seperate machines to do seperate things.

    As for your list...it's like saying this: I want to build a car, I already have 4 tires and a bucket seat.

    I mean for the money you are looking at for that rig why not just by a mac and a gaming rig. Probably cheaper and you'll get more out of it.

    Right, okay, so this is a dream machine, what I want to do now is get a machine that can live up to new upgrades for two or three years so let's boil it down to the pieces I want to start out with.

    I really don't want to buy two computers and OSX86 isn't a huge deal but I would love to have it for editing work I do sometimes and I can do that on my laptop, but it's getting a bit slow.

    All the 3D & VFX stuff is going to happen on the Windows side. I only think I'll have one VM running all the time, the others I flip on when I want to learn something like *nix, it's not something that's going to be mission critical full time.

    So let's revise the list to what I want and what I want the options for.

    • Stable *In Windows*
    • Dual CPUs that will be upgradeable to highend quadcores in the long run. Getting two midrange dualcores are fine for now.
      • Supports Hardware Virtualization
    • 8 Dims on the motherboard open but I can live with just four. For now, 4-8GBs of ram is fine. If the 4GB sticks drop as much as everything else has I don't mind not eight slots.
    • SLI 7600GT pair that I already own, upgraded to a single mid-range geforece later and then add a second one futher down the road. I just want the motherboard able to handle what's out now and what's probably down the road.
    Probably not a big deal:
    • NVIDIA motherboard because I assume that playes best with the GPU and will work best with CUDA. Not a big deal either way though, it's what I have in the M2N32-SLI Deluxe and I like the setup.
    • RAID controler can be software, it works perfectly on my current computer.
    The big data/media RAID will be put together seperatly when I get some editing work coming in that will justify building it.

    I already have a good case, great fans, monitor, keyboard, mouse, speakers etc.

    That leaves me only two components, motherboard and CPU I want to buy now and everything else can slip into place over the next six months or a year.

    Is that more manageble?
  • LeonardoLeonardo Wake up and smell the glaciers Eagle River, Alaska Icrontian
    edited February 2009
    That leaves me only two components, motherboard and CPU I want to buy now and everything else can slip into place over the next six months or a year.

    Is that more manageble?
    That's not advisable. Six months to a year from now most likely, unless it's the case and peripherals, you won't be satisified with the 'old' parts you've stockpiled. Upgrading an existing, working machine with new parts (or new-to-you) makes sense; you upgrade exactly to your needs and budget. Compiling parts over an extended time frame for the purpose of building a top of the line computer is not a good plan, IMO. Chances are, when you finally procure that last part at the end of your procurement term, the first and second parts that have been waiting in the parts bin won't be so attractive to you anymore. If in six months you still want the same motherboard and CPU that you are contemplating now, well, then just buy them six months to a year from now, not now, and they will 50% cheaper!
  • chrisWhitechrisWhite Littleton, CO
    edited February 2009
    Ha, I'm just not explaining myself clearly, I'm not trying to stockpile, I am upgrading my current computer, just the motherboard and CPU for now with plans to upgrade RAM, GPU and a even better CPU in the future. I just want to choose which motherboard to get that will suite my needs for the next six months and be okay for the next year or two.

    I'm trying to anticipate where I'll be going in future upgrades. These are the things I think I'll want no or soon, so I'm looking for input on what motherboard might be a good choice given what I'll want in near future.
  • kryystkryyst Ontario, Canada
    edited February 2009
    I'll agree with Leo. If you don't need it now save your money and buy it when you do need it. 6 months from now buying todays stuff will save you a significant chunk or you'll be buying 6 months newer technology for what your budgeting.

    $1300 gets you a 20" iMac subtract the games and it'll do everything you are asking in spades.

    Mac Pro's start around $3000 with dual quad processors xeon's. They support 32gigs of ram and have 4 pci-e slots that can do up to 4 video cards or 2 video cards if you are using a raid card and/or fiber channel card. It'll run osx and give you the option of running windows off a boot camp partition you can also run parallels and get full acess to that boot camp partition while in osx and it's rock solid stable. They are seriously sick machines. Plus it's server class hardware so the hardware is very stable.

    Just to give you an idea
    $3800cdn
    • Two 2.8GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon (8-core)
    • 4GB (4x1GB)
    • None
    • 500GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
    • 500GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
    • None
    • None
    • 2 x ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MB
    • One 16x SuperDrive
    • None
    • None
    • Apple Mighty Mouse
    • Apple Keyboard (English) + User's Guide
    And it's still upgradable from that spec. Plus you can use some of your own components and shave some of that price down.

    You can probably spec out a comparable PC for less. But it'll likely not be server class components, which may or may not be an issue for you or not. But speaking from personal experience there is a difference when it comes to long term stability. However compare the pricing to dell smb servers and they are on the same field.
  • chrisWhitechrisWhite Littleton, CO
    edited February 2009
    You've got some good points there. I dislike iMacs, despite loving most things Apple, it's just not enough power to be my primary rendering system and, well, I think they're ugly ;-)

    The MacPro on the other hand is something I'm looking at and drooling over. It would probably be the rights system for my needs. The two reasons I'm exploring other options is the expense, which with some savings I can handle, but also that I just like building computers and I think I'll miss that if I don't have one PC around that I can bang on when I want to. I should probably just get over it. Once you starting hitting that price range though, you're also beginning to hit the level of getting a Boxx system, which I hear nothing but great things about and is specifically made for 3D so that's a big decision.

    For what it's worth, I run bootcamp, Parallels and sometime VMWare Fusion, the reason I want to go Server 2008 is just to educate myself better on the system as it's something we use at work and I'll probably end up managing somebody else's renderfarm one of these days, though they probably are running it on *nix.

    Thanks for the comments guys! Lots to think about.
  • LeonardoLeonardo Wake up and smell the glaciers Eagle River, Alaska Icrontian
    edited February 2009
    Chris, I think you are the perfect candidate for building almost-new, high performance systems. When top of the line hardware has been on the market for about six months, you will start to see drastic price drops for the new and very nice prices on well maintained, but used parts in the trading forums. What is six months? If it's a powerful system now, it will still be a powerful system but half a year later. Buying new provides a very nice feeling and the ability to return defective parts to the store or online vendor, but the advantages don't go much beyond that. Used quality components that are still fairly young will still perform well and usually will still covered by factory warranty. Start watching the trading forums to get a feel for how they work. There are some excellent bargains to be had. Today's $300 motherboard will perform just as well in August will be much less expensive. Oh well, you get the point. If you look at my signature you might think that I spent a small fortune on the parts. Nope, not at all. More than half of those components were purchased off of trading forums. Almost all of the parts I purchased new were at greatly reduced prices or had rebates. The 9800GX2 video cards I have were in the $350-400 range just six months ago. The most I paid for one was $215 shipped. (that's just an example)
  • chrisWhitechrisWhite Littleton, CO
    edited February 2009
    Wow, really? I've never even considered used computer equipment beyond maybe laptops. So what forums do you usually look for equipment on and is there a way to figure out whether people are legit, scamming or selling off bad equipment?

    I totally agree on buying behind the curve, I bought my 7800GTs when the 80000 line first started selling for instance.
  • LeonardoLeonardo Wake up and smell the glaciers Eagle River, Alaska Icrontian
    edited February 2009
    You can start HERE at Icrontic. Read the security guide at the top of the page, which will introduce you to security principles.
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