LITTLEBLACKDOG.COM

Well after a few hours of shopping I've come to the conclusion that I'm lost.

I'm looking to get a second system. One that will basically do some like web server work, along with ftp, mail and probably some other stuff in the future. It'll be running BSD, and I've got everything picked out except for the main part;

You guessed it, the CPU and MB.

First Id like to go with AMd. Never had issues with them, and I like sticking with folks that dont' give me issues. However I've got no idea whats the good choices, and what's entry level anymore. AM@, 754, 939, 940 what the heck is the pecking order?!

I'm also looking for a board that is pretty solid, has onboard video, SATA and RAID support, but of course without knowing what chip to go with, the selections are monstrous.

And now I read about VIA's new offering where their power consumption is like a 1/10th of AMD/Intel? Needless to say, I coudl use some help here.

Posted: Sat Sep 23, 2006 12:43 pm Post subject:

Amd's 940 is there latest generation chip and replaces the 939 chips as there flagship chips. Key difference is that the 940 chips support ddr2 memory where as the 939 chips don't. The 754 chips are the third in the line of chips (I think).

Unless you have a socket 939 board go with the am2(a.k.a. 940 socket) this will give you a good board / features with the chip you decide to use.

I would recomend one of the m2n boards from asus (depending on features / chip you decide to get).

http://usa.asus.com/products2.aspx?l1=3&l2=101

imho

Posted: Sat Sep 23, 2006 1:03 pm Post subject:

Go with a Dual CPU board with Dual Core Opteron CPU's. I bought one for work and it runs great.

ASUS K8N-DL Dual Socket 940 NVIDIA nForce4 Professional Extended ATX Server Motherboard - Retail

AMD Dual-Core Opteron 265 Italy 1.8GHz Socket 940 Processor Model OSA265CBBOX - Retail

I went with the cheaper processor, but you can see the 5 dual core opteron processors they have here:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?N=50001028+1050706979+1051707445+1302420180+1302820275&Submit=ENE

Posted: Sat Sep 23, 2006 1:06 pm Post subject:

BTW, I started out with a GB of Ram but I have 3 more GB's on the way since the pagefile has grown in size since I migrated our e-mail users from bellsouth to our exchange server.

Overall the MB is great...has 6 DDR slots that can support 24GB overall...for our config I doubt we will outgrow it anytime soon. I can still throw in a second Dual Core CPU if needed

Posted: Sat Sep 23, 2006 1:09 pm Post subject:

Holy crap that'd be awesome, but might be a bit high for what I need at this time. For some reason when I think Dual's I"m thinking big iron (aka DB servers and the like)

Something to consider if I can tighten the ole belt a bit and might actually work out well for other options that are more CPU/memory intensive.

Posted: Sat Sep 23, 2006 3:43 pm Post subject:

The dual core dual socket quad-processing option that Extreme suggested is probably good for a heavily-loaded server. For lighter use, a single-socket system would be significantly less expensive. I don't know much about servers, but my suggestion is in bold, below.

Here is the socket situation for AMD:
Socket-754 is completely obsolete. It uses single channel unbuffered DDR memory.
Socket-939 is obsolete. It uses dual channel unbuffered DDR memory.
Socket-940 is obsolete. It uses dual channel registered DDR memory.
Socket-AM2 is current for desktops. It uses dual channel unbuffered DDR2 memory.
Socket-F is current for multi-processor servers. It uses dual channel registered DDR2 memory.

Here are a few things to consider for Socket-AM2:
$154 AMD Athlon64 X2 3800+ Windsor 2.0 GHz 2x512KB level 2 cache dual core socket-AM2 processor with HSF
or $165 AMD Athlon64 X2 3800+ 65W Brisbane 2.0 GHz 2x512KB level 2 cache dual core socket-AM2 processor with HSF
or $249 AMD Athlon64 X2 4600+ Windsor 2.4 GHz 2x512KB level 2 cache dual core socket-AM2 processor with HSF
or $ 41 AMD Sempron64 2800+ Manila 1.6 GHz 128KB level 2 cache single core socket-AM2 processor with HSF

$ 89 Gigabyte GA-M55plus-S3G socket-AM2 ATX motherboard with NVidia GeForce 6100 chipset and integrated DX9 graphics
or $ 89 ASUS M2V socket-AM2 ATX motherboard with VIA K8T890 chipset

For Intel, the desktop chip to have is C2D for LGA-775:
$320 Intel C2D E6600 Conroe 2.4 GHz 4M shared level 2 cache LGA-775 dual-core processor with HSF
or $180 Intel C2D E6300 Conroe 1.86 GHz 2MB shared level 2 cache LGA-775 dual-core procesosr with HSF

$156 Gigabyte GA-965G-DS3 LGA-775 ATX motherboard with Intel G965 chipset and integrated craptastic Intel graphics
or $146 ASUS P5B LGA-775 ATX motherboard with Intel P965 chipset

DDR2 memory prices have risen with the recent strong demand:
$280 -15MIR 2x1GB Muskin PC2-6400 5-5-5-12 1.9V unbuffered DDR2-800 memory
or $221 2x1GB Mushkin PC2-5300 5-5-5-12 1.9V unbuffered DDR2-667 memory

Since this is a server, you could use integrated graphics or add a low-priced graphics card:
$ 56 Gigabyte GeForce 7300LE 128MB (+turbocache) PCI-Express X16 graphics card with passive cooling
or $112 HIS Radeon X1300 128MB (+hypermemory) PCI-Express X1 graphics card
or $ 56 eVGA GeForceFX 5500 128MB PCI graphics card

P.S.: A 4-way motherboard with 4 socket-F dual-core Opteron 8216 (2.4GHz) processors and 8GB of PC2-5300 would set you back about $8K, but 8-way processing is pretty good computing density for a single motherboard.

Leg Humper Joined: 01 Jun 2004 Posts: 4702 Location: Utah

JAE pretty much gave all the advice neccessary... But I have one comment.

If you're going to be running *nix (like you said), do NOT get a motherboard with the ATI XPRESS chipset! *nix support for this chipset is flaky at best, and several issues are well-known (i.e. with APIC the hardware clock appears to tick way faster than normal - as much as three times as fast as normal).

Posted: Sat Sep 23, 2006 9:34 pm Post subject:

You will notice that none of the motherboards that I linked uses an ATI chipset. For Windows use, an ATI chipset would be a good choice.

Leg Humper Joined: 01 Jun 2004 Posts: 4702 Location: Utah

JustAnEngineer wrote:
You will notice that none of the motherboards that I linked uses an ATI chipset. For Windows use, an ATI chipset would be a good choice.

Yes, the ATI chipset works great under Windows. Even though you didn't link any, figured I'd warn him anyway, so he wouldn't make the same mistake I made. I've got it working properly now - but it wasn't fun. Sad

Posted: Sun Sep 24, 2006 8:21 am Post subject:

ya ATI si not on my happy list thats' for sure

SOme good suggestions folks. I'll have a look at these this week and see if they sell any of this up my way.

Posted: Sun Sep 24, 2006 9:16 am Post subject:

You seem to have a few things north of the border.
http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=19355&vpn=90-MBB4E5-G0UAYZ&manufacture=ASUS
http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=19144&vpn=BX80557E6600&manufacture=Intel
http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=18580&vpn=TWIN2X2048-6400C4&manufacture=CORSAIR
http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=19341&vpn=996527&manufacture=MUSHKIN
http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=17284&vpn=128-P1-N320-LX&manufacture=eVGA

Posted: Mon Oct 02, 2006 2:07 pm Post subject:

Well went with the following. WE'll see hwo well this works Smile

AMD Athlon64 X2 3800+ AM2 Dual-Core Processor, Retail

Asus M2N-MX AM2 GF6100 MATX Mainboard - PCI-E/DDR2/SATAII/RAID/GbE/Video

Crucial 1GB DC PC2-5300 DDR2 Memory Kit *ECC*

Antec TruePower2.0 380w Power Supply, Retail

4 x Seagate NL35 250Gb 7200RPM 16Mb SATAII Hard Drive, 5yr

1 x 3Com Office Connect 4 Port Cable/DSLRouter

1 x APC BackUPS ES 500VA UPS Battery w/RJ45 & Coax Protection, Black

1 x Antec SLK3000B Mid-Tower Case NO PS, Black

1 x Plextor PX-755SA 16X DVD±RW SATA Drive, Beige/Black

Lycander wrote:

JustAnEngineer wrote:

Lycander wrote: