Athlon or Opteron? Help me future-proof my box

[ho72]

I am soon to build a rig for image editing and page layout. I use Photoshop for files that can go beyond 500Mb, sometimes far beyond (but that's rare). I also use Illustrator, FreeHand and InDesign as well as other less well-known apps. I don't do games. I don't need or want SLI. I have already purchased a Matrox P650 PCIe board for the video chores. I need, or at least prefer, two conventional PCI slots since I will be using at least one legacy SCSI drive, a Maxtor Atlas IV, attached to an Adaptec 19160N. The other PCI slot is for my modem. I could use an external modem if I'm forced to.

My first inclination was to go the Athlon X2 route, for it seemed to me to offer the best power to cost ratio. In this arena I was looking at the Tyan K8E and perhaps the 4400 X2. For now, I would want 4G of RAM to work reliably (apparently this is an issue with some boards).

However, I am becoming interested in dual core Opterons (265) simply because of the ability to break the 4G RAM barrier when I migrate to a 64bit OS and apps. The Opteron boards I'm looking at (for $ reasons) are the Asus K8N-DL and the Foxconn NFPIK8AA, a single-socket board.

I want *whatever* I build to last as long as practically possible because I HATE the process of installing and tweaking and fiddling with a new machine. I just want to use the damn thing. SO, that's why I'm looking hard at the Opterons right now--I can slap in 3 or 4G of RAM right away and add more when Vista and Photoshop force me to do so. Maybe even add a processor if I choose a 2 socket board.

Lest you think I jest about hating the work involved in setting up a new box, I am currently using an Abit BM6 with a Celeron Tualatin 1.2G and 768Mb of RAM. This board was originally home to a Celly 300A and I have upgraded it 3 times; the last time was about 2 years ago.

So... what do y'all think? I have been lurking on this board for a few days and I can see that there is a fair amount of experience and expertise here. I don't have much of either and I'd be grateful for the help.

BTW, whatever happened to the 1XX series of Opterons? Vaporware? And, if they ever arrive, will they be 939s or 940s?

Thanks

 

[Dan_D]

I am soon to build a rig for image editing and page layout. I use Photoshop for files that can go beyond 500Mb, sometimes far beyond (but that's rare). I also use Illustrator, FreeHand and InDesign as well as other less well-known apps. I don't do games. I don't need or want SLI. I have already purchased a Matrox P650 PCIe board for the video chores. I need, or at least prefer, two conventional PCI slots since I will be using at least one legacy SCSI drive, a Maxtor Atlas IV, attached to an Adaptec 19160N. The other PCI slot is for my modem. I could use an external modem if I'm forced to.

My first inclination was to go the Athlon X2 route, for it seemed to me to offer the best power to cost ratio. In this arena I was looking at the Tyan K8E and perhaps the 4400 X2. For now, I would want 4G of RAM to work reliably (apparently this is an issue with some boards).

However, I am becoming interested in dual core Opterons (265) simply because of the ability to break the 4G RAM barrier when I migrate to a 64bit OS and apps. The Opteron boards I'm looking at (for $ reasons) are the Asus K8N-DL and the Foxconn NFPIK8AA, a single-socket board.

I want *whatever* I build to last as long as practically possible because I HATE the process of installing and tweaking and fiddling with a new machine. I just want to use the damn thing. SO, that's why I'm looking hard at the Opterons right now--I can slap in 3 or 4G of RAM right away and add more when Vista and Photoshop force me to do so. Maybe even add a processor if I choose a 2 socket board.

Lest you think I jest about hating the work involved in setting up a new box, I am currently using an Abit BM6 with a Celeron Tualatin 1.2G and 768Mb of RAM. This board was originally home to a Celly 300A and I have upgraded it 3 times; the last time was about 2 years ago.

So... what do y'all think? I have been lurking on this board for a few days and I can see that there is a fair amount of experience and expertise here. I don't have much of either and I'd be grateful for the help.

BTW, whatever happened to the 1XX series of Opterons? Vaporware? And, if they ever arrive, will they be 939s or 940s?

Thanks

Let me just start by saying, that "future proofing" your box doesn't exist. I see that term alot on the forums and I'll tell you that this is a fantasy. New sockets come out every year to 1.5 years, updated drive interfaces in about that interval and new ram technologies appear quickly as well. Lets not even go into CPU's and video cards. Let's be frank, upgrade paths are actually alot shorter than all the marketting people in the computer industry would have you believe. Fact is, sockets, PSU's, memory and video cards have much shorter spans of usefullness for high end work than we'd all like to accept.

In order to keep "current" you'll be like me and have to upgrade constantly. Which also means that you'll need to replace motherboards, video cards and CPU's more often than you'd probably like.

So here is my advice, if you really hate messing with your machine, build the most badass high performance rig you can now, and you shouldn't need to touch it aside from maybe adding additional hard drives and memory, from time to time as needed. Then in three years, replace the whole system.

As far as Windows XP Professional x64 Edition goes, I'll tell you now to avoid it. This is comming from someone who is running it right now. There are too many app compatibility issues (installers mostly) and there is a distinct lack of hardware support with it.

Photoshop is still 32bit and will not see any bennefits from being run on the 64bit OS.

Opteron vs. Athlon X2.

