Build a daily driver.

[Tom_S]

My sister wants a new computer for her husband for Christmas, sub $400 so I'll use most of my daily work computer (that I just finished building) for her and build myself a new one. I don't need extreme or OC, that's what my sig rig is for, just something to do the everyday chores with. My ideas are below but I'm open to other solutions like PCI card controller for IDE, video card instead of onboard, etc.

Thanks,
Tom

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc

Daily tasks, AutoCad, dBase, web, streaming video, VMs,

2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?

let's try to stay under $1,000 tax and shipping incl.

3) Which country do you live in? If the U.S, please tell us the state and city if possible.

US, zip = 64506, its about an hour to Micro Center

4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. The word "Everything" is not a valid answer. Please list out all the parts you'll need.

Cpu - maybe i5 3550
Motherboard - maybe Asus P8H67-m PRO/CSM Rev 3.0
Ram - maybe 16 gb
Power supply - maybe Seasonic 500 to 700 watt range

5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.

Case = Antec Three Hundred Two
HD = Crucial M4 128 gb and 2 80 gb ide drives
OD = LG GH24
Drive rack/card reader = NexStar SE
USB = SYBA Super Speed USB 3.0 PCI-Express Card

6) Will you be overclocking?

I don't think that MB will OC.

7) What is the max resolution of your monitor? What size is it?

1920x1200, 23" or 1920x1080, 25"

8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?

Now

9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? eSATA? Onboard video (as a backup or main GPU)? UEFI? etc.

IDE
Onboard video (but i could be convinced to buy a card) would like displayport but need DVI
Sata 3
Lots of fan headers
4 memory slots capable of 32gb
USB 20 pin box header (I doubt thats avaiable on any board w/IDE support)

10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If yes, what OS?
Is it 32bit or 64bit?
No but NE has a combo for the MB and Win 7 Home Prem and I have an upgrade to Win 7 pro on the way that was for this computer anyway

 

[Deleted member 88227]

Do you really need those two 80 PATA drives? I only ask because they are probably extremely slow, not to mention the price to get them to work on current mid-range motherboards just isn't worth it when for ~$80 you can have 1TB worth of space. (Like six times the space of those two drives)

That motherboard isn't bad, per se but I feel with your budget a ~$150 board will be much better for your current and future needs.

Also with your budget, since you do not need that many items you could get an i7. How serious are you with running VMs? Does AutoCad or dBase make use of multiple cores/threads? The only major difference between an i5 and i7 is the i7 has hyper threading (4 physical cores/8 logical cores) vs the i5 with no hyper threading (4 physical cores/4 logical cores).

 

[Tom_S]

Hi Skillz,

The VMs are to run a propritery data base program that is stored on the IDE drives, I will be glad for the day that I never have to deal with this program again. I have tried cloning the drive to a newer sata drive before with no luck. I'd love t ditch these drives.

Yes I would like some more flexibility choosing a MB, I did a z68 for a guy a while back and was real pleased with the results.

Yes an i7 w/HT would help the AutoCad, but I have another cad program that I need to use occassionally that needs to run in XP mode so I could benefit from Vt-d. My i7 3930k doesn't support that.

I an open to a PCI card controller for the IDE but I have no idea what to get.

Thanks,
Tom

 

[Deleted member 88227]

Oh I see, that does suck then.

None of the "k" series processor support VT-d. Get the non K version and it can make use of VT-d.

 

[Dangman]

As Skillz noted, all of the K series CPUs do not support VT-D. As such, if you had gone with the i7 3820 for your 2011 setup, that would have had VT-D but no overclock capability or those two extra cores. However, something is a bit odd with your statement: AFAIK, XP mode doesn't require VT-D at all. MS dropped that requirement awhile back according to this article:
http://www.everything-microsoft.com/2010/03/18/xp-mode-no-longer-requires-hardware-virtualisation

In any case, VT-D support is also motherboard dependent as well. So the motherboard has to support VT-D in order for it work. VT-D support in the Intel H61/H67/Z68 series motherboard chipsets weren't that widespread whereas the H77/Z77 mobos have slightly better support for VT-D. In fact, your motherboard choice doesn't support VT-D at all according to this. Not to mention that the H77/Z77 would have a better chance of supporting the Ivy Bridge i5s and i7s out of the box. As such, I recommend this mobo:
$130 - Gigabyte GA-Z77X-D3H Intel Z77 mATX Motherboard

Key advantages over the Asus you chose:
- VT-D support
- Better chance of supporting the Core i7 3770 CPU (I also recommend this CPU to you)
- Native USB 3.0 support which means less driver issues and such
- Front-panel USB 3.0 support

As for the PCI IDE controller, this appears to have decent Windows 7 support:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816132012

PSU wise, for a budget Seasonic built PSU, I recommend this PSU:
$64 - Antec NEO ECO 520C 520W PSU

 

[Tom_S]

Thank you Danny Bui and Skillz,

Looks like a good board for my needs, and thanks for sourcing the controller card, I was at a loss on that one.

Do you recommend the the i7 3770 over the less expensive i7 3770S?

Vt-d is not necessary for XP mode however one of the programs I run in VM (not XP mode) does benefit from direct access to certain peripherals.

If I decided to add a video card for better multiple monitor support is this power supply sufficient? (maybe 69xx or 79xx)

BTW I don't think i7 3820 was available when I built that machine, I built it for my own education and to test out some things that my clients had been asking about. Also some times you just want to try a build on the bleeding edge. I only do a build like that ever 5 years or so.

