£450 Matlab and Sony Vegas pc for brother

[Stylis10]

the Quick sync would be ideal for what the system needs, then if a graphics card needs to be added later on he would have saved enough money by then to buy a decent graphics card.

[Stylis10]

EDIT! -double post

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I have come with the following build.



Here is the product page for the case:

http://www.thermaltakeusa.com/Produc...C=1465&ID=2029

The Intel motherboards are meant to have a stable BIOS. The motherboard has both USB3.0 and SATA3.0 ports. It is not in stock ATM so I would ring Scan.

[Stylis10]

I have come with the following build.

[IMG]http://i559.photobucket.com/albums/ss33/CAT-THE-FIFTH/Build3.jpg[IMG]

Here is the product page for the case:

http://www.thermaltakeusa.com/Produc...C=1465&ID=2029

The Intel motherboards are meant to have a stable BIOS. The motherboard has both USB3.0 and SATA3.0 ports. It is not in stock ATM so I would ring Scan.

The build is perfect, just shown my brother, he loves the setup, just not the case...i almost give up, you have done so much, thank you very much.

Ive decided im going to go for this build (i shall acquire the room to put the base somewhere), ill let him choose his own case, he wants a smaller case, maybe a micro-atx. ill leave that to him to sort out, even though ill be building it.

[circuitmonkey]

I've run into memory management problems in the past using MATLAB with only 4GB RAM. MATLAB likes to hold all of an array in memory at one time (yes I could have used multiple smaller arrays, but it was to much of a performance hit) so it may not be a bad idea to go for 6 or 8GB if depending on the type of programming your brother will be doing.
There is also a nice Library for MATLAB to off load some routines to the GPU, but IIRC it's a CUDA (aka Nvidia) only affair so if your going with a discrete GPU solution I'd start looking 9500 GT (pci-e 2.0) and above.

Hope this helps!

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Here are some articles looking at the gaming performance of the Intel HD3000 IGP:

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4083/t...2100-tested/11

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/gra...mance-review/5

http://techreport.com/articles.x/20188/17

Like I said ATM Quick Sync will not work ATM with a discrete graphics card although Lucid was working on a solution a few months ago:

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4113/l...n-sandy-bridge

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

The build is perfect, just shown my brother, he loves the setup, just not the case...i almost give up, you have done so much, thank you very much.

Ive decided im going to go for this build (i shall acquire the room to put the base somewhere), ill let him choose his own case, he wants a smaller case, maybe a micro-atx. ill leave that to him to sort out, even though ill be building it.

You can go with the Biostar mATX motherboard or a better quality Gigabyte motherboard for your brother's build:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigab...-raid-matx-vga

The are also the Intel mATX motherboards which also have USB3.0 too:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/intel...-raid-matx-vga

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/intel...s-raid-atx-vga

This case is not too big:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/silve...finish-w-o-psu

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/silve...s-atx-uatx-psu

The PSU is used as the main system exhaust though. AFAIK,the stock cooler should be able to fit under the PSU fine.

There is also this case too:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/silve...silver-w-o-psu

The black one costs more though:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/silve...silver-w-o-psu

Here is the product page for the Silverstone case:

http://www.silverstonetek.com/produc...G02-F&area=usa

There is also this Antec case and PSU combination:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/antec...bays-120mm-fan

However,the 380W PSU will limit the graphics card you can use and some longer cards like the HD5830 1GB may not fit unless you remove the hard drive cage.

I've run into memory management problems in the past using MATLAB with only 4GB RAM. MATLAB likes to hold all of an array in memory at one time (yes I could have used multiple smaller arrays, but it was to much of a performance hit) so it may not be a bad idea to go for 6 or 8GB if depending on the type of programming your brother will be doing.
There is also a nice Library for MATLAB to off load some routines to the GPU, but IIRC it's a CUDA (aka Nvidia) only affair so if your going with a discrete GPU solution I'd start looking 9500 GT (pci-e 2.0) and above.

Hope this helps!

It is interesting to know that CUDA can accelerate Matlab - it has been a few years since I last used it myself TBH!

To the OP don't forget the free Scan postage and the special offers web-pages I mentioned.

Edit!!

