Could someone give me some help/advice on new purchase

[xjack111]

Im about to buy a system from scan and Im just trying to get the final details sorted befoe purchase. Can anyone comment on any potential problems or whether they think there is a better alternative to my spec.

I basically need a powerful workhorse that isn't going to drop out very often like my current system does (current system is 3 years out of date). Im using lots of big VI and big sample sets. Looking in the £1500 range.

I do work a little bit with video and graphics (after effects). Sound and musi is my main work but I want something that can also handle a bit of video. Would this graphics card fall short? Would it help if I put in a NVIDIA QuadroFX Graphics card instead?

Any advice or comments greatly appreciated

SPEC so far..

Coolermaster RC-1000 Cosmos Silent Full Tower Case
Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD5, Intel X58, Sok 1366, PCI-E 2.0, DDR3 1066/1600/2000, SATA II, ATX
Prolimatech Megahalem 12025 (120mm x 25mm) fan Wire Clips
120mm Sharkoon "Golf Ball" Silent Eagle SE fan Quiet Case Fan inc 4x Speed Cable Set
120mm Sharkoon 1000 "Golf Ball" Quiet 19 dB(A) Case Fan
Sharkoon 3pin Voltage Adaptor Cable 12V -> 9.5V (Reduces Fan RPM and Noise)
AcoustiPack BLOCKS Acoustic Foam Blocks for 5.25"/3.5" Bays
Acronis True Image Home 2010 - System Back Up Software
Scan 3XS System - 1year Onsite Warranty (Mainland UK)
Scan System Configuration
60cm AKASA SATA2 DayGlo Blue UV - Right Angled Connection
Scan System Configuration (Details confirmed at checkout stage)

Qty Selected Specifications
1 *No Custom Colour Required*
1 Intel Core i7 920, D0 (SLBEJ) - Socket 1366 (B), Nehalem, 2.66GHz, Cache 8MB, 130W, Retail
1 Prolima Megahalems Super 6 Heatpipe Tower Cooler (Fanless)
1 **No Overclocking Required**
1 6GB (3x2GB) Corsair XMS3 DDR3 PC3-10666 (1333) CAS 9-9-9-24
1 512MB Gainward 9400 GT Passive Cooled , 700MHz GDDR2, GPU 550 MHz, 16 Cores, HDMI Out
1 *No ATI VGA Card Required* (NVIDIA Required)
1 625W Enermax MODU82+ EMD625AWT Modular Quad PCI-E Rail, ATX12v 2.3 , 88% Eff, AirGuard, SafeGuard
1 250 GB Seagate ST3250310NS Barracuda ES.2, 7200 rpm, 32MB Cache
2 1TB Samsung Spinpoint F3, 7200rpm, 32MB Cache
3 Scythe "Quiet Drive" Internal HDD Silencer for 3.5" HDD on 5.25" bay
1 *Solid State Drive Not Required*
1 Akasa AK-ICR-07S 3.5" Internal Multi Mem. Card Reader Incl. M2, Micro SD & USB port
1 Sony AD-7240S-0B - 24x DVDRW
1 *Blu Ray Not Required*
1 *No Soundcard Required*
1 Lycom PE-107 PCI-E 2 Port FireWire 800 (1394b) and 1 Port Firewire 400 (1394a) Card
1 AcoustiPack ULTIMATE Multi-Layered Material Kit
1 ***No Wireless Required***
1 Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition SP3 OEM - Single Pack
1 *No Software Required*
1 *No Software Required*
1 CyberLink PowerDVD 9 - Movie/Audio Player & Decoder Software
1 *No Software Required*
1 *Monitor Not Required*
1 *Keyboard Not Required*
1 *No Keyboard / Controller Required*
1 *No Studio Monitors Required*
1 Standard 3XS System Warranty - 2 Years (1st Year Onsite / 2nd Year Return to Base)

[Biscuit]

A better gpu would help you out in adobe apps but you dont need to go mental looking at Quaddro imo.

I dont see a motherboard in there?

How about an SSD for a system drive that would speed things up?

[xjack111]

Thanks a lot for the reply,

Ive added in themotherboard on the post, must have missed it.

If the quaddro stuff is going too far could you give me any recommendations on gpu/graphics card, or a vague idea what I should be aiming for,

I did think about ssd but to get anything in a decent size it is a lot more expensive and im not sure I could justify it.

Thanks a lot

[Biscuit]

Something like this maybe for the GPU... shame it isnt silent but there seems to be a severe lack of silent GPUs at the moment.

As for hard drives i just got 2 x 500GB samsung F3s which are running RAID 0... still has fantastic speeds and with them being single platter drives they are quiet and cheap too

[DarkStar_GT]

-- DVD drive?
-- Case sound-proofing needed?
-- Won't you want a HDD silencer of each (of the 5) disks?
-- OS ?

[xjack111]

Thanks!

If I am not using the graphics card intensively (ie whilst doing audio work), will it still give off a lot of noise. I did a quick google search and it seemed to be on the noisy side of gpu apparently, then again if it makes no noise when im doing audio this isnt a problem.

If that is not the case, are there any other quieter recommendations. I am a little wary about shelling out on all these cooling components and acoustic foam for the graphics card to be really noisy and ruin everything.

J

[xjack111]

Realised I missed a chunk of the spec, stupid. Have updated post

As for OS I was thinking of risking windows 7

Ive been using xp 64 without hitch but cant really justify sticking with it on a new comp when nothing supports it anymore. Can't face vista 64 due to the amount of problems there are with it and Im think of just taking the risk on 7.

[DarkStar_GT]

That looks pretty similar to the config i am thinknig about.

You've dropped back to 3Gb memory - was that intentional?

I am considering Windows XP 32-bit for the moment, then installing Windows 7 as a Dual Boot when its SP1 is released.

[PeteG@Scan]

To be honest Vista's been alright since Service Pack 1 and Vista 64 is certainly a better option these days than the now unsupported XP64. As long as your app's have been updated you should be fine going with either of them.

Silent GPUs are indeed lacking current. Going with a more powerful card may help you if you have Adobe CS 4 due to the fact you can offload processing onto the card via CUDA but you will certainly be affected by the noise from high end graphics cards. I suppose this will come down to which is more important the video or the audio. I'd be tempted to say that you may have to go with the lower powered passive card through, but only if your Adobe is happy to run on it but you'd need to consult the offical Adobe specs there through.

[Biscuit]

Im on windows 7 so far and im yet to have any problems with compatability at all

[xjack111]

Darkstar - that was a mistake, put it back now, does anyone think it would be worth going up to 12gb?

Again, thanks for the replies. I think I may just go with windows 7 64 as most people seem to have gone without problems so far and I really dislike vista.

As for the graphics card, my current, very weak graphics card is a ATI Radeon X300. I want to notice a very very significant improvement on this when working with 3d graphics and video. Am I likely to notice that with the 9400 GT? I know very little about graphics cards spec so I find it hard to compare. Audio is far more important but I just don't want to shell out and end up with a gpu that is as slow as the one im on currently.

J

[DarkStar_GT]

Darkstar - that was a mistake, put it back now, does anyone think it would be worth going up to 12gb?

Again, thanks for the replies. I think I may just go with windows 7 64 as most people seem to have gone without problems so far and I really dislike vista.

12GB? - depends what you going to do with it - huge Sample Libraries? Have a think about how many simultaneous instument you use and check their size on disk. or go for 6 to start iwth.

Windows 7 64 - double-check that you can get drivers for your devices.

I'm curious about the 9400GT too (I'll post separately about that)

[Biscuit]

I dont think a 9400 would be an immense boost but because it is Nvidia 9 series it should have CUDA support which will pass some of the processing onto the GPU rather than running it all on the CPU (as PeteG mentioned) i personally would still spend a bit more and get somethig a bit faster if you really want to notice the difference. Even the 9600GT would be significant

[Noggin]

Thanks a lot for the reply,

Ive added in themotherboard on the post, must have missed it.

If the quaddro stuff is going too far could you give me any recommendations on gpu/graphics card, or a vague idea what I should be aiming for,

I did think about ssd but to get anything in a decent size it is a lot more expensive and im not sure I could justify it.

Thanks a lot

you don't need a decent size ssd, you have a small one for your operating system and applications and then a normal hardrive for other storage.

[PeteG@Scan]

Even the 9600GT would be significant

The 9400 should be a jump up from the X300 which is a 5 year old design now. The problem with the 9600 cards is that the isn't a passive available. The's a 9500GT passive range http://www.scan.co.uk/Index.aspx?NT=1-0-17-568-0 (bottom 3) that may be better for the OP but they are still fairly low mid cards.

I've asked the purchasing team to obtain me some of the new Gainwood 2 series passives but having just checked out the benchmarks i'm not sure if they are worth considering. They appear to be great on being low power usage cards but they don't have much grunt otherwise.

Just looking at some midrange benchmarks here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...-220,2445.html

and whilst I was going to point at the ati solution here ( http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/512MB...-DL-DVI-I-HDMI ) the benchmarks there surgest that the 9500GT i surgestions at the top would be the best passive solution for you.

Past that if you want some real grunt your only option is a card with a fan. The best result i've seen so far is the Gainwood solutions which run quite quiet with resonable sized fans.

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/512MB...128-Cores-HDMI

I've had one running and it's not that bad as far as cards with fans go.

Acturly i've just been reminded about this passive cooling solution:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=878532

With a larger 92mm fan it could well be the best compromise if you want to go with a more powerful card.