- Aug 20, 2014
- 15
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Background Information:
This is my first post, opinions, advice, etc. all welcome.
I work for a small IT consulting firm as a .NET developer. My department has recently got some budget for new hardware. Most of the dev's in my department are upgrading to new DELL mini tower workstations -- they're good machines, just not particularly impressive; I remarked on this, and my company has extended me a special offer: I can have a $2000 budget to build my own workstation instead -- if I'm willing to support it myself (that means handling all the RMAs, warranties, etc. myself); also this budget would have to include any monitor upgrades, etc.
My current "workstation" is a Lenovo ThinkPad W520 (4270-CTO). It's got a Core i7-2720QM CPU @ 2.2 GHz, 16 GB of RAM; 250 GB SSD (Samsung 840), and the world's slowest 1 TB hard drive (TOSHIBA MK1059GSM).
The video uses NVidia Optimus (it combines an NVidia GPU with the built-in Intel GPU -- my understanding is that everything ultimately goes through the Intel GPU, but that the NVidia GPU has direct access to the Intel GPU's framebuffer. The windows drivers add explorer shell right click integration so you can right click a program and say "Run with specific GPU" -- you can also select the default GPU for a given app -- it uses Microsoft Detours to accomplish this and the compatibility / performance is pretty poor regardless of which GPU you use. The specific model I have is NVidia Quadro 1000M).
I currently run three displays (and Dexpot) on Windows 7 (64-bit).
Display 1: ThinkPad display -- I think it's about ~14", 1920 x 1080
Display 2: ViewSonic VX2835WM -- it's a little over ~27", 1920 x 1080 -- connected via HDMI through a display port to HDMI adapter.
Display 3: Acer AL2216W -- it's about ~20", 1680 x 1050.
Operating Systems / Usage:
I want to be able to run a lot of different operating systems / VMs -- so hardware compatibility is a concern, also it's gotta support hardware virtualization, etc.
The primary OS it will run is Windows 8.1, but it would be nice if it was compatible with the latest version of Windows Server (so hardware from the compatibility list is a plus).
I would like to have the option of running Mac OS with okay compatibility (3D and sound must work -- must be usable -- not a gamer, but it should be able to run mid/low-end mac games and tools either: via dual booting as a Hackintosh -- or if I can get it to go via Virtual PC or Hyper-V that's fine too. -- I've experimented with running MacOS under Virtual PC on a high-end AMD machine and ran into a lot of issues; so probably best to stick to Intel, and maybe the specific mother board matters?).
I've also considered running it as a Linux host machine with Windows Clients hosted on VirtualBox (or another emulation platform), so long as the performance and compatibility is good (otherwise, I'll be running Linux guests under VirtualBox or HyperV).
Not sure if it's out of my price range or not, but it would be nice if the motherboard had some sort of low-level JTAG (or even a TTL-level serial port) that I can get access to without a lot of extra soldering / warranty voiding -- so that if I accidentally brick it during a BIOS/firmware update or something, or if I need to update the firmware without a CPU, etc., that I'll be able to recover from it. -- a removable JDEC-like ROM chip is also acceptable (do they even make boards with those anymore?) -- this isn't a hard requirement, but just a nice to have... -- even if it's out of my price range, etc. if you have any knowledge here, I'd like to know what my options are.
What I'm considering:
My next machine will be a desktop (or rather, a "tower").
I would like to max out all of the WEX scores (I know it's not the best benchmark, but at least, if nothing else, it'll be a tangible ego boost versus going with a Dell. XD)
I'd like to run dual SSDs in RAID 0 (striping) as my primary hard drive -- for higher performance -- so the onboard(?) RAID controller needs to not be crappy (if it's slower in RAID 0, or the TRIM commands aren't supported, etc. then I wasted my money). -- Recommendations on drives, RAID cards, or motherboard options are very welcome here. (Would like to upgrade to 3 SSDs in the future, but not a must.) -- I would like a total of at least 250 GB of primary storage via this array, but 500 GB is preferable.
I'd like to run one or two larger drives (at least 1 TB, maybe 2 TBs) with decent speed as well. -- Redundancy is less important to me than performance. Would like to shoot for drives with high cache and/or RPM if possible. If more than one drive, then likely again in RAID 0. -- I would like a total of at least 2 TB of secondary storage (4 TB is preferable).
VMs will be bound to these secondary drives, so there will be a lot of IO on them -- Low IO throughput is currently one of my biggest bottlenecks; It really slows me down.
I'm also interested in prosumer hardware caching devices / strategies to improve IO throughput (especially if they're transparent to the OS, and don't require drivers -- like battery backed write caches for the RAID card, etc... -- probably out of my price range, or does not exist in the prosumer market, but willing to listen to suggestions here).
As far as the CPU / cooler goes: at a minimum I'd like to see 4 GHz on this box -- 5 GHz is preferable. Not too worried about ECC support, so it doesn't have to be a Xeon, but I don't want blue screens (after the initial burn-in / stabilization), it's got to be a good solid overclocker without voiding warranties (so "Black Edition" products?). -- Right now, we're all using Core i7s, but if I can hit 5 GHz on a Core i5 (or equivalent) for substantially less budget impact, then I'm open to considering it.
I prefer air cooling, with low decibel coolers if possible. I've hit 4 GHz with off the shelf CPUs and budget grease (you know the kind with checkered flags or rocket ships on the side with super engrish brand names...) with such combinations (as an afterthought, the machines were never designed to be overclocked...) -- but advice is definitely welcome here if I need to adjust this strategy to hit a reliable 5 GHz within my budget.
It's gotta have at least 8 hardware threads (so quad core with hyper-threading works), but 12 or 16 (so hexa/octo-core or even dual-CPU is preferable)... -- again, this is not a gaming PC.
Now, I really like AMD/ATI hardware -- I run an AM3 hexacore at home with a Radeon HD 6970 -- I'm all ears for an AMD or ATI setup, I'm very interested in the new APU architecture and exploring OpenCL a bit more -- but their drivers in recent years, and especially abysmal Linux support (and also Mac support -- though, totally not their fault on that one) is leading me to steer away from them for a professional build... -- also in my experience, my recent Intel builds (especially overclocked) seem to be more stable / hardy than my AMD builds (maybe it's just me? -- ...but, I mean, I'm the one that'll be building/maintaining this monster, so...).
As far as RAM goes -- faster is always better -- RAM with heatsinks that can handle the overclocking, overvolting, etc. (to keep up with the overclocked CPU) is better. It needs a minimum of 16 GB, but I'd like it if the board could support 32 GB, and if, at 16, there was still one or two free slots (so a six slot / two channel board, with 4 x 4 GB modules installed is fine, as that leaves two slots open for later expansion -- also a four slot board with 2 x 8 GB modules is fine too, as that also leaves slots open for later expansion).
As far as video card goes, again, I like AMD/ATI, but I think it's going to have to be NVidia on this build -- again not a gaming PC, so it doesn't have to be super high end, but I do plan to do some stuff with the hardware accelerated video -- I might play games on it in my off time or do the occasional OpenCL development so a mid range would be nice. -- Also I plan to do hardware video acceleration on my VMs (for the occasional android development with Genymotion or to get Aero working in a VirtualPC VM, etc.) -- I would like to be able to run 3 monitors from the one card (I've found that just having extra ports doesn't mean the card can run all of them simultaneously). -- I would like the ports to all either be display port or HDMI -- if the card supports HDMI audio, even better.
If I can squeeze a monitor out of the budget (preferably a matching 27" ViewSonic VX2835WM, but anything 1920x1080 of >= 20" would be better than what I have now...)
What do you think?
So, I get that this isn't 100% doable for within my current budget -- but I wanna try to get as close as I can; so, what manufacturers / products should I be willing to look at? -- What compromises should I be willing to consider to hit my goals?