For the build with the full sized case I would get the following RAM:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/4gb-(...-9-24-xmp-150v

[Stylis10]

Right, now that im back (i needed a break my eyes were straining from all the searching), i shall try to build 2 systems (for me and brother). CAT, would you mind just approving the choices if i show them in the thread...considering all the systems considered and put together by you anyway i suppose they should be fine.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Right, now that im back (i needed a break my eyes were straining from all the searching), i shall try to build 2 systems (for me and brother). CAT, would you mind just approving the choices if i show them in the thread...considering all the systems considered and put together by you anyway i suppose they should be fine.

No problems!

[Stylis10]

Here are the builds i have come up with, the first is for me, and i dont know which of the last 2 to get for brother, please can you comment on any changes and such?

1.


2. Case coems with PSU


3. Case and PSU seperate


I will be gone for a while but will comment more when i get back.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

If you want a system to last you need to get a decent PSU and the CiT ones are not that great TBH.

I would be looking at a much better PSU. The second build looks better but I would change the PSU.

The XFX 550W or the following 520W PSU would do the job:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/520w-...ps12v-v291-psu

Both will give you enough power in case your brother wants to get a discrete graphics card.

Alternatively if he is going to stick with IGP or goes for a low powered graphics card you could get one of the following PSUs instead:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/400w-...mm-fan-atx-12v

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/pro45...l-power-supply

[aidanjt]

Note that Matlab now supports GPGPU computations using CUDA, so nab an nVidia graphics card.

[Stylis10]

If you want a system to last you need to get a decent PSU and the CiT ones are not that great TBH.

I would be looking at a much better PSU. The second build looks better but I would change the PSU.

The XFX 550W or the following 520W PSU would do the job:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/520w-...ps12v-v291-psu

Both will give you enough power in case your brother wants to get a discrete graphics card.

Alternatively if he is going to stick with IGP or goes for a low powered graphics card you could get one of the following PSUs instead:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/400w-...mm-fan-atx-12v

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/pro45...l-power-supply

Considering the 2nd and 3rd systems are excataly the same just different case and PSU, is it worth just gettign a different case witht he PSU's you reccomended as the idea for the CiT was that it came with the PSU and it was "shiny" (my brothers words not mine).

Im not extremly good with spotting differences, but would i be right in thinking all 3 systems are fundamentally the same? just different case and motherboard for system 1?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Considering the 2nd and 3rd systems are excataly the same just different case and PSU, is it worth just gettign a different case witht he PSU's you reccomended as the idea for the CiT was that it came with the PSU and it was "shiny" (my brothers words not mine).

Im not extremly good with spotting differences, but would i be right in thinking all 3 systems are fundamentally the same? just different case and motherboard for system 1?

The thing is that the CiT PSUs are not that great. One of my mates had one and went kaput relatively quickly and took out a hard drive in the process. I ended giving him a very old Globalwinn PSU(was a decent PSU at the time) as a stop gap and it still works!

At least you will get a few years of good service out of a better quality PSU.

[Stylis10]

The thing is that the CiT PSUs are not that great. One of my mates had one and went kaput relatively quickly and took out a hard drive in the process. I ended giving him a very old Globalwinn PSU(was a decent PSU at the time) as a stop gap and it still works!

At least you will get a few years of good service out of a better quality PSU.

oh i will undoubtably choose a PSU you suggested, but just wanted to know how similar all the systems are, they seem pretty much the same to me hence i was thinkign i might just stick with a small build too.

Im probably driving you mad with my decision changing, but i do appreciate all the help, for myself i want the pc to last a good 5 years before i replace it.

Is the CiT case a decent case or should i look for something more upmarket?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

oh i will undoubtably choose a PSU you suggested, but just wanted to know how similar all the systems are, they seem pretty much the same to me hence i was thinkign i might just stick with a small build too.

Im probably driving you mad with my decision changing, but i do appreciate all the help, for myself i want the pc to last a good 5 years before i replace it.

Is the CiT case a decent case or should i look for something more upmarket?

The Dokker is still a better case especially for the extra ventilation and expansion it offers. The same goes with using an ATX motherboard as you have more slots.

My current computers are a Shuttle SFF PC and a mini ITX based one but they tend to cost more and have more limitations when compared to a full sized build.

Edit!!

Here are some other micro ATX cases worth looking at in addition to the ones I suggested earlier:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/nzxt-...-(atx-psu-fits)

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/inwin...ng-case-no-psu

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/silve...ro-atx-w-o-psu