Finishing up workstation need some crit and advice

[imashination]

Just on the power supply, 1.2 kwatts for such a basic system is insane, all of that will hapilly run on 450 watts or so.

Dont waste money on sli, it wont do anything in 3d apps.

[olson]

Why are you wanting to spend so much money on a system targeted at gamers and consumers? If you're going to spend that much money I would wait for the dual socket platform for Nehalem or look into dual socket Opteron systems or current Xeon systems. The board has six memory slots and supports 24GB so you would need all 4GB modules which are pretty hard to find if you can even find them and are very expensive. Going with a system that has more memory slots (so you can use 2GB modules instead) would be better if the quantity of memory is a concern. Cheers!

[olson]

I was under the impression that SLI did increase 3d application speed, otherwise I would find it kind of silly for nVidia to create the 4700 x2 the SLI quadro FX card. The setup is geared towards a workstation, high end maya, realflow dynamics, and rendering, and I need the texture support avaliable in the quadro cards. Preferably the 8k and the new shader model. Also Adam from Boxx was saying that the new i7 outdid 2 core duos and that its the fastest out there. Bottom line though is that I need a workstation and I dont have any idea when they are gonna release the dual socket boards for i7's.

Anyways says Olsen is a realflow specialist, what machines do they use that allows them to sit there with 2k resolution emitters and smile? Anywho Im after rendering power, speed, and simulation power. Ill probably install vista 64 and Linux of course.

Get a dual socket system to get the most from your money instead of spending over $1000 on a single processor. More processing cores for the buck with more memory slots to use cheaper modules. There are plenty of options but if you want a dual socket Nehalem system then Gainestown is scheduled to release Q1 of 2009. Cheers!

[Nea381]

Just on the power supply, 1.2 kwatts for such a basic system is insane, all of that will hapilly run on 450 watts or so.

Dont waste money on sli, it wont do anything in 3d apps.

I was under the impression that SLI did increase 3d application speed, otherwise I would find it kind of silly for nVidia to create the 4700 x2 the SLI quadro FX card. The setup is geared towards a workstation, high end maya, realflow dynamics, and rendering, and I need the texture support avaliable in the quadro cards. Preferably the 8k and the new shader model. Also Adam from Boxx was saying that the new i7 outdid 2 core duos and that its the fastest out there. Bottom line though is that I need a workstation and I dont have any idea when they are gonna release the dual socket boards for i7's.

Anyways says Olsen is a realflow specialist, what machines do they use that allows them to sit there with 2k resolution emitters and smile? Anywho Im after rendering power, speed, and simulation power. Ill probably install vista 64 and Linux of course.

[RobotClayton]

I think you can save a lot of money if you change a couple of things.

You can OC an i7 920 to 3.8GHz on air, stable. Get a nice cooler, and if the 920 isn't fast enough (should be though) Over Clock it. You could save a good deal if you used 1333 RAM. You will in no way shape or form need a 1000-1200 watt PSU. You're only going to be able to use one video card anyway, get a 750 watt supply and spend the left overs on a Workstation quality card.

Or heck, you have a big enough budget to buy a nice Boxx.

[Nea381]

Thanks for the response, I guess I was mistaken about power supply needs, I guess it depends on pci devices and number of processors. I will definitely look into it, Thanks

[imashination]

To give a rough idea, youre looking up to 150 watts for the cpu, 100-200 for the gfx card and then a fairly inconsequencial amount for the ram, mobo and drives. So the power draw is only likely to be around the 300 watts mark. Pad out some space so the psu isnt rammed to the limit and youll find youre perfectly fine with 400-500 watts. Personally id even say 750 is taking the piss a bit; its like sticking premium petrol in a mondeo, youd just be fooling yourself into thinking it makes a difference.

[vlad]

You can use this to give you an idea on your psu needs :
http://www.antec.outervision.com/