Who has the best warranty / RMA / customer service / most reliable and performant products? (again, if I build this, I will only get a very minimal level of hardware support from our IT staff -- if any at all -- I will have to handle all RMAs, warranty stuff, etc. on my own.)
What am I missing here? -- Are there questions that I'm not asking that I should be?
Opinions, advice, discussion, further questions, etc. are all very welcome. 🙂
Other Information (per the sticky):
Approximate Purchase Date: September / October 2014 ~ ish.
Budget Range: $2000
System Usage from Most to Least Important: VMs, Cross platform Development, Running way too much crap at once, mid-range multiplatform "gaming"...
Are you buying a monitor: I would prefer to.
Your Monitor Resolution: All are above in the "Background Information" section, I'd like to aim for another 1920 x 1080, 20" to 27" HDMI if I buy one. Would prefer another ViewSonic VX2835WM, (even if it's an ebay acquisition) -- just to have matched displays.
Parts to Upgrade: Everything, this will be a new build.
Do you need to buy OS: No, I have a premium MSDN subscription and have means to obtain all other required software and licenses legally outside of this budget.
Preferred Website(s) for Parts: You tell me. I've used newegg and amazon in the past.
Location: Redmond, WA USA
Parts Preferences: Intel -- but flexible.
Overclocking: Yes, absolutely, want to hit 5 GHz (4 GHz minimum).
SLI or Crossfire: No preference. Want to aim for the best mid-range and highest compatibility / support.
Additional Comments: Quieter is better, I've done fan-less video cards in the past in some of my builds -- but I'm willing to tolerate a little bit of noise to meet my performance / budgetary goals.
And Most Importantly, Why Are You Upgrading: because I can and I have budget to do so. -- Current machine is pretty awful at running VMs (bad IO throughput), and gets a bit loud at times (esp. under 100% CPU load, the fan really goes nuts), large projects take a long time to compile.
This is my first post, opinions, advice, etc. all welcome.
I work for a small IT consulting firm as a .NET developer. My department has recently got some budget for new hardware. Most of the dev's in my department are upgrading to new DELL mini tower workstations -- they're good machines, just not particularly impressive; I remarked on this, and my company has extended me a special offer: I can have a $2000 budget to build my own workstation instead -- if I'm willing to support it myself (that means handling all the RMAs, warranties, etc. myself); also this budget would have to include any monitor upgrades, etc.
My current "workstation" is a Lenovo ThinkPad W520 (4270-CTO). It's got a Core i7-2720QM CPU @ 2.2 GHz, 16 GB of RAM; 250 GB SSD (Samsung 840), and the world's slowest 1 TB hard drive (TOSHIBA MK1059GSM).
The video uses NVidia Optimus (it combines an NVidia GPU with the built-in Intel GPU -- my understanding is that everything ultimately goes through the Intel GPU, but that the NVidia GPU has direct access to the Intel GPU's framebuffer. The windows drivers add explorer shell right click integration so you can right click a program and say "Run with specific GPU" -- you can also select the default GPU for a given app -- it uses Microsoft Detours to accomplish this and the compatibility / performance is pretty poor regardless of which GPU you use. The specific model I have is NVidia Quadro 1000M).
I currently run three displays (and Dexpot) on Windows 7 (64-bit).
Display 1: ThinkPad display -- I think it's about ~14", 1920 x 1080
Display 2: ViewSonic VX2835WM -- it's a little over ~27", 1920 x 1080 -- connected via HDMI through a display port to HDMI adapter.
Display 3: Acer AL2216W -- it's about ~20", 1680 x 1050.
Operating Systems / Usage:
I want to be able to run a lot of different operating systems / VMs -- so hardware compatibility is a concern, also it's gotta support hardware virtualization, etc.
The primary OS it will run is Windows 8.1, but it would be nice if it was compatible with the latest version of Windows Server (so hardware from the compatibility list is a plus).
I would like to have the option of running Mac OS with okay compatibility (3D and sound must work -- must be usable -- not a gamer, but it should be able to run mid/low-end mac games and tools either: via dual booting as a Hackintosh -- or if I can get it to go via Virtual PC or Hyper-V that's fine too. -- I've experimented with running MacOS under Virtual PC on a high-end AMD machine and ran into a lot of issues; so probably best to stick to Intel, and maybe the specific mother board matters?).
I've also considered running it as a Linux host machine with Windows Clients hosted on VirtualBox (or another emulation platform), so long as the performance and compatibility is good (otherwise, I'll be running Linux guests under VirtualBox or HyperV).
Not sure if it's out of my price range or not, but it would be nice if the motherboard had some sort of low-level JTAG (or even a TTL-level serial port) that I can get access to without a lot of extra soldering / warranty voiding -- so that if I accidentally brick it during a BIOS/firmware update or something, or if I need to update the firmware without a CPU, etc., that I'll be able to recover from it. -- a removable JDEC-like ROM chip is also acceptable (do they even make boards with those anymore?) -- this isn't a hard requirement, but just a nice to have... -- even if it's out of my price range, etc. if you have any knowledge here, I'd like to know what my options are.
What I'm considering:
My next machine will be a desktop (or rather, a "tower").
I would like to max out all of the WEX scores (I know it's not the best benchmark, but at least, if nothing else, it'll be a tangible ego boost versus going with a Dell. XD)
I'd like to run dual SSDs in RAID 0 (striping) as my primary hard drive -- for higher performance -- so the onboard(?) RAID controller needs to not be crappy (if it's slower in RAID 0, or the TRIM commands aren't supported, etc. then I wasted my money). -- Recommendations on drives, RAID cards, or motherboard options are very welcome here. (Would like to upgrade to 3 SSDs in the future, but not a must.) -- I would like a total of at least 250 GB of primary storage via this array, but 500 GB is preferable.
I'd like to run one or two larger drives (at least 1 TB, maybe 2 TBs) with decent speed as well. -- Redundancy is less important to me than performance. Would like to shoot for drives with high cache and/or RPM if possible. If more than one drive, then likely again in RAID 0. -- I would like a total of at least 2 TB of secondary storage (4 TB is preferable).
VMs will be bound to these secondary drives, so there will be a lot of IO on them -- Low IO throughput is currently one of my biggest bottlenecks; It really slows me down.
I'm also interested in prosumer hardware caching devices / strategies to improve IO throughput (especially if they're transparent to the OS, and don't require drivers -- like battery backed write caches for the RAID card, etc... -- probably out of my price range, or does not exist in the prosumer market, but willing to listen to suggestions here).
As far as the CPU / cooler goes: at a minimum I'd like to see 4 GHz on this box -- 5 GHz is preferable. Not too worried about ECC support, so it doesn't have to be a Xeon, but I don't want blue screens (after the initial burn-in / stabilization), it's got to be a good solid overclocker without voiding warranties (so "Black Edition" products?). -- Right now, we're all using Core i7s, but if I can hit 5 GHz on a Core i5 (or equivalent) for substantially less budget impact, then I'm open to considering it.
I prefer air cooling, with low decibel coolers if possible. I've hit 4 GHz with off the shelf CPUs and budget grease (you know the kind with checkered flags or rocket ships on the side with super engrish brand names...) with such combinations (as an afterthought, the machines were never designed to be overclocked...) -- but advice is definitely welcome here if I need to adjust this strategy to hit a reliable 5 GHz within my budget.
It's gotta have at least 8 hardware threads (so quad core with hyper-threading works), but 12 or 16 (so hexa/octo-core or even dual-CPU is preferable)... -- again, this is not a gaming PC.