Thanks,
Tom

 

[cyclone3d]

As Skillz noted, all of the K series CPUs do not support VT-D. As such, if you had gone with the i7 3820 for your 2011 setup, that would have had VT-D but no overclock capability or those two extra cores.

3820 is plenty overclockable. Have mine running at 4.9Ghz right now. Just have to up the base clock.

You can overclock to 4.3Ghz by just upping the multiplier.

 

[Dangman]

Do you recommend the the i7 3770 over the less expensive i7 3770S?

Considering that there is only a $5 difference between the two CPUs, I'd go for the i7 3770 since it's faster and has virtually the same power consumption as the S model.

Vt-d is not necessary for XP mode however one of the programs I run in VM (not XP mode) does benefit from direct access to certain peripherals.

Ok just to be clear, what exactly do you mean by peripherals? KB/M and other items like that or straight-up NICs, storage controllers, video cards, etc? And are you sure that can be enabled using your virtualization software?

I'm making a point about this becase every instance I've seen VT-D actually in use is related to a Type 1 hypervisor like HyperV or ESXi or XenServer. I've never seen or heard of a Type 2 hyper visor (desktop virtualization like VirtualBox, VMWare Workstation, etc) actually enabling VT-D support.

If I decided to add a video card for better multiple monitor support is this power supply sufficient? (maybe 69xx or 79xx)

Yes. For any single GPU config out there, that PSU will be enough.

 

[Tom_S]

@ Cyclone3d,

Congrats on that OC. Thanks for that info as I have another build that I might consider 3820 for. BTW my 3930k runs 4.6 24/7, I can do 4.767 and 4.8 stable on prime95 but not 4.67 or 4.7. If I drop from 32gb memory to 16 gb it can do 4.9 and 5.0 stable but the core temp start flirting w/81c running prime95 which makes me nervous.

 

[Dangman]

3820 is plenty overclockable. Have mine running at 4.9Ghz right now. Just have to up the base clock.

You can overclock to 4.3Ghz by just upping the multiplier.

I stand corrected.

 

[Tom_S]

Thanks again Danny Bui,

I assumed that the Vd-t was used for direct access to the NIC so that I could remote in to the company server, but that access is set up for me so I don't know the answer. That legacy software and server is supposed to be replaced in the next 18 months, I guess I could keep an old XP machine running that is already setup for it. Its just seemed easier to do everything from one machine.

Does dropping that requirement change you mb/cpu recommendations?

 

[Dangman]

Thanks again Danny Bui,

I assumed that the Vd-t was used for direct access to the NIC so that I could remote in to the company server, but that access is set up for me so I don't know the answer. That legacy software and server is supposed to be replaced in the next 18 months, I guess I could keep an old XP machine running that is already setup for it. Its just seemed easier to do everything from one machine.

All right now I'm a tad confused: Were you planning on virtualizing that XP machine since it has that legacy software and server with this new PC?

Does dropping that requirement change you mb/cpu recommendations?

Only changes my mobo recommendation (Better UEFI interface):
$120 - MSI Z77A-G43 Intel Z77 ATX Motherboard

 

[Tom_S]

All right now I'm a tad confused: Were you planning on virtualizing that XP machine since it has that legacy software and server with this new PC?

Yes. I guess that was the wrong approach. The software was originally implemented when we were all running Win95 machines and updated to run on Win98, the original company that built the proprietary program and server has long since gone out of business and they have limped along since (it was a lot of money for a small company) the decision to change is long over due but I don't get much input on that. I don't even work directly for this company any more, I just work on contract when they need help. I don't make enough money from them to justify going to all this trouble but it has been a good contact point for meeting new clients.

Only changes my mobo recommendation (Better UEFI interface):
$120 - MSI Z77A-G43 Intel Z77 ATX Motherboard

I appreciate all your help, you do yeoman's work here and don't get near the accolades you deserve!

Thanks again,
Tom

 

[Tom_S]

Hi Danny Bui,

I found MB "ASUS P8Z77-V LK" at NE open box for $102.99. I've done an open box RMA with NE before, while it wasn't pleasant it wasn't the end of the world either.

I've not worked with MSI MBs before is the one you recommended superior to this ASUS board?

Thanks,
Tom

 

[Deleted member 88227]

We don't like to recommend open box deals in our builds. Simply because it's a gamble on whether or not you'll get everything you need in the motherboard packaging not to mention as you stated, RMAing the board should it go bad is some what of a gray area with NE. With that being said, the ASUS P8Z777-V LK is the most recommended motherboard around here.

 

[Tom_S]

Hi Skillz,

First, Thank you for all the hard work you put in helping people here. I will probably chance the "open box" deal since you guys think highly of this board.

I've had good luck with open box MBs from Micro Center and Newegg. The MBs from NE aren't true open box like from MC but are usually white box, The reason I had to RMA the one MB to NE was because the box contained the wrong MB. They aren't for the faint of heart because sometimes you have to reset cmos/bios to get them to post properly.

Whats the best deal now in 2x8gb memory (1333 or 1600)?

Thanks again,
Tom

 

[Deleted member 88227]

If you get this with the promo code.

$79.99 - G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600

Use promo code EMCNBGN47 to get $10 off that price.