My recommendation is to stick with the Athlon X2. It will give you 90-95% of everything the Opteron can give you at a fraction of the cost. The memory, PSU, case, and motherboards are more expensive than they are with the X2. Even if you stick with a uni-processor dual core Opteron. You'll still be looking at more cash to run one of those. Plus the Opteron won't give you anything over the X2 in a single processor configuration. Although, the platform is more robust, it's overkill for most people's needs. Including my own. When doing SQL or some other application that can take advantage of NUMA, the Opteron will shine against the X2. Also, when more than 2 cores are needed, the Opteron has advantages in scalability. These things are not generally needed in the desktop enviroment.

I simply have a dual Opteron system for the simple reason that I got a good deal on them thanks to the AMD Tech Tour bundle. However, a X2 4800+ based system. would serve my needs just as well as an Opteron system does. And do so cheaper.

 

[ho72]

Let me just start by saying, that "future proofing" your box doesn't exist.... In order to keep "current" you'll be like me and have to upgrade constantly..... in three years, replace the whole system.

No. I'm not interested in staying "current", at least as I understand you to mean it. I need a computer that runs my apps in a stable, reliable and efficient manner. The machine I am using now runs the "Amd Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core CPU - Photoshop Test" (found in a current thread in this forum) in a tick under 4 minutes; the fastest participants run it in under 30 seconds. Yet my computer doesn't *seem* all that slow to me because it's all I ever use. And it cranks out my work day after day without a hiccup or complaint. That's what I want from my new computer. For a long time.

As far as Windows XP Professional x64 Edition goes, I'll tell you now to avoid it. This is coming from someone who is running it right now. There are too many app compatibility issues (installers mostly) and there is a distinct lack of hardware support with it.

I have no intention of moving to Vista (or whatever) until I'm forced to. I address this in my next comment.

Photoshop is still 32bit and will not see any benefits from being run on the 64bit OS.

Right. This is where the "future proofing" comes in. Since I fully expect to be using whatever I build for a minimum of 5 years (built my current box in '99), I will almost inevitably upgrade to the 64 bit version of Photoshop during that time, and, for better or worse, the Windows 64 bit OS (Vista, SP3?). Since optimal memory requirements will then surpass the 4G limit imposed by today's Athlon boards, the Opteron becomes a possible solution. Whether two dual core processors will be an advantage won't be known for some time. It depends on how they code those future pieces of software. Having an extra socket may or may not be an advantage. Even if I go with the Foxconn board (single socket Opteron) I can still use 8G of RAM. That may get me by quite nicely.

My recommendation is to stick with the Athlon X2. It will give you 90-95% of everything the Opteron can give you at a fraction of the cost.

See previous paragraph.

I appreciate the comments. It may seem as though I have my mind made up, but I really don't. I just want to make sure I thoroughly examine my options before I make a move. I've been guilty in the past of buying too conservatively (384Mb of RAM instead of 768, for example) and I don't want to make that mistake again.

 

[Dan_D]

Well, a dual core Opteron unit will cost quite a bit, but the performance is awesome. Take it from me, I use one for every day tasks and that includes some Photshop work as of late. I suppose if you want to spend the money, and you plan on having more than 4GB, plus the long term bennefits of muli-core, that is more than two cores, you might definately want to consider an Opteron. Bear in mind that its more scalable, but not necessarily faster than the X2.

Windows XP Pro x64 Edition works for all my needs, I've only got minor complaints, but its somewhat early to tell if support will get better for it, or if it will limp along with its current level of support until Vista comes out. Dual booting between XP 32 and XP 64 is a viable option.

 

[ho72]

Well, a dual core Opteron unit will cost quite a bit, but the performance is awesome.

What do I give up by using only one cpu on a 2 socket board, such as the Asus K8N-DL... for example, does NUMA work with a solitary dual core or do both sockets have to be populated?

Also, Asus claims 24G maximum memory (the board has an unconventional 6 memory slots: 4 on one socket, 2 on the other), so that works out to 4G per slot. Do the memory modules exist to make such a configuration possible?

Anything else a noob needs to know or be warned of before taking this plunge?

 

[Dan_D]

What do I give up by using only one cpu on a 2 socket board, such as the Asus K8N-DL... for example, does NUMA work with a solitary dual core or do both sockets have to be populated?

Also, Asus claims 24G maximum memory (the board has an unconventional 6 memory slots: 4 on one socket, 2 on the other), so that works out to 4G per slot. Do the memory modules exist to make such a configuration possible?

Anything else a noob needs to know or be warned of before taking this plunge?

NUMA requires the memory controllers of two chips. You need two seperate memory banks for NUMA, which means you need two memory controllers, which in turn means two CPU's. NUMA requires interleaving across two memory banks. On boards like the K8WE, you can not use the second PCI-E slot, as its tied to the 2200 Chipset, and you can't access 4 of the DIMM sockets without the second CPU. On the Asus board, that may not be true of some of the motherboard resources, but you can't have NUMA without a second processor.

Yes NUMA with six sockets is possible. I am using that configuration with my PC right now. NUMA also can't work with a single dual core CPU, as only one memory controllers is present. Dual core CPU's share a single memory controller built into the packaging. You can have NUMA with two dual cores, as two memory controllers would be present. The odd two DIMM sockets that are behind the CPU are tied to the second CPU and the first can access it through interleaving somehow. I am not sure how it works precisely, as I discovered it could be done through my motherboard manual.

On my board I have 8 sockets, but I can only get NUMA in six sockets, by populating bank 0 on CPU 1 and bank 0 and bank 1 on CPU 2.