Now, I really like AMD/ATI hardware -- I run an AM3 hexacore at home with a Radeon HD 6970 -- I'm all ears for an AMD or ATI setup, I'm very interested in the new APU architecture and exploring OpenCL a bit more -- but their drivers in recent years, and especially abysmal Linux support (and also Mac support -- though, totally not their fault on that one) is leading me to steer away from them for a professional build... -- also in my experience, my recent Intel builds (especially overclocked) seem to be more stable / hardy than my AMD builds (maybe it's just me? -- ...but, I mean, I'm the one that'll be building/maintaining this monster, so...).
As far as RAM goes -- faster is always better -- RAM with heatsinks that can handle the overclocking, overvolting, etc. (to keep up with the overclocked CPU) is better. It needs a minimum of 16 GB, but I'd like it if the board could support 32 GB, and if, at 16, there was still one or two free slots (so a six slot / two channel board, with 4 x 4 GB modules installed is fine, as that leaves two slots open for later expansion -- also a four slot board with 2 x 8 GB modules is fine too, as that also leaves slots open for later expansion).
As far as video card goes, again, I like AMD/ATI, but I think it's going to have to be NVidia on this build -- again not a gaming PC, so it doesn't have to be super high end, but I do plan to do some stuff with the hardware accelerated video -- I might play games on it in my off time or do the occasional OpenCL development so a mid range would be nice. -- Also I plan to do hardware video acceleration on my VMs (for the occasional android development with Genymotion or to get Aero working in a VirtualPC VM, etc.) -- I would like to be able to run 3 monitors from the one card (I've found that just having extra ports doesn't mean the card can run all of them simultaneously). -- I would like the ports to all either be display port or HDMI -- if the card supports HDMI audio, even better.
If I can squeeze a monitor out of the budget (preferably a matching 27" ViewSonic VX2835WM, but anything 1920x1080 of >= 20" would be better than what I have now...)
What do you think?
So, I get that this isn't 100% doable for within my current budget -- but I wanna try to get as close as I can; so, what manufacturers / products should I be willing to look at? -- What compromises should I be willing to consider to hit my goals?
Who has the best warranty / RMA / customer service / most reliable and performant products? (again, if I build this, I will only get a very minimal level of hardware support from our IT staff -- if any at all -- I will have to handle all RMAs, warranty stuff, etc. on my own.)
What am I missing here? -- Are there questions that I'm not asking that I should be?
Opinions, advice, discussion, further questions, etc. are all very welcome. 🙂
Other Information (per the sticky):
Approximate Purchase Date: September / October 2014 ~ ish.
Budget Range: $2000
System Usage from Most to Least Important: VMs, Cross platform Development, Running way too much crap at once, mid-range multiplatform "gaming"...
Are you buying a monitor: I would prefer to.
Your Monitor Resolution: All are above in the "Background Information" section, I'd like to aim for another 1920 x 1080, 20" to 27" HDMI if I buy one. Would prefer another ViewSonic VX2835WM, (even if it's an ebay acquisition) -- just to have matched displays.
Parts to Upgrade: Everything, this will be a new build.
Do you need to buy OS: No, I have a premium MSDN subscription and have means to obtain all other required software and licenses legally outside of this budget.
Preferred Website(s) for Parts: You tell me. I've used newegg and amazon in the past.
Location: Redmond, WA USA
Parts Preferences: Intel -- but flexible.
Overclocking: Yes, absolutely, want to hit 5 GHz (4 GHz minimum).
SLI or Crossfire: No preference. Want to aim for the best mid-range and highest compatibility / support.
Additional Comments: Quieter is better, I've done fan-less video cards in the past in some of my builds -- but I'm willing to tolerate a little bit of noise to meet my performance / budgetary goals.
And Most Importantly, Why Are You Upgrading: because I can and I have budget to do so. -- Current machine is pretty awful at running VMs (bad IO throughput), and gets a bit loud at times (esp. under 100% CPU load, the fan really goes nuts), large projects take a long time to compile